Five Things I Learned from Heather Brewer's Book Signing...

I attend a lot of author events because, well, I love to meet authors. Most recently I saw Heather Brewer, author of the best-selling Chronicles of Vladimir Tod series, doing a signing at my local B&N to support the release of book #4 in the series, ELEVENTH GRADE BURNS. This was a particularly fun author event for me (more on that below) and Heather did a terrific job addressing her young (and not so young) audience about her writing career and her books and her characters. Here are a few things we learned:

1) Give yourself permission to write.
Not to get all Nike on you, but if you want a career as a writer, it's not going to happen unless you just do it. Although it was something Heather longed for for years, she was told by parents and even her beloved librarians that being an author wasn't really an option and she'd need a "real job." Finally, she said, after her youngest child started school, she discussed her career options with her spouse. What would you do, he asked her, if money didn't matter and you could do whatever you wanted? I want to be an author, she told him. Then do it, he said. (She proceeded to write, find an agent, get a book contract, and hit high on the New York Times Bestseller List.) It's OK to give yourself permission to follow your dream. But if it takes a supportive, encouraging significant other, that's OK too.

2) Goal setting is important.
Heather's Brewer's formula: butt + chair = writing. Even when she's on tour she writes 1,000 words a day. Books don't write themselves, after all. So, again, just do it.

3) Mine the painful stuff for material.
Heather told the bookstore audience about growing up in a small town where she felt like an outcast and was bullied. (Except when she spent time in the library. "Bullies don't know there is a library," she said.) She calls upon these experiences as she writes her main character, Vladimir Tod. Because, really, who's more of an outcast than a vampire in junior high?

Heather Brewer's Chronicles of Vladimir Tod books.

4) Boys read.
And they come to author events. There were a lot of them and they were excited. I sat next to kid named Nick who talked my arm off about the books and characters he loved. (I asked him what grade he was in. "Sixth," he told me. Then he looked at me, paused, and said," You're not in any grade, are you?") Another boy raised his hand during the Q&A and when called on he was so nervous he couldn't remember his question. (He did later, then asked several more.) Another boy who seemed kind of shy was in front of me in the singing line. With his head slightly lowered he spent several minutes giving Heather a synopsis of the story he wants to get published (which sounded really cool). These boys love books.

5) Authors are rock stars.
OMG. The kids LOVE Heather. Love love love. A heard a few of them say they'd been there for hours because they wanted good seats. A couple of girls with hair dyed unnatural colors said they wanted to high five Heather and never wash their hands again. Four girls drove in from Michigan. (That's far.) One girl took a photo with the author, ran next door to Kinkos and got an 8x10 printed and came back to get it signed. And they were asking questions, thoughtful ones that could have only come from devoted fans. Tons of them wore vampire smiley face apparel. It was the best, most enthusiastic bunch of slightly awkward, slightly pimply, hoodie-wearing tween fans I'd ever seen. I wanted to take them all home with me. But I bet they all wanted to go home with Heather Brewer.

Heather Brewer at the signing table.

Crawling Out From Under Snowpocalypse & Being Lost in a Good Book...

If you don't live around here, I'm sure you've all seen the news of the recent enormous snowfall dumping on hunks of the country. In case you missed them on my Facebook page, here are a few pictures I took through the windows of my warm house, most likely while wearing a Snuggie.




Because of the snowiness, I was pretty much stuck in the house for FOUR SOLID DAYS. Me, Katkin, the boy, the elderly cat, and a dwindling supply of cereal and canned goods. But instead of watching the Olympics, I engaged in a few glorious days of all-in reading.

A friend recommended Kathryn Stockett's debut novel THE HELP (note: a book for grown-ups) and once I got into it, I was gone. I neglected my family. I ate very little. I wore pajamas. There was no showering. I read chapters out loud and copied down my favorite lines. And when I finally finished it at 3:15 AM on Monday I sat weeping on my sofa. Sigh.

Several times a year I'm completely consumed by a book this way. Nothing exists but me, the characters and their world. And when I read the last page and close the cover, it's as if I'm leaving a lover after a secret weekend in a hotel room. There has been very little sleeping. Scenes linger in my thoughts for weeks. And I wish I could go back and experience it anew.

I am now clean, well-rested and back at my desk. I've loaned the book to another friend and ordered her to start reading so we can discuss. And I'm looking forward to the next snowstorm or airplane ride or day when I suddenly have a few hours and a gem. (Your recommendations are welcome.)

