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Each year the SCBWI sponsors two student writer scholarships to the Summer and Winter Conferences for full-time university students in an English or Creative Writing program.

This is an invaluable opportunity for young writers! We are now accepting applications for the 2015 SCBWI Winter Conference in New York, February 6-8.

Award:

–Full tuition to main conference events including keynotes and breakout sessions. (Award does not include travel or hotel expenses.)

–Exclusive exposure to industry professionals at the conference.

–An SCBWI Conference advisor to help navigate the jammed-packed weekend.

PLUS:

NY Conference: Admission to the Writers’ Plot Intensive or Writers' Roundtables event.

Deadline: December 8, 2014

Eligibility:

1. You must be at least eighteen years old to apply.

2. All full-time students enrolled in an accredited educational institution are eligible to apply.

Guidelines:

One winner will be chosen from a graduate or doctoral program and one winner will be chosen from an undergraduate program.

Applicants are required to submit:

–Short cover letter stating why you want to attend the conference and a synopsis of your work.

–Five-page sample of a manuscript

–Copy of your student ID

–Letter of recommendation sent directly from a professor at your university.

Applications MUST BE electronically submitted as ONE PDF to:

kaylaDOTheinenATscbwiDOTorg (Change AT to @ and DOT to . )

Letters of recommendation can be sent separately as a Word document.

Applications will be judged by a panel decided by SCBWI.

In the event that a recipient cannot attend for any reason, the grant committee should be notified as soon as possible. The scholarship may, in that event, be awarded to another applicant. The grant is not transferrable and cannot be postponed. SCBWI reserves the right not to award the scholarship in any given year.

Questions? Contact the Grant Coordinator, Kayla Heinen

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Each year the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators sponsors two student writer scholarships to the Summer and Winter Conferences for full-time university students in an English or Creative Writing program.

Award:
–Full tuition to main conference events including keynotes and breakout sessions. (Award does not include travel or hotel expenses.)
–Exclusive exposure to industry professionals at the conference.
–An SCBWI Conference advisor to help navigate the jammed-packed weekend.
PLUS:
LA Summer Conference: An individual manuscript consultation of the first twenty pages of your manuscript with an industry professional and entrance to the Writers’ Intensive.

Eligibility:
1. You must be at least eighteen years old to apply.
2. All full-time students enrolled in an accredited educational institution are eligible to apply.

Guidelines:
One winner will be chosen from a graduate or doctoral program and one winner will be chosen from an undergraduate program.
Applicants are required to submit:
–Short cover letter stating why you want to attend the conference and a synopsis of your work.
–Five-page sample of a manuscript
–Copy of your student ID
–Letter of recommendation sent directly from a professor at your university.
Applications MUST BE electronically submitted as ONE PDF to:

kaylaDOTheinenATscbwiDOTorg (Change AT to @ and DOT to .)

Letters of recommendation can be sent separately as a Word document.
Applications will be judged by a panel decided by SCBWI.
In the event that a recipient cannot attend for any reason, the grant committee should be notified as soon as possible. The scholarship may, in that event, be awarded to another applicant. The grant is not transferrable and cannot be postponed. SCBWI reserves the right not to award the scholarship in any given year.

Deadline: April 15

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Let’s welcome Mindy Alyse Weiss back…she’s got the scoop from the recent SCBWI FL Conference. And boy, what a scoop it is! It’s chocolate fudge with rainbow sprinkles!

Ever wonder about an editor’s wish list? Wonder no longer! In the Editor Panel, Stacy Abrams, Kat Brzozowski, Aubrey Poole, Laura Whitaker and Andrea Pinkney discussed what kind of projects they’re seeking—and not seeking. There seems to be a trend away from dystopian and paranormal novels in YA.

Stacy Abrams, Executive Editorial Director of Bliss and Entangled Teen
Contemporary (no paranormal or dystopian). Can have an issue in it, but the book can’t be about the issue.

Kat Brzozowski, Associate Editor, Thomas Dunne Books, MacMillan
Dystopian is hard. Would love a good YA mystery. Comes across as loving dark but does love girl meets boy and they kiss, light romantic contemporary stuff for girls.
With social media, if you do one thing well but don’t like another, don’t force it.

