Wow! The Things I Learned!

This week I plan to devote my blogs to what I learned at the SCBWI conference.

First of all, I have to mention that we had the most beautiful snowfall on the day of the conference. Tulsa doesn't usually get snow in March, much less 6 inches! We beat the record by ten days and five inches. Wow! So, of course, since it IS Oklahoma it is now melted with only a few traces of snow remaining.
--Drat! the ground is too soft to do any of the gardening I have planned!

I really liked the way this SCBWI program was set up. We had six speakers who spoke for 45 minutes then we had a 15 minute break to get up, walk around, get coffee or use the restrooms. Throughout the day, they had a box for questions that would be used during the panel session at the end of the day. The moderator spent the second to the last session reading and organizing the questions. She was able to group similar questions together forming a question that composed all the questions. Very well organized!

Since this is a SCBWI conference, the I stands for illustrators. There was a separate room for illustrators to show their portfolio, their product. and there was a first and second place winner. In addition, the illustrators were able to hold a 'pitch' type session with the Simon & Schuster art director. I don't know if this was an extra charge for the illustrators, but talk about an opportunity!
--Just like the editor critique that I paid $30. Best money ever spent! I'll blog about it tomorrow.

Just like any genre, children's books have sub-genres, BUT within each sub-genre comes another set of sub-sub-genre. Yeah, it is very complicated because there are no real delineations between them. So how does a writer figure out where her work resides?

I had my epiphany during Kristin Daly's talk. An editor with Harper Collins, she talked about the role of Easy readers and chapter books. Many ER's and CB's feature a series character: Henry and Mudge, Amelia Bedelia, Junie B and Judy Moody. Some of these are CB's, but they are also Easy Readers. Same thing goes for picture books and easy readers. How do you tell the difference? Other than PB's being cut on larger sized paper?

Now, I think the editor will have the final say in this decision, but you have to know roughly where your work resides. Take my Peter books. I always thought they were picture books, but came to the conclusion they were really Easy Readers. It's a combination of many things: sentence structure, vocabulary, and identifying with character--read that as building a series. When I wrote them I envisioned children reading the story, BUT an adult can also read to the child. The words are simple, but there might be one or two the child would have to decipher within the context of the text or pictures.

Hopping around here: Half of the picture book story MUST be told within the illustrations. While the illustrations in Easy readers tend to confirm the written text.

And while we're at it, throw word count to the dogs. There is no place for it in these books. Some chapter books are as short as 500 words or as long as 15000 words, depending where they fall in the child's reading development. Children's books have to fall in a very structured book format, except the longer chapter books. Even the Magic Treehouse books fall into this category and they are beginning chapter books.
PB's, ER, and early CB's have to be 32 pages. Period. Which means you have to make each page count. If you thought adult readers were unforgiving, children are worse. Do NOT bore a child.

So this week I've taken five different books off my daughter's shelf and will be typing them into the computer. I plan to use single space, but will double space between the 'pages'. I want to visualize the rhythm, pattern, and pace of these published books before I edit my Peter stories. I think the Peter stories will do well, but I need to figure out the formatting and pacing before I send them to the editors and agent.

I now have the tools to improve my stories, and I intend to use them. We all know how stubborn I am about my writing, but to ignore this chance to improve my story would be stupid.

Write on!

Oklahoma's SCBWI Conference

On Saturday, I'm attending my first SCBWI conference. For those not in the know, SCBWI is the acronym of Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators. In Oklahoma they hold a conference every year, splitting each year between OKC and Tulsa. Yay! This year it's in Tulsa. I only have to go downtown for an all day seminar.

I also spent some extra bucks for a writing critique by one of the agents or editors. I sent in my first picture book story, Peter's Messy Room. Since then I've written a total of 8 Peter stories and I'm working on another PB along with a MG book.

To tell you the truth, I've been in a blue writing funk. I can't seem to write on ANY story, not even my adult UF. Ever since I entered Demon Within in a couple of writing contests, I'm stumped. What if I actually get some feedback that will help me figure it all out?