Some Monday Fun: Author Erin Dealey Raps on Writing...

Check out Erin Dealey's Writer's Rap featuring a guest appearance by SCBWI and a cameo by the 2010 CWIM. And remember: Ya gotta have a hook.

DBW, SCBWI, My Webinar & WD Intensives...

I've been gone for more than a week, so I've got so much to talk about!

DBW & SCBWI
I got back from New York last night after attending both Digital Book World and the SCBWI Annual Winter conference. I hope you all were following the tweets (#dbw, #scbwiny10) and the SCBWI Conference Blog. (Mega kudos for my amazing TEAM BLOGgers Jaime, Jolie, Lee and Suzanne.)

TEAM BLOG, l to r: Lee Wind, Suzanne Young, Jaime Temairik, me, Jolie Stekly

One of the sessions I attended at DBW was on Digital Content and Marketing for the Born-Digital Generation. I wrote about it for DBW so click over to read about the cool and successful things Simon & Schuster, Harper and Scholastic are doing to reach out to their young, tech-savvy audience. Agent Holly Root of Waxman Literary also participated in the panel. She offered this advice to writers: "Reach readers, navigate the changing review landscape, use social media to its fullest."

UPCOMING EVENTS
If all the DBW and SCBWI conference coverage has you in the mood for an informative event (and you'd like some tips that can help you better follow Holly Root's advice), I've got a couple things coming up that might interest you.

First, I'm presenting an hour-long webinar focused on children's publishing called Get Your Children's Writing Published. I gave a similar webinar last year and I was thrilled to see a tweet about it the other day (YAY!):

@lkblackburne Last year, w/ no blog, no twitter account, and no clue, I took @alicepope 's Children's writing seminar. So worth it.

You can get more information and register here.

If you've got more than an hour to devote to learning, the Writer's Digest staff is offering one of our popular Editors' Intensives March 13-14. This event offers a day of programming, a one-on-one manuscript critique, and a some solid WD swag. Plus we can only fit a limited number of people in the WD HQ so there's an intimate feel and plenty of opportunity for interaction with WD staff. (You'll get all your questions answered!)

You can get more information and register here.

A side note: Thanks to everyone for your input on Twitter and Facebook throughout my week of conferencing. I so appreciate your comments, responses and retweets.

Alice Has Left the Nati--Follow Me Online...



As soon as I post this, I'm leaving the office and heading to the airport to got to New York for Digital Book World and the SCBWI Annual Winter Conference.

But, never fear--you don't have to miss me...

Watch my Twitter feed on Tuesday and Wednesday for tweets from DBW (#dbw) and check the DBW blog for daily reports on the event. You can also follow DBW on Twitter.

For as-it-happens conference action, stay glued to the Official SCBWI Conference Blog where I and the rest of SCBWI TEAM BLOG will cover the event live. (If you can't join the fun, we'll bring it right to your computer screen!)

Here's a rundown of our exclusive pre-conference interviews with SCBWI Winter Conference speakers (as swiped from Jaime's blog):

• Jolie Stekly featured blogger Jenn Bailey
• Lee Wind featured Art Director Laurent Linn and agent Eddie Gamarra and author Jacqueline Woodson
• Suzanne Young featured publisher Ben Schrank
• Jaime Temairik featured publisher Allyn Johnston and illustrator Peter Sis
• I interviewed agent Tina Wexler and conference tips from conference-goer Jane Makuch

Debut Author of the Month:
Libby Schmais

Je suis heureux de vous informer that starting today, I'm reviving le Debut Author du mois feature on mon blog. (Those of you who contacted me for First Books: You may be hearing from in months to come.)

January's DAotM is Libby Schmais, whose YA debut is The Pillow Book of Lotus Lowenstein, released from Delacorte en Décembre. Says Kirkus: "readers of any age will savor Lotus’s panache...Chick lit par excellence." You can read a délicieuse excerpt here.

Describe your debut YA novel, The Pillow Book of Lotus Lowenstein.

The Pillow Book of Lotus Lowenstein is a diary book by a teenager living in Brooklyn who is obsessed with all things French. Lotus feels stifled by her life in Park Slope, Brooklyn and fancies herself an existentialist, although her real knowledge of that philosophy and actual French words is a little sketchy. She and her best friend Joni end up both liking the same guy, another Sartre aficionado, and things come to a head during a school trip to Montreal, challenging both her friendship and her freethinking ideas.