Aubrey Poole, Associate Editor, Sourcebooks Jabberwocky and Fire
Loves sci fi, YA, not looking at genre really—it’s the stories that stand out within a genre. More experimenting with format. Read more about her wish list here.

Laura Whitaker, Associate Editor, Bloomsbury Children’s Books
She’s tired of dystopian and paranormal YA. She wants to be immersed in a story so much that she’s physically removed from her own issues. She wants to read about real people. Contemporary, original voice. With MG and YA, networking is important. Do a lot of digital marketing initiatives. You can get a huge impact from doing a blog tour. “Help me help you.”

Andrea Pinkney, Vice-President and Executive Editor, Scholastic
More diversity, African American boys, adventure, mystery, fun. Contemporary stories. *You need to normalize and not make it about the problem, even with something like bi-polar.” She’s interested in a novel with a character who has piercing or a lot of tattoos.

Besides writing a well-crafted story, how do you catch an editor’s attention? Laura Whitaker presented “Dating 101: What Makes YOU Desirable to an Editor”.

Tell her something interesting about your writing journey. What drew you to telling this story? Let her know any cool things you can share about yourself—show what makes you vibrant and unique.

Title—come up with something original that represents your work. If the title is the same when you’re published and there’s a story behind how you arrived at the title, marketing will want it later for a blog/Tumblr piece.

She’ll look at a query for 30 seconds to a minute. First thing should be the hook, then a two sentence synopsis (three if you have to), then info about yourself.

Your website is your calling card—especially for picture books.

Do you tweet out interesting, dynamic tweets? It’s the best way to build connections with other authors, agents, and editors. Twitter is more important for MG and YA.

Interact! Do you write about the process or what you’re working on? Marketing and publicity want to see your social media platform. The more social media, the better—but it is not a substitute for the craft.

Thanks again, Mindy!

Come back on Friday for the rest of the scoop from SCBWI FL. We’ll have vanilla and strawberry for those who don’t like chocolate. (Don’t like CHOCOLATE? Who are you people???)

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Ack! I see snow in my last blog entry--must get a new blog entry. Okay, so I could do a blog with lots of rain images, and how the rain makes our creative spirits grow, but right now, today, at 3:42 this lovely Tuesday afternoon, the sun is shining, and my red tulips in the front yard are just starting to peek out. (The brave white ones bloomed two days ago, even in the rain.)

So that is how it is with our writing too--some of the stories just huddle away in the quiet parts of our hearts until the sun shines on them enough to open them up to our conscious. But some of our best stories open out and flourish in the rain, even sometimes in the storms of life.

It's a good thing to remember for those of us who live in the Pacific Northwest!

May your stories bloom this week, both in the sunshine and in the rain.

Looking forward to seeing many of you at one of our favorite Story Blooming spots, the SCBWI conference in Redmond Town Center. Just three days to go!

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I was lucky enough to attend the SCBWI Carolinas conference this weekend-- with some of my fellow Secret Gardeners! (you know who you are)

Of course I drew some of the presenters--
pictured here (roughly sketched):
Alan Gratz, wonderful (local!) author
Liz Waniewski, Senior Editor, Dial Books
-- also awesome and sweet!
Alvina Ling, Senior Editor,
Little, Brown Books
-- so funny and smart (and prettier than my sketch!)

I would have drawn the talented and fun Elizabeth Dulemba or the charming and handsome Laurent Linn, Art Director at Simon & Schuster, BUT they kept showing us these fascinating images, so I had to keep my gaze upward...

BUT during the other presentations, sketching seemed unavoidable. Like crossing and uncrossing my legs. My hands seem to want to keep moving. It's almost annoying. And I worried about being distracting (or annoying) to other attendees.
(at least I stopped rattling my candy wrapper when you told me to, Donna!)

I don't want to be a compulsive person (she says, rolling and unrolling a scrap of paper) but maybe crazy-hands is part of being an artist. (horrors!)

hey, at least I'm not robbing banks.

How do you direct your crazy energy (when you're not at your computer/in your studio) Were you the one with the candy wrapper sitting right behind me? Don't worry; I understand.

apologies for not doing that linking thing w/ everyone's name-- can someone tell me how to? You definitely should check out Alan Gratz's great books!

