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Welcome to day four of Nancy Sanders’ 6-day NWFCC February Author Showcase tour.

Q: With your experience writing over 80 books, do you offer tips or strategies for other children’s writers to experience success?

A: My book, Yes! You Can Learn How to Write Children’s Books, Get Them Published, and Build a Successful Writing Career is chock-full of practical strategies and inside tips on how to experience success as a children’s writer. I share actual methods I’ve taken to experience success as well as strategies my writer friends take. To learn more about my book, children’s writers can visit its website at www.YesYouCanLearn.wordpress.com.

Q: What are other people saying about your book, Yes! You Can?

A: Here are just a couple of quotes people have told me about this book:

“I’m on Chapter 11 of your book. I love it! You have changed my whole approach to writing for children. By the end of Chapter 2, I started to try your methods. I landed a book contract that same week using your strategies! My whole critique group is buying your book now. I think you may be pioneering a new era. Thank you so much.”

-Jennifer

“Thanks to you & your book, Yes! You Can, I now have 2 national magazine articles scheduled for printing!”

-Betsy

“You know how you put those little boosters at the beginning and the end of each section…read on to see how to do it…and you can then reach for the stars…and ‘I’ll show you how’? It is amazing how much they really help me to keep going through the book, and to not give up.”

-Suz

Q: What words of advice would you like to share with wannabe children’s writers?

A: Always use three different strategies to meet three different goals. So many writers try to write one manuscript to meet all three different goals: get published, earn income, and experience personal fulfillment as a writer. I’ve found that this is a sure-fire recipe for frustration, fistfuls of rejection letters, and hardly any income. Instead, I recommend using a different strategy to meet each of those three goals.

From my experience, I encourage writers to write steadily for the no-pay/low-pay market to build up published credits. I recommend learning how to query widely and query well in order to start landing contracts to earn income while you write. And I always encourage writers to devote a small portion of each week to writing that manuscript they’re passionate about.

In other words, work on three different projects for three different goals. I’ve discovered this helps build up published credits, helps land contracts, and brings a treme

It's a real treat to have as my guest award-winning and extraordinarily prolific (she's written over 75 books, after all!) author Nancy I. Sanders. To promote the release of her latest children's book, America’s Black Founders, Nancy will be touring the blogosphere this week. On this the second day of her tour, Nancy talks about her book, her inspiration for it, the publishing process and her writing habits. I hope you'll enjoy the interview!

Hi, Nancy. It's great to have you here. I see you write a lot of nonfiction children's books about the African American culture? Can you tell us when and how your passion for this subject started?



The first book I wrote on the African American culture was A Kid’s Guide to African American History. It covers the entire history from the glorious kingdoms in Africa during the Middle Ages up to current events. After I was done with that book, I realized I was in a very unique position. I knew a vast amount of university-level information on this topic AND I was a children’s writer. I therefore made it my goal to share the info I had learned in as many formats and genre as I could to reach as many kids as possible. I wanted to share my discoveries with the world! So far I’ve had a trade picture book, a book of readers theatre plays for middle grade students, and a nonfiction activity book published, along with my current title America’s Black Founders. This spring will also see the release of my first middle grade novel and a nonfiction book of primary sources—all on the topic of African American history for kids.

Your latest book is AMERICA'S BLACK FOUNDERS. In a nutshell, what does the book offer kids, educators, librarians and parents?



My goal and desire with this book is to show today’s generation the faces of the amazing men and women who helped found our nation. My book is filled with portraits of America’s Black Founders, many of which were d

Hi all,

It's an honor to have as my guest tomorrow award-winning children's author Nancy Sanders. Sandy is the author of over 75 (yes, 75!) children's books.

I first learned about Nancy from the Children's Writers Coaching Club, where she's a writing teacher. Her teleclasses are just awesome and shock-full of information for both beginners and more experienced writers.