You’d published a couple of books for adults—what made you write for a YA audience?

I didn’t consciously set out to write a YA book. The character of Lotus appeared to me one day, and the voice was a teenage one, so I just kind of went with it. I think if I had decided to write a modern-day YA novel from the beginning, I would have been intimidated, because it was out of my comfort zone.

Why did you choose diary format? Have you kept journals at some point?

Well, Lotus is studying The Pillow Book of Sei Shonagan in school, a famous Japanese diary book so that’s part of the reason I chose the diary format. The other reason is that I’ve always wanted to write a diary book. So many of my favorite books are diary books, like I Capture the Castle, Bridget Jones’ Diary, The Diary of Adrian Mole, etc. And in answer to your question, I have tried to write in many journals over the years and have a stack of half-filled notebooks that are impossible to read because my handwriting is so terrible.

Like your title character Brooklynite Lotus Lowenstein, are you a Francophile and/or an existentialist?

I’m definitely a Francophile. I love French food, speaking French badly, and I have recurring fantasy about moving to the South of France, preferably near a field of lavender and an outdoor café. I’m also a bit of an existentialist, particularly on Mondays, when life seems très meaningless.

How did you end up at Delacorte? Do you have an agent?

I do have an agent—the fabulous Stephen Barbara of Foundry Media, who hooked me up with Delacorte. I actually have a two-book deal, so I will have another YA book coming out in approximately a year or so, with a totally different character, although equally quirky and misguided.

You’ve recently completed the My-Life-Is-Merde-but-Have-a-Bonnes-Fêtes-Anyway Blog Tourapalooza, you’ve got a fan page on facebook, and you blog and tweet as your main character. Did I miss anything? How are your book promotion efforts going?

Wow, it sounds so exhausting when you put it like that. Yes, that covers it, except for maybe Goodreads, which is a great site for authors. I have to say all the YA bloggers are a very encouraging and enthusiastic bunch, and they’ve been very positive about the book, so I’d say the online promotion is going well, although I always feel that I could be doing more.

Can you offer some advice to first-time YA authors?

Advice. Hmmm. Probably the same advice I give myself—try not to be too influenced by what everyone else is doing and write the story that you need to write. And don’t be so hard on yourself. Writing is not easy.

ALA Award Winners Announced...

Here are the highlights:

The 2010 John Newbery Medal for most outstanding contribution to children’s literature went to When You Reach Me, written by Rebecca Stead.


The 2010 Randolph Caldecott Medal for most distinguished American picture book for children went to The Lion & the Mouse, illustrated and written by Jerry Pinkney.


The 2010 Michael L. Printz Award for excellence in literature written for young adults went to Going Bovine, written by Libba Bray.



For a complete list of ALA medalists, click here.

Congratulations to all the outstanding authors and illustrators who were recognized!

NOTE: Printz Award winner Libba Bray is the opening keynote speaker for the SCBWI Annual Winter Conference next week in New York City. Click here to register for the event.

Conference Tips (Especially for the Less Experienced Conference-Goer):
A Guest Post by Jane Makuch...

As a follow-up to my recent post on upcoming events, today I offer some tips for attending conferences. What follows are some lessons learned by a relatively new conference-goer Jane Makuch who I met at our Writer's Digest Editor's Intensive in September. Jane will also be attending the SCBWI Annual Winter Conference and the pre-conference Writers Intensive. She's currently revising a YA manuscript.


JANE'S CONFERENCE TIPS
So many of us spend lots of money and want to do the "right" thing at conferences, but we're so often on the outside looking in. I've spent countless hours looking for do's and don't and know I still have so much to learn. Some things I have learned that I think will be helpful are:

• Develop a 30-second pitch. Not just for agents and editors, but also the dozens of times other attendees ask, "What's your book about?"
• Develop a 2-minute pitch for one-on-ones. So many new conference goers seem to think they need to spend the 10 or 15 precious minutes talking instead of interacting, answering questions and listening.
• This might be elementary, but be presentable. Fit the part--show up showered and well dressed. I've been rather surprised by the lack of hygiene, sweatpants, and dirty toenails sticking out of the end of sandals...eewww! Clean and pressed doesn't have to mean expensive, but it does show professionalism.
• No answering cell phones during classes. (Turn them off, or at least mute them.)
  