I think part of my problem is mental. Isn't it always? I know I'm going to get feedback on my pb, so why write something if I might actually get some constructive critsism? But I can tell you right now, I can almost guess exactly what the crit will be: Nice writing, but nothing special.

The story of my life. I've never excelled at anything. Oh, don't get me wrong, I've tried. I've tried all sorts of things, but I'm just not gifted at any one thing. And it's frustrating. I've trained horses, writing romance, teaching MT's and aerobics, and even my old career as a MT bench tech. I was good, efficient even if all my evaluations were true, but I didn't excel.

I'm just sick and tired of sucking at things. Hell, I can't even lose weight though I'm exercising my wazoo off at the moment. Damn plateaus.

Sorry, didn't mean for this to turn into a gritch session.

I am excited about meeting other writers and learning the secret handshake of children's book publishing, but I'm not holding my breath.
--that way I won't get disappointed.

I'll let you know how it went on Monday's blog.

Believe in your own BS

Normally, I don't post on Thursdays, but today is an exception.

My friend Cyndi is working on her pitch for the Nocturne Bites contest. She sent it to me last night and I made a few suggestions. But it seems her main problem lies in the names she's chosen for her worlds.

There are three levels in her world:

Underworld filled with demons,etc.
Otherworld with beings of special abilities
and, basically, Earth with humans.

Now, she also has different names for these worlds, BUT she still wants to use the 'underworld' connotation along with the other names. Subconsciously, I think she wants to help the reader 'get it'. As an avid reader of Paranormal romance and Urban Fantasy, I think this is the kiss of death--the author MUST believe in her world. The reader doesn't really exist, only the world does.

If the author is confident with her world, the reader will understand the world in the subtext. True, you will have to have a minor sentence somewhere that will 'tell' the reader, 'demons belong here', but if woven into the story effectively it won't jar the reader from the progessing story.

Believe in your story--it is the only way the reader will also believe.

Blood Magic

Good Morning, All!

I have to talk about Blood Magic, a book that I read while hubster drove across the bare, rolling hills of Colorado and Kansas as we drove home after our skiing vacation.

It's Blood Magic by Jennifer Lyon. She's a new-to-me author, but has an impressive backlist under the name Jennifer Apodaca.

I've been reading the Murder She Writes blog for quite awhile now, drawn to the blog by my online friend, Karin Tabke, and Jennifer was one of the original five authors who blogged. The MSW blog has now expanded ten marvelous women. Go visit, take a cuppa joe, and read some of the archives. Who knows? Maybe you'll discover a couple of New-To-You authors like I did!

Anyhoo, back to this wonderful book! I have to admit that it's been a long time since I've been this enthusiastic about a book, but Jen managed to pull me in from the get-go. Now, I'm not a 'real reviewer', so I'm going to post Amazon's product description of the story, since I KNOW I couldn't do it justice!

In the days when powerful witches used their magic to shield humanity from demons, their allies and guardians were a group of men gifted with preternatural abilities of their own–the witch guardians. But when a band of witches traded their humanity for demonic power, the ancient bond was broken, and the guardians became the hunters.

Darcy MacAlister knows nothing of demons or magic. But this beautiful young woman is about to discover the truth about her past . . . and her future. For she is a witch–not just any witch, but the key to breaking the curse that has plagued witches and the men who hunt them. For if a hunter kills an innocent witch by mistake, the price is no less than a piece of his soul.

Axel Locke, gorgeous leader of the Wing Slayer Hunters, has sworn never to shed the blood of the earth witches who have resisted the temptation of demonic power. But when his sister is cursed by a demon witch, he discovers that Darcy MacAlister may hold the cure–if she can master her newfound powers in time. When the chase begins and Axel and Darcy come face-to-face, this hunter must weigh his soul against his honor–and against his heart.

If you enjoy hot steam romance with a paranormal element, you will truly enjoy reading Jen's Blood Magic! Truly, thong-wetting! Go out and buy it today!