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Just received an email about the 2010 SCBWI conference in Los Angeles and I am thrilled to be joining other RAs Chris Eboch, Sue Ford and Alexis O'Neill on Faculty.
The link to the Summer Conference is here and to the programme.
Registrations begin in a few hours time!!

The 39th Annual SCBWI International Summer Conference features 4 days of agents, editors, publishers, workshps and networking designed to take your writing and illustration to the next level. From individual consultations on your manuscript or portfolio with an editor or agent, to keynotes and targeted workshops from best-selling writers and illustrators, the SCBWI Summer Conference gives you the opportunity to focus on honing your craft while networking with industry decision-makers

I will pop up notes in the next short while (read that as sometime soon) as I skim the programme.

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One week ago Saturday, I stepped into a Story Garden. Immediately, like magic, roots grew down into the ground, connecting me to a rich substrata of writers, editors, agents, all with amazing stories to tell. As I wandered the Story Garden (known to some as the SCBWI Western Washington Writing and Illustrating for Children Conference) flowers of every sort shot up out of the ground at my very feet. I watched with amazement as one particularly bright colored blossom (Genus Lainius taylorus, fuschia petals, quite lovely) began to speak. Wondrous tales of a circus troupe within her very being, struggling to emerge, wove a spell around all of us in the Story Garden, prompting great excitement at the possibilities for each of us, ready to bring forth our own fruit.

As the day wore on, and we were watered, fertilized and shone upon by Master Gardeners Jay Asher, Peter Brown, Edward Necalsulmer IV, Jordan Brown, Lisa Graff, Paul Rodeen, Michael Bourret, Sara Crowe, and so many others--voila! We bore fruit. Many of us scurried to secret corners, to quickly capture those first buds of a new story, the tentative tendrils of a plot twist.

No garden is quite complete without a Garden Gnome, and by early afternoon, our very own gnome appeared (see above), cheering us on, giving bits of writing advice to each of us who captured him before he disappeared back into his own hidden garden, once again to write.

And now each of us have returned to our own secret gardens, treasuring all we brought back from that magical weekend, seeding our own stories to bloom in due time.

Watch our gardens grow!

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"No new posts" I was asked.
"Are you away?" I was emailed.
No was the answer. It was just that last week was a very busy week ... and also I wanted to leave PaperTigers and their new project at the front of the blog for just a tad longer.

Much of last week was spent involved in the BUSINESS of writing and tied up in meetings, with:-
* Linsay, my wonderful publisher, sorting out new writing projects for me to sink my teeth into;
* a colleague from Goulburn with whom I am working on an animation project; Me writing an animation you ponder ... well I never throught that I would write a libretto either ... but i have!
* my web designer - yes, the website for Pa' Christmas Star is underway. That will be live later in March and people will be able to download the complete package for the musical and then come Christmas 2010 (oh yes we are already planning for that) we hope that somewhere in the world the musical will be staged.
* finalising a few SCBWI projects (annual reports, inaugural voting awards, organising our 3rd international SCBWI Australia and New Zealand conference) too ...
* and finishing off creating the book trailer for the marketing collective of SCBWI folks ... just in time for the USA summer holidays! Need a Good Book to Read These Holidays?

Yes ... it was a busy business week.

More will be posted on these over the next few days.

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Our Western Washington SCBWI conference is two weeks in the past now, and still some of the wonderful snippets of wisdom and tantalizing tips stick in my mind, and continue to to nourish me.

I'll not forget Nina Laden (ROMEOW AND DROOLIET) reminding us, "If you don't make mistakes, you may not make anything."

And Deb Lund (MONSTERS ON MACHINES) reading her unforgettable poem about that inner voice that harasses us as we write, and summing it up by telling us, "Sometimes we have to revise our own story, that story we tell ourselves."

Krista Marino, Senior Editor at Delacorte, reminded us to take cute out of our dictionary, when talking about children's books.