• No talking to neighbors during a sessions because you're bored or scared or overwhelmed. They paid to be there also.
• Have calling/business cards. Vistaprints.com has very inexpensive cards with quick delivery. Put blog and twitter addresses on them and use a nice size, readable font.
• Ask people you meet at conference for their business cards. (Jot notes on the back so you can remember where/when you met them.)
  
• Research the speakers ahead of time. Do you know of an agent who would be great to meet? If you have a polished manuscript, be ready to ask if you could query them. Then mention in your query that you met them at the conference.
• Don't be bossy or rude. Never ambush an agent or editor. No knocking on bathroom stalls or hotel rooms!
• You can't go wrong with a more formal etiquette. Kindness and respect will most likely get you noticed when presenting yourself with confidence and professionalism.

What's your best advice for getting the most out of a conference? Leave a comment!

• Note that we have an Editors Intensive coming up in March at our WD HQ. Click here for info on the WD Editors Intensive. (Registration will be open soon.)
• And you can still register for the SCBWI Annual Winter Conference. Click here for the SCBWI registration page.

Upcoming Events (Where You'll Find Me!)...

I always think of January as being nothing but dull dull dull and cold cold cold. January 2010, however, is shaping up to rather exciting (and yet...still cold cold cold). Here's what's coming up:

WRITER'S DIGEST 90th ANNIVERSARY PARTY, January 20th
This takes place at the very cool Northside Tavern in Cincinnati. Join us for networking, give-aways, cake and various other anniversary fun. Here's my recent post about the party. No RSVP needed--just show up.

DIGITAL BOOK WORLD, January 26-27
This two-day industry event in New York City is a big ol discussion of current and future strategies, tools, and best practices for consumer publishers big and small in the age of eBook and e-readers. And pretty much everyone will be there. Registration for Digital Book World is still open. (I will be there tweeting and blogging.)
Click here to follow DBW on Twitter.

ALICE RESTS, January 28

SCBWI ANNUAL WINTER CONFERENCE, January 29-31
You can still register for the biggest and best event for children's writers and illustrators there is (besides the SCBWI Summer Conference). If you can't attend, don't fret--you can follow the conference as it happens on The Official SCBWI Conference Blog manned by SCBWI TEAM BLOG (Jaime, Jolie, Lee, Suzanne and me.)

Editor Interview: Andrew Karre on His First Year at Carolrhoda...

I last caught up with Andrew Karre in October 2008 shortly after he moved from Flux to become editorial director at Lerner Imprint Carolrhoda Books so I thought it was about time I check in with Andrew to see how things are going...

You’ve have just more than a full-year under your belt as editorial director at Carolrhoda Books. How did year one go?

It went very well. I work with an amazing group of colleagues and being able to work with them on the books that were in process when I arrived was a pleasure and an education. And what a great batch of books my predecessor left. It’s an impressive act to follow. Sally Walker’s Written in Bone and Vaunda Nelson and Greg Christie’s Bad News for Outlaws have been critical highlights (six stars between them), but there are so many more I could name.

I’m also very excited about what we’ve been able to acquire for 2010. I think the fall 2010 list is going to be very exciting—a great mix of new names and veteran authors and illustrators.

Has the economic climate had an effect on your line? What’s your advice to new writers on breaking in at this point?

The economy affects everything, of course, but I don’t feel like we’ve let it affect the books in terms of quantity or quality. It just means your publishing decisions need to be that much smarter.

Your company has a good online presence. Do you encourage your authors to use the Internet (Twitter, facebook, blogs, site) for promotion as well?

I don’t see how an author can start out now without some sort of online presence, so yes, I encourage. But I don’t think publishers help anyone when they simply say “go forth and do online promotion.” It’s not enough to say get on Twitter and Facebook and start a blog. There needs to be strategy and a reasonably deep understanding of how these technologies can advance an author’s career and sell the publisher’s books. It’s more work to do this author by author, but at least it has a chance of bearing fruit.

What kinds of things do you discuss on the Carolrhoda blog?

For the moment, the blog is mostly my thoughtful spot. I dump a lot of unrefined thoughts about publishing and editing and writing and whatever there. It’s also where I post submissions information.

Tell me about some Carolrhoda projects you’re excited about.