Uh, no, you can't borrow mine--it is ensconced in my keeper file as I anxiously await for Soul Magic to come out in November of '09! Plus Jen happily informed her Wing Slayer fanatics that she has a contract for two more books!

If you like looking at half-neeked hunks of maleness, wander over to her blog sometime and definitely take the time to stroll leisurely through her archives.

Write on!

Swooshing down the slopes

I’m back from skiing. Actually, we got back late Friday night, but I've had laundry to do, email to read, etc, PLUS we finally got our furniture that we've been waiting on for about six months! That story is also blog worthy, so when I find I'm dry of ideas to yatter on about I'll jot it down to fill up one of my days.

Back to Spring Break:
We had four wonderful days of swooshing down the slopes of Keystone, Breckenridge and Vail. Keystone is still my fave since I think it is the most challenging of the three. The intermediate slopes (blue) are as steep as many expert (black) runs. Many of the slopes are half groomed/half moguls, so it adds to the challenge. Vail is a close second for simply the sheer size of the place. I think it has 7 or 8 mountains/bowls to ski off—I’d verify it on the trail map, but hubster put it somewhere. And they have the most groomed black runs I’ve ever seen, though some of Keystone’s blue runs were along the difficulty and steepness factor as Vail’s black runs. Breckenridge is a really nice town, but the slopes are flat and freakin’ crowded, really freakin' crowded. Lift lines took anywhere from 10-30 minutes of waiting. And dodging a bunch of newbie skiers is low on my list of fun things to do. Ugh!

But the spring skiing was awesome. No, I was NOT the chick wearing shorts snowboarding! It was nice not to have to wear all the turtle fur to keep warm—and I have the sunburn/tan to prove it! And yes, I DID slather on sunscreen and still got toasted. Oh, BTW, Burt’s bees lip balm DOES NOT have any SPF factor at all and my lips look like a lizard shedding its skin. Purty, huh?

The kiddo did great after a weak start in the car. The night before we left she started complaining of a headache and ear ache. She's been fighting the cough that seems to be going around and coughing up lung puppies in the process. So, of course, the poor thang was puking in the car most of the way to the mountains—12.5 hours of it. Thank God, I always bring a small trash bag double lined with Wal-Mart bags! And the kiddo hit the bag every time! What a little trooper!

Rachel skied with us every day and kept up with only a couple of wipeouts and one face plant—there’s a reason kiddo’s wear helmets. The face plant happened on the first day when we were on Keystone's North Peak, skiing down Last Alamo. It's a fairly steep run, basically groomed icesince they hadn't gotten any fresh snow in awhile and the daily temps were in the 40's. She did a turn, but an edge caught, and down she went. Normally, on a beginner (green) run she would have stopped right there, but a steep blue--NOPE. She slid for about thirty feet before hubster got her stopped. Of course, she wanted to quit, but SORRY, not happening. We were in the middle of the run with no way out except down. After we got down it was time for a break and she wanted to quit. Surprise! We went to the front side of the mountain after that. But the next day at Breckenridge she got her confidence back.

We’ve discovered she likes skiing bumps (moguls). Too bad, neither hubster nor I can tolerate the bumps any more. The knees just can’t take it, so we tend to ski groomed stuff, unless we venture down a mogul blue by accident.

By the last day of skiing, the kiddo was going full tilt. Her cough seemed to have disappeared--until I looked at her eyes. Yep, conjunctivitis. Once we got home on Friday, I had some eye drops left from a couple of years ago and we doctored her up. Luckily there were enough drops to do the trick.

That's it for now. I'll talk about the books I read on Wednesday. I read one FANTASTIC book that I highly recommend.
Hope you all had a great Spring Break!
Write on! ---yeah, I need to get back into the saddle with that again!

Fuzzy Critters--Redo

I borrowed this topic from Kristen Nelson’s blog Pub Rants, and posted it on Pink Fuzzy Slippers blog. So I'm going to run it here--to fill in one of my days.