Nathan Bransford (Agent, Curtis Brown Ltd.) gave us his pet peeves for story beginnings: Don't start your book with

• the weather
• your character waking up
• looking in the mirror
• sarcastic characters (too flip and negative)

Steven Malk (Agent, Writer's House) says it's great to be aware of trends, but don't write to them.
He also advised us to be nice to everyone, not only because it's the right thing to do, but also because you never know when that editorial assistant may become the Senior Editor.

Kelly Sonnack (Agent, Andrea Brown Literary) told us to avoid

• forced pace-building (suddenly, quickly, at that moment)
• copious tears (only one tear per story)
• faces draining white or blushing
• exclamation points!

Justina Chen (NORTH OF BEAUTIFUL) encouraged us to "say yes to the emotional truths of your heart."

And Sundee Frazier (BRENDAN BUCKLEY'S UNIVERSE AND EVERYTHING IN IT) told us she has to write, that she cannot deny that creative part of her being. "I could not deny the One who created me."

I've offered just a few nibbles of that wonderful feast that was spread before us at our unforgettable Feed Your Genius conference. Now fully fueled, it's back to work. Happy writing, everyone!

Picture above: Some of my favorite people in the whole world--Molly Blaisdell, Janet Lee Carey, me, Katherine Grace Bond, Holly Cupala, all members of our Diviner Writing Group, all of us enjoying the Conference Feast

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SCBWI Summer Annual Conference Info Now Up on scbwi.org...


Registration doesn't open until May 5, but you can get a peak at the SCBWI Annual Summer Conference faculty, schedule and info now on scbwi.org (click on "Summer Conference.") The event will take place August 7-10 at the Hyatt Recency Century Plaza.

Keynote speakers for the L.A. event include Ingrid Law, Betty Birney, Karen Cushman, Sherman Alexie, Ellen Hopkins, Holly Black, Dan Yaccarino, David Wiesner and Kathleen Duey. Plus there's a host of authors, illustrators, agents and editors (including yours truly) on the faculty.

SCBWI TEAM BLOG Coverage!

Between now and the August event look for exclusive interviews with keynote speakers, Golden Kite winners, and conference faculty, along with other fun and informative conference posts, here and on all the SCBWI TEAM BLOGgers blogs. TEAM BLOG includes Jaime Temairik, Jolie Stekly, Lee Wind, Paula Yoo, Suzanne Young and me. (See the SCBWI TEAM BLOG roll at right.) Whenever a TEAM member offers a conference post, I'll give you a link.

And don't forget--during conference time SCBWI TEAM BLOG will live blog the event. If you're not attending, you can follow our play by play. If you'll be there, you can read about all the sessions you don't attend. And much more.

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I'll Be Live Blogging from the SCBWI Conference in New York!...

Right now I'm in my second day of being held hostage in my house by snow and ice. But it's stopped snowing, and I'm sure the snow emergency will be lifted tomorrow. And I'm assuming everyone at the Greater Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport is working really hard on the runways so I will have no trouble or delay for my trip to New York on Friday.

Yep--Friday I'm headed to NYC for the SCBWI Annual Winter Conference and I'll be serving as SCBWI's Official Blogger from the conference floor! I'll have my laptop and my iPhone and I'll be keeping you abreast of all the conference happenings throughout Saturday and Sunday. (I get in Friday afternoon, so I'll offer a few Friday posts as well.)

Here's where you can my find SCBWI conference news as it happens:

• For my SCBWI conference reports, visit the as-yet-unpopulated SCBWI conference blog. (I'm going to work on that next.)
  
• You can follow SCBWI on Twitter for some quick and dirty updates.
  
• You can follow me on Twitter for those I'm-totally-in-the-elevator-with-Richard-Peck tweets as well as some scoopage from the Friday night VIP party during which I will mingle with Very Important publishing peeps and tweet anything noteworthy.
  
• And if you're on facebook, you can join the Fans of SCBWI group and follow the status updates.

It will be almost as if you're all there in person!

(Now I'm off to plan my outfits.)