I’m excited about so many things in fall 2010, but before that, in spring, there’s a piece of narrative nonfiction for YAs that I think will get a lot of attention. It’s called An Unspeakable Crime and it’s by Edgar-award-winning novelist Elaine Marie Alphin. Basically, it’s the story of the lynching of Leo Frank in 1914. It’s a shocking and seminal moment in post-Reconstruction/pre-Civil Rights history, and there’s very little written about it for YAs (and teens were a big part of the story).

In fall, I’ve got a new picture book illustrated by CSK winner Floyd Cooper, and I’ve got three absolutely brilliant YA novels, and a new work of nonfiction by Sally Walker.

According to your blog, at the end of September you cut off accepting unsolicited submissions. Will this change in the near future?

This is temporary. I’m just way, way behind. I imagine in a couple months I will turn on the fire hose again. When I do, the blog will be the place to find out. (And Twitter: @andrewkarre)

Find Andrew Karre and Carolrhoda online:

• Blog: carolrhoda.blogspot.com
• Twitter: @andrewkarre
• Also find Carolrhoda on Facebook
  
• Follow Lerner Publishing Group at The Lerner Books Blog, on Facebook, and on Twitter
  
• Visit lernerbooks.com for up-to-date details on their highly reviewed and award-winning titles for children and young adults.

Writer's Digest is Turning 90, We're Having a Party & You're Invited!...

Writer's Digest is hitting the big 9-0 so we're celebrating with a birthday bash at the ubercool Northside Tavern in the Nati on Wednesday, January 20th at 7 PM.

We'll be giving away lots of writerly swag and there will be cake (and a well-stocked bar).

“All of us on staff are honored and humbled to be a part of the Writer’s Digest legacy, and this anniversary gives us a moment to celebrate and give thanks to the writing community that supports us,” says Jane Friedman, our Publisher and WD Community Leader. “Anyone who’s ever worked with or for Writer’s Digest is encouraged to join us, as well as anyone who has read and appreciated the magazine over the years.”

If you are in the area--or even if you're not--come join the WD team in anniversary revelry.

Reaching Your Target Audience Online:
A Guest Post by Greg Pincus...

Happy New Year readers! I've been away from my office for weeks, I've trudged through the snow, I'm back at my desk, and I'm starting off 2010 with a guest post by Greg Pincus.

Greg's guest post was sparked by a comment he left on Jane Friedman's There are No Rules blog which I asked him to expand on. (Click here to read the post and the comments.)

Read on–and please leave comments yourself if you can offer advice about reaching an audience of young readers online...

If you’re an author or illustrator who’s blogging, Tweeting, Facebooking or using other social networks to build your platform, you need to think strategically about who you’re going to reach online and how you’re going to do it.

Some choices are easy–you’re not likely to use LinkedIn to appeal to the kids who read your picture books. But if you write YA, in particular, you often have to make some more complex choices since your potential readership is actually online…and in large numbers.

Teens, however, don’t use the web the way adults do. As a result, most author/illustrator blogs and websites don’t attract teenage readers unless the author is already known to them. Twitter connections follow a similar pattern.

This means that if you’re offering up a “this is my journey” or writing advice or book review blog or just tweeting as as yourself, you should focus on appealing to the gatekeepers rather than teen readers. If you want to reach your core readership, you need to consider building a community around a central idea or offering up interactivity that your potential readers want and can’t replicate elsewhere. Some examples:

• Author P.J. Haarsma built a game which attracted a huge audience that became the core supporters of his books. The game community helped test storylines and championed the books to their friends, too.

• The women behind Readergirlz have built a community around authors, books, and reading. The site is a destination offering interactivity, changing content, and projects that involve offline participation, as well. While the site is not directly about the Readergirlz “divas” themselves, the connection to the readers still exists for them individually as well as collectively.
  

• Finding underserved, pre-existing communities can be an effective path to having a teen readership, as Lee Wind has done with his blog I’m Here. I’m Queer. Now What the Hell Do I Read?. Again, the community here is not directly about Lee’s writing… and it’s a mix of gatekeepers and teens.

In all these cases, helping the community grow involves consistently creating content, understanding what your site’s readers want, and making sure your own career goals don’t come in conflict with the wants of your readers.