When I was growing up, I never had a pet, not even a fish or hamster. Dad didn’t like animals. Don’t know why, maybe it was because the house was already a zoo with nine of us kids running around. Anyhoo, when I turned sixteen I started working for a veterinarian. Someone had dropped off a Great Dane puppy for adoption, the owner lived in the apartment and he didn’t realize how large Great Dane’s got—uh, for general purposes here, Dude was a moron only an idiot would think a Dane was an apartment-sized dog—yes, I know people own Great Danes in New York City, but in Oklahoma? Come on. So, I brought Gretchen home, and she became one of the family until she died during my second semester of college.

I love animals. All animals, even the nasty wildcat that bit through my thick leather gloves. Currently, we have a small menagerie, consisting of fish, guinea pig, cat, and dog, though in the past we’ve had rabbits, hamsters, and horses.

And, yes, I do write animals in my stories. Doesn’t everyone?

Sometimes they are the invention of my imagination, like Inky, the scuttling shadow, or Ted, a Stitch-like six-legged creature from another universe. I’ve also written horses, dogs and cats into my stories. I’ve even written a picture book where the main character, a fly, has a pet aphid. Yeah, I like my critters. I think they give an additional dimension to my stories by way of characterization. The reader can learn a lot about your characters by the way they interact with our fuzzy/scaly friends.

Now, Pub Rants original blog post was basically in response to another blog post about the lack of characters in science fiction/futuristic/fantasies. I find this amazing considering how many writers DO write animals in their stories. They could be your basic dog, cat, or not. Here is a very small sampling:

1. Jim Butcher’s Dresden series—Mister the tomcat, and Mouse, the temple dog
2. Andre Norton & Robert A. Heinlein—cats
3. Jayne Castle’s (Jayne Ann Krentz) Harmony series has omnivorous dust bunnies (LOVE THEM!) Uh, a word to the wise, don’t get on their wrong side
4. Robin D. Owens has various critters throughout her Heart series
5. Johanna Lindsey had a futuristic with saber tooth’s as pet felines
6. Anne McCaffrey’s Pern series has fire lizards
And some movies:
1 Star Trek’s Tribbles—cute fuzzies, but bred faster than rabbits
2. Alien (#1) had an orange tabby cat Riley went back to rescue

I know I’ve missed tons of fuzzy critters, but these were the few examples I could think of off the top of my head.

So what’s your take on pets in novels? Love them? Hate them? Will always write some sort of critter into your story?

Spring Break!

This is spring break week.

And originally, this blog was going to go dark, but I decided that I'd write a few blogs in advance and auto post them.

Sorry, but I won't be able to respond to any of your comments this week. Though I will read them after I sort through the bazillion and one digests that I'll have to read and/or simply delete.

I love Spring Break, except that no matter where you go there will be crowds. Ugh!

We missed skiing last year, so this year we are going for four days! Woohoo!
Instead of putting the kiddo in ski school, she promised to ski with us without complaining. . . Yeah, I'll believe it when it happens, too! We still have the threat of ski school hanging over her head if she grips too much or doesn't listen to our instructions.

Personally, I think she'll do well. Two years ago we discovered that it works best if I lead the pack with the kid in the middle and hubster batting clean-up (he can pick her up when she falls down--I can't, she's too heavy). As skiers, we like to stick on the blue runs. Neither one of us are very adventurous on the black runs, unless they're groomed. Steeps are okay, just don't give me any freakin' bumps! My knees can't handle it! So she'll just follow my tracks with hubster batting clean up or pick up depending on how much snow the kiddo eats. Every now and then, I think hubster or I will break away to bomb a slope or two and then meet up again.

Now, all we have to do is get through the hell of driving 12 hours to Keystone. Talk about a butt-numbing experience. Seat heaters are a blessing especially if your lower back gets sore sitting, but then again the butt cheeks tend to get sweaty in the process.

Or is that TMI?

Ski on!