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So, remember how I told you I was going to be teaching a creative writing class at the Brandywine YMCA starting this January? Well, registration for Y members opened this week, and open registration begins next week. Here are the details:

ADULT FICTION WRITING WORKSHOP

Calling all closet writers! Dust off your manuscripts and bring them to class. We'll discuss the craft of creative writing and workshop your short stories and novel excerpts (no poetry, please). Want to try your hand at writing, but have nothing prepared? We will also do weekly writing exercises to help you get those juices flowing - and get your ideas onto the page! Our instructor is award-winning young adult novelist Lara Zeises, whose novel True Confessions of a Hollywood Starlet (written under her pseudonym Lola Douglas) was recently made into a Lifetime television movie. Class is limited to 10 students.

Day/Time: Mon 01/12/09 - 2/18/09 7:00-8:00 pm
Fees: Full Members $48 / Program Members + Public $54

You can find the rest of the registration information here.

Registration also opened this week for the SCBWI of Eastern PA's 17th Annual Pocono Mountain Retreat, which will be held at the lovely Shawnee Inn and Golf Resort from April 3-5, 2009. This year's theme is "Inspire the Fire." I'm so excited, because I've heard such wonderful things about this conference over the years, and not only do I get to attend, but I'm going to be the keynote speaker for Friday night! The workshops look fabulous, too - I'm especially interested in Verla Kay's one on creating a web site that works for you, because I almost feel like in this day and age, the author web site is dead. I mean, it's really more about the blog and the Facebook page and the Twitter updates, isn't it? All of which overwhelm me on a regular basis.

On an unrelated note: Thankfully, the unrelenting rain has finally (!) moved on out. My head feels like it weighs a thousand pounds, and my sinuses are like, "Hi, we feel like size 10 feet shoved into size 6 shoes. How's it going?" Oy.

Happy weekend, everyone!

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Namrata Tripathi Moving to Atheneum...

Just read this on Anastasia Suen's Children's Book Biz News blog (which you all should bookmark):

Namrata Tripathi, currently Senior Editor at Disney/Hyperion, will move to Atheneum as Executive Editor in December.

Here's a little on Namrata from my August SCBWI conference post about a panel she participated in with other emerging editorial voices:

Namrata Tripathi describes herself as part analytical and part nurturing. She works on picture books through YA fiction and describes her style as eclectic/literary. She learned from Brenda Bowen that “interesting people make interesting editors.” Her interests are varied, including picture books, nonfiction, fiction, and funny, quirky, truthful, and heartbreaking all appeal to her.

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A new part of the Midsouth SCBWI conference this year was a poster contest for children's book art. The conference faculty (including an art director from Greenwillow, an editor from Abrams, and Harold Underdown) chose the one that they felt looked most like the cover of a children's book and mine won. How exciting is that!

If I had used a piece of artwork that I had in my portfolio last year at this time, I don't think I would've won. This past year I've grown a lot in my art, and I contribute the starting point of that growth to portfolio critiques from a number of art directors at SCBWI conferences this past year. Each critique pointed out small changes I should make to bring my art to a new level.

There were a lot of beautiful illustrations at the conference this year. Those of us who had attended last year's conference and had met with the Art Director, Laurent Linn, have greatly improved our portfolios based on his articulate suggestions. I think it's so important to get your portfolio critiqued by Art Directors as often as you can.

It's easy for illustrators to stay so stuck in the same way of drawing and painting and composing scenes just because they've sold some artwork. I want to grow as an artist. I want my newest work to always be my best work - but that takes being open to suggestions from others, especially Art Directors, and not getting defensive about my work. Then putting in a lot of hard work to implement those changes. When you look over your portfolio, do you have old pieces in there because they're better or the same quality as your newest work? Are you always striving to bring your artwork up to a new level?

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This Blogging Daily Thing...

The thing about me and blogging every day is that I'm not always great at planning posts ahead of time. I saw Cynthia Leitich Smith talk at the SCBWI Conference last year and she mentioned that she has, like, a bajillion non-time-sensitive posts on deck in case she doesn't have time to do something fresh. I'm not sure she ever sleeps. Do you other bloggers out there do this? (I refer to the planning ahead thing, not the never sleeping thing.)

It's fun for me when I'm getting my CWIM newsletter together--I know I'll have a few posts to go along with it. (My October newsletter will include my Debut Author of the Month along with an editor interview and the long versions of both of will be posted here.) And later this week I'd like to get a few new CWIM book publisher listings posted here as well. (My assistant Fharris is hard at work getting a few together for you.)