Her latest titles include Yes! You Can Learn How To Write Children's Books, Get Them Published, and Build a Successful Writing Career (I got a copy, it is FAB!) and America’s Black Founders.

In fact, to promote the release of this latest title, Sandy will be on a virtual blog tour this week.

Today she's over at National Writing For Children Center blog.

Don't miss my interview with her tomorrow here on Mayra's Secret Bookcase!

Today we kick off Black History month with an interview with Nancy I. Sanders, author of the new book America’s Black Founders.

This is also Day 1 of Nancy’s virtual tour for this book.

In the world of publishing, sometimes a publisher locates images and sometimes an author does. According to my contract with Chicago Review Press, the author is responsible for finding and paying for any image used in a book in their “For Kids” series. I had never done this before, so it was a brand new adventure. Here are some of the steps I went through to gather images and make this book the best it could be.

Explore: I set up a separate e-mail account to handle the contacts I made to collect the images. This made my search so much easier to track. Then I explored various ways to acquire the digital images my publisher required. I looked for the “photograph credits” listed in the books I was using as research. I discovered there are professional repositories of images that charge over a thousand dollars for use of one of their images in my book. I contacted large historical societies and discovered that they charge over $100 for use of one of their digitized images in my book. Small historical societies and state archives had smaller fees such as $10 to $35 per image. Some offered the use of their images for free. Since I also wanted to include images of a variety of historic sites, I went on Flickr.com and found that many generous individuals were willing to offer free use of their photographs at these sites in my book in exchange for a line of credit next to the image. I also went through my own photographs that I had taken sightseeing at various historic sites to see if any were good enough quality to use in my book. I was happy to discover that many were.

Budget: Since I had to pay for every image out of my own pocket, I made a priority list of images I wanted to include in my book. The more important, obscure images were at the top of my list and were ones that I was willing to pay more for permission to use. Any key images that were free, especially original documents or paintings from the 1700s and 1800s, were automatically slotted for use in my book. These included images from the Library of Congress that stated “No known restrictions on publication.” The images of lesser importance were carefully evaluated regarding their cost as to whether or not I decided to include them.

Permissions: Organizations usually had their own permission form for me to fill out and sign, and then they countersigned. Some organizations and most individuals didn’t, so I used a permissions form provided by the publisher for them to sign. To obtain permission

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There are all sorts of markets out there for your holiday and seasonal articles, but how do you find them? And how do you know which market to send your holiday or seasonal articles and stories to?

Find out the answers to these questions - and much MORE - during this week’s teleclass from the Children’s Writers’ Coaching Club. Nancy I. Sanders will talk about Writing for the Holiday and Seasonal Markets tomorrow, Thursday, December 3, 2009, at noon CST.

To register for this special teleclass go to www.getrealresources.com. If you can’t attend the LIVE class, don’t worry. On Friday, you’ll receive a link to the recording of this special event.

The lovely thing about the internet, and blogging in particular, is that it leads you down a wonderful path of discovery. This is also the dangerous part. When to stop! I found a cool ezine called Small Magazine. It's full of creative stuff, incredible photography, and some of the most beautiful children I've ever seen, except for my own kids, of course. From there I wandered off to new places. One of these was The Small Object by artist Sarah Neuburger, where I found the coolest accessory for the thumb wrestling crowd--thumb wrestling championship belts! Can you imagine?

Writing for Children:
I also wanted to mention Write4Kids. It's a great writing resource.
I'm very excited about Nancy Sanders' blog. She's doing a series called Book in a Month Club, as in actually writing the whole darn thing in one month!

International Illustrators:
I've been traveling via the internet this week and found some wonderful blogs, most of which are in Spanish. Some are in English, also. Looks like I need to learn a new language.
Claudia Degliuomini
Marta Chicote Juiz
Merce Lopez
Marlowa
Cara Carmina

And last, but not least, I discovered the lovely site of Amanda Soule. She's written a book called, The Creative Family. Her blog is so enjoyable and heartwarming and inspiring.