To many parents in China, picture books are considered must-reads for their children. From importing from Western countries to increasing domestic production, Chinese publishers and authors have been exploring and improving.  

Poplar Kid's Republic is one of Beijing's oldest picture book stores. It's been selling children's favorites for 14 years in the city's downtown area and has witnessed the notable development of the industry over the past few years. 

"When our bookstore opened up more than a decade ago, we hardly had any visitors," said Yang Peng, director of the bookshop. "But now, the rooms are usually full, especially during weekends. Sometimes three generations in a family come together. More and more parents realize the importance of reading to their kids, and Poplar seems to be a good place to do so."

Not just a bookstore, Poplar is also a publisher. Its first motivation to publish China's own picture books came from its staff members' visits to international book fairs more than a decade ago. 

They were surprised at the quality of the Western picture books and imported some of them as a first step. 

"The big volume of imports from the West at the beginning of the 21 century has changed the reading habits of many Chinese kids. Picture books become popular again. It has also boosted the development of domestic originals," said Wang Zhigeng, director of the Children's Library of the National Library of China. 

Poplar is among the first group of publishers that decided to create China's own picture books. But they encountered obstacles at first. 

"The biggest challenge we had was that writers, even some famous writers, didn't know how to organize scripts for children, or how to make the story simple and funny at the same time," said Zhang Donghui, general manager of the Beijing Poplar Culture Project Co., Ltd. "Painters had the same problem. They might have already been quite successful artists, but they still found it hard to draw pictures for kids in the years when we first started up."

Later on, the publisher tried to figure out the reading habits and interests of Chinese children by publishing several originals each year and importing some foreign best sellers at the same time. The feedback in the bookstore has helped a lot, and original Chinese works have started to become popular in recent years. 

The bookshop's staff said they usually see surprising expressions on the young readers' faces when they turn to a new page. They are attracted by either old legends or new tales, something warm or something sad, any well-organized story. Trying to tell stories creatively is something picture book creators are still doing and doing it even better.