There are also many days where, when I get to the office, I feel like I'll have nothing to blog about, then ten things pop into my head and/or inbox through the course of the day. Today, for example, it was my turn to post on Farmers & Writers. Having a Monday slot is sometimes tough. But I was inspired this morning by my lack of a spam filter and wrote a post with help from the spammers who continually spewed crap into my inbox every few seconds as I wrote.

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My Last SCBWI Conference Post...


Wrapping things up...


Speakers Who Made Me Cry:

• Bruce Coville on the first day in his opening speech
  
• Yuyi Morales during her Golden Kite acceptance speech and during the SCBWI Success Stories panel
• Sara Pennypacker during her Golden Kite acceptance speech (for the second year in a row)
• The tribute to Sue Alexander
• Susan Patron in her conference-closing address

(Note: No one has yet to beat readergirlz's Justina Chen Headley who made me tear up a dozen times during one breakout session in 2006.)


Hours of Sleep I Got During My Five Nights in LA:

• Twenty-eight
  

Things I Really Dug About My Conference Experience:

• The first person I ran into was my oldest conference pal, illustrator Kevan Atteberry
  
• Gretchen Hirsch introducing herself as Stephanie Meyer at the faculty dinner
  
• The steel cut oatmeal at the Breeze, and seeing Arturo the long-time host who always remembers my name
• The Literary Ladybugs
• “Reading Is Power” red rubber bracelets (with graphics that could possibly be interpreted as “Dreidel Equals Muscles”)
• Steve Malk’s party at Equator Books in Venice, even though I left before Nicholas Brendan got there
• Hundreds of people eating Dove ice cream bars outside the ballroom
• Being saved from technical difficulties by audience members
• Riding in Aaron Hartzler’s pickup truck
• Yoga class and dinner with Martha Brockenbrough from Washington (who has a daughter named Alice which I find brilliant)
  
• My one celebrity siting: Jami Gertz (best role: Muffy Tepperman in "Square Pegs")
• Having my photo taken by Sonya Sones
• Getting my photo taken with Lisa Yee’s Peepy
  
• Micheal Stearns' chart that explains the entire publishing industry using a few overlapping circles
• Autographing and cupcakes
• Scoring an SCBWI hoodie
• Chatting with everyone at the wrap party at Lin Oliver's house (even though the food wasn't super vegetarian-friendly)
  
• Discovering that Paula Yoo loves Skyline Chili, the official favorite food of the Nati
  
• Being on the faculty
• Lin Oliver ending the conference in a fit of giggles after announcing someone lost a shoe ornament
  

Things I Didn’t Dig About the Conference:

• The 2009 CWIM didn’t show up for the bookstore
• The gaping hole in the lobby bar that used to be filled by Darlene the (former) Century Plaza cocktail waitress
  
• The X Bar (especially because they stopped serving the awesome onion rings they used to have on the menu)
• The oddly bright red veggie burger I ate a few bites of at Houston's in the mall (my dinner companions, however, were stellar)
  
• Leaving--and the hell that is LAX. (I apologize to the woman at the Delta check-in counter with whom I had some angry words. Next time you wait on four people who came up after me because they can't figure out how to use the kiosk and you make me stand there for 10 minutes in that hot crowed space when I haven't gotten much sleep I'll try to be a little more patient.)

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Emerging Editorial Voices Panel…

The last day of the SCBWI conference opened with a great panel of emerging editors, featuring four editors relatively new to the industry—Nancy Consescu of Little, Brown; Amalia Ellison of Abrams; Gretchen Hirsch of HarperCollins; and Namrata Tripathi of Hyperion/Jump at the Sun.

Krista Marino of Random House moderated, and opened by saying that, just as each writer has her own voice, each editor has her own unique voice in terms of what she acquires and how she acquires. Publishing, she said, is an industry based on apprenticeship. Editors start as editorial assistant (honing their Xeroxing and mailing skills), all the while learning from their mentors who pass their philosophies onto them.

