NEW YORK: Add another name to the list of celebrity children’s book writers: Whoopi Goldberg. She has agreed to a multi-book deal with Hyperion’s Jump at the Sun imprint, which specialises in releases by African-American writers. “If I can give kids and their parents something that’ll make them smile and maybe teaches them a little something about living with one another on our planet, it makes me a happy granny,” Goldberg said.

The first of several expected books is scheduled for 2005.

Other celebrities who have recently written children’s stories include Madonna, Jerry Seinfeld and Billy Crystal. Goldberg stars in the new NBC sitcom ‘Whoopi’ and also can be seen on Nick Jr’s ‘Whoopi’s Littleburg’. — AP