Gretchen Hirsch include Allyn Johnston and Liz Van Doren among her mentors, and she currently works under Farrin Jacobs at Harper. She said she’s learned different skills from each of her mentors. She signed up two picture book authors at a recent regional SCBWI conference. She learned from Allyn Johnston that even when you think you’re done working on a book, you might not quite be there. She’s interested in smart teen chick lit, paranormal YA, and offbeat picture books. She said Harper is currently growing their picture book list. Books about dogs are an interest.

Amalia Ellison started as an intern at Scholastic before moving to Random House and now Abrams. She’s been working in publishing for three years and describes her interests as eclectic/commercial. She feels that writers should be really plugged into what kids are into—it’s valuable in abstract ways. She’s just recently completed her fist acquisition which was through an auction. She’s interested in “just something good.”

Namrata Tripathi describes herself as part analytical and part nurturing. She works on picture books through YA fiction and describes her style as eclectic/literary. She learned from Brenda Bowen that “interesting people make interesting editors.” Here interests are varied, including picture books, nonfiction, fiction and funny, quirky, truthful, and heartbreaking all appeal to her.

Nancy Conescu started working on paperbacks at Penguin then mass market books. Now she’s at Little, Brown working with Andrea Spooner, Liza Baker and Megan Tingley. She favors books that are ultimately somehow hopeful when it comes to fiction, and irreverent when it comes to picture books. She sometimes finds new talent (illustrators) online in places like blogs or etsy.com. She’s interested in a strong chapter book voice, which she says is missing on her list.

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My Session #2: Keeping Current Roundtable...

After the agent panel, I had a breakout session that was part of the Published Authors track called Keeping Current on Market Research: A Roundtable Discussion. Instead of doing all the talking myself, I started by asking the audience questions. I wanted to know whether they do anything different in terms of market research now that they're published. I wanted to know what their concerns are. And I wanted them to share information with one another--and they did. The audiences included several SCBWI RAs and authors like Susan Patron, Linda Joy Singleton, and Verla Kay.

Verla talked about the boards on her website that registered members can access, such as the agent boards and response time boards--really useful stuff.

We actually ended up talking a lot about promotion. We discussed MySpace and using it as a means to connect with readers. We talked about getting mentioned on blogs and doing blog tours, and in fact had an author in the audience, Tina Nichols Coury, who interviews tons of authors and illustrators on her own blog.

Someone mentioned Library Thing, a site where you can enter books and be connected to others based on the books you share--a way to find readers reading your own books.

I really enjoyed this session and felt like I learned a lot from the participants and got some ideas for CWIM. Thanks to all who attended and share information and asked great questions. Please remember to email me if you'd like a handout.

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This Morning....

I wish that I drank coffee.

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Saturday Morning Panel: Today in Children's Publishing...

Since I stayed up past two a.m. last night, I didn't make it to the first morning ballroom session on picture books with Arthur Levine, but I did end up having a serendipitious breakfast with illustrator Melanie Hope Greenberg (who was sporting some great temporary tattoos of mermaids in support of her book Mermaids in Parade) and we talked about picture books, so I kept to the morning theme.

After some sub-par $8 oatmeal, I made it to the Today in Children's Publishing panel featuring Brenda Bowen of The Bowen Press and Walden Pond Press, Debra Dorfman of Scholastic, David Gale of Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, Dianne Hess of Blue Sky and Scholastic Press, Elizabeth Law of Egmont Books USA, and Allyn Johnston of S&S imprint Beach Lane Books. (Interesting to note the the majority of the panel have recently taken on their current positions and several--Bowen Press, Egmont and Beach Lane--are brand new imprints.)

Lin Oliver moderated the panel. One question she asked was What's different now in the industry--what defines children's publishing today?

Here's a little from each panelist:

David Gale: He said publishing now is more complicated and kind of schizophrenic, without rules. The picture book market is still soft. The cost of producing a book is more challenging--tighter P/Ls--it's more difficult to make books earn money on paper when they are trying to get them approved. There's a lot of contradiction, and publishing a book is more of a gamble than ever.

Elizabeth Law: She discussed the fact that a company is always looking for more growth and more cash. And with higher numbers come more pressure.

Dianne Hess: She said marketing is at the forefront of publishing now.

Debra Dorfman: She talked about mass market accounts (Toys'R'Us, Wal-Mart) trying to dictate to them what they should be publishing as well as designs for products and price points.

Brenda Bowen: She said everyone can get their material out there now--as opposed to 10 years ago--via the Internet.

Allyn Johnston: She said, during her days at Harcourt, everything was lumped together in terms of sales. Now, at her new imprint, she feels like there's a spotlight on the outstanding expenses and the pressures on e to sell when their debut list materializes.

Lin Oliver asked if publishers track what's going on online--and they definitely do. They all talked about ways their companies are trying to attract kids to books online, create book projects with interactive elements, finding readers on MySpace, etc. Social networking sites are definitely on publishers' radar it seems.

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Can’t go to the 37th Annual Summer SCBWI conference this year? Yeah, I can’t either; I just can’t afford the air flight, hotel, etc. Well, we’re in luck, because Alice Pope, editor of the Children’s Writer’s & Illustrator’s Market, will be covering the conference on her blog.

The conference is from August 1-4 in Los Angeles, CA. Pope will report on all the sessions she attends, the people she meets, the portfolio event, the parties and schmooze opportunities, and maybe even some things she overhears.

I’m sure there’ll be other people blogging about the conference, too. Know someone who will be? Or you’ve written a blog post yourself? Let me know and I’ll update this post.

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Registration for SCBWI LA Is Open...


Today is the first day to register for the 37th Annual SCBWI Summer Conference in L.A.! So beat the crowd and click over to www.scbwi.org to sign up. You can also check out the faculty and read about the sessions. And guess who's presenting? It's your favorite CWIM editor! (Finally, I won't have to crash the after party.)

(Speaking of parties, the theme for the annual Saturday poolside is Paint the Town Red. I've got to start planning my outfit.)

Here are all the presenters in random order (it's quite a list):

Katherine Applegate
Sid Fleischman
Krista Marino
Namrata Tripathi
Jay Asher
David Gale
Mark McVeigh
Lisa Yee
Bonnie Bader
Melanie Hope Greenberg
Stephen Mooser
Paula Yoo
Tracy Barrett
Judy Goldschmidt
Yuyi Morales
Cecilia Yung
Ann Bausum
Margaret Peterson Haddix
Diane Muldrow
Linda Zuckerman
Michael Bourret
Dianne Hess
Lin Oliver
Brenda Bowen
Gretchen Hirsch
Susan Patron
Donna Bray
Mac McCool (aka Christian Hill)
Ann Whitford Paul
Christopher Cheng
Allyn Johnston
Sara Pennypacker
Rachel Cohn
Alan Katz
Alice Pope
Nancy Conescu
David LaRochelle
Laura Rennert
Bruce Coville
Elizabeth Law
Adam Rex
Suzanne Cruise
Arthur A. Levine
John Rocco
Debra Dorfman
Laurent Linn
Abigail Samoun
Amalia Ellison
Dorothy Love
Michael Stearns
Connie C. Epstein
Steven Malk
Julie Strauss-Gabel
Dilys Evans
Leonard Marcus
Mark Teague

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I must be on a type kick lately. Very cool the way it's used in this video-- easy to sing along whether you speak Spanish or not. (The title means I don't know what to do with myself anymore. Hmmm... ever have days like that?) The band is from Uruguay.

This afternoon I'm off to the New England SCBWI conference in New Hampshire! They're having a lot of great workshops and speakers this year-- I'll post about it next week.

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What People Are Saying About the Recent SCBWI New York Conference...

In my recent newsletter (click here to subscribe), I asked to hear from writers and illustrators who attended the SCBWI Mid-Winter Conference which took place in New York February 8-10. I was not able to attend so this was my way to live vicariously through those of you would did.

These bloggers alerted me to their posts about the conference: Kristi Valiant; Mary Cronin; Donna McDine; and Darcy Pattision whose blog includes links to other attendees conference reports.

I'm keeping me fingers crossed that I'll get to attend the SCBWI Conference in LA this summer.
If I do, I'll be blogging like mad, just as I have the past two years. (See my August 2007 and August 2006 archives if you're interested. I just now relived the last conference as I read through my old post. It was lovely to think about being in sunny Los Angeles, abuzz with children's book people, instead of here in cold, snowy, icy Cincinnati.)

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