There are great success stories with authors connecting with their readers via social media. Ellen Hopkins’ use of MySpace and John Green’s use of videos and Twitter–where he has over 1,000,000 followers including members of his core audience–are two notable examples. For most of us, however, social media remains a difficult way to connect to a large network of teen (or younger) readers.

There are many good resources for learning how teens use the Internet. A good place to start is with the work of danah boyd and by looking at sites that already work.

Have you had success reaching your core readership online? Do you know other good ways to attract teen readers? I’d love to hear about them as, I suspect, would everyone else trying to reach them.

Find Greg Pincus online:

• The Happy Accident
• Gotta Book
• On Twitter

Exclusive SCBWI TEAM BLOG Pre-Conference Interview: Laurent Linn...

Visit Lee Wind's Blog for the latest in our series of exclusive SCBWI TEAM BLOG pre-conference interviews with SCBWI Winter Conference speakers and keynoters.

Lee interviewed Laurent Linn, Art Director at Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers. Lauren will offer breakout session on The Real Deal About Visual Story Telling.

I'll continue to direct you to more pre-conference interviews as we approach conference time. (It's getting close!)

To register for the SCBWI conference, click here. And here's a link to Laurent's own website: www.laurentlinn.com.

Embracing Inappropriate, Violent & Blasphemous: Three Writers Make Negative Reviews a Fashion Statement...

As I prepare for the SCBWI Annual Winter Conference I thought it was about time I followed-up with three of my favorite Annual Summer Conference attendees, Emily Wing Smith, Brodi Ashton and Bree Despain, to talk about their outfits.

I spotted Emily, Brodi and Bree at the LA conference this past August wearing these t-shirts:


Word shirt ring leader Emily Wing Smith told me the terms emblazoned on their chests—"blasphemous," "violent" and "inappropriate"—were all stinging comments they heard about their own novels.

Below the three talk about those negative critiques, how they were impacted, and how they forged ahead through fashion.


Emily Wing Smith
I N A P P R O P R I A T E

When I wrote my YA novel THE WAY HE LIVED, I expected some backlash. After all, the book deals—however briefly—with some serious themes: suicide, homosexuality, mental illness. But I wasn’t prepared for the words of an anonymous commenter who left a review on a book retailer’s website, claiming she “tried to overlook the references to homosexuality and other inappropriate matters” but ultimately couldn’t get past it.

Okay, so I don’t happen to believe that homosexuality is an inappropriate matter. I don’t think anyone should believe that. But what really baffled me? Being offended by even a reference to something she deemed inappropriate. I believe that murder is inappropriate, but I’m not offended when someone refers to it. Maybe that makes me inappropriate—if so, then my “Inappropriate” t-shirt is actually appropriate!

www.emilywingsmith.com


Brodi Ashton
V I O L E N T

My YA book ECHO features a teenage girl who becomes an alien hunter, so I wasn’t surprised when readers called it “too violent.” The problem came when I tried to change every scene that had offended someone. I quickly learned two things: 1) No two people were offended by the same scene; 2) If I removed every scene that had one detractor, there’d be no book left.

Not everyone is going to like my book. Someone, somewhere, is going to think a story about a teenage girl who can kill an alien with a fork will be too violent. But if I let myself think that too, I never would’ve typed “The End” and found an agent who thinks my book is just violent enough.

My “Violent” t-shirt was a smart move because it got me to the front of one of the lines at the SCBWI conference. The lady said I could cut because she didn’t want to mess with me.

www.brodiashton.blogspot.com


Bree Despain
B L A S P H E M O U S

I think for many authors, one of the hardest things to deal with is occasionally hearing negative feedback about our book. It doesn’t seem to matter how much praise, or how many awesome reviews we receive, when somebody finds something not to like about our books, or is offended by something we wrote, we can let that negative energy eat away at us—sometimes even to the point where we find ourselves unable to write.

Around the same time that Emily’s book received a particularly upsetting review because of some supposed inappropriate references, I was dealing with getting over something someone else had said about my book THE DARK DIVINE. A writer friend had read the manuscript and told me that she thought my book was “blasphemous” because I talked about faith and mythological paranormal creatures in the same story. She also worried that people would think it was blasphemous to use a teenage girl as a metaphor for grace and redemption. I didn’t agree with my friend, but I found myself wondering if I needed to rewrite my entire book in a way that it couldn’t possibly offend anyone. (A completely impossible feat, I soon discovered.)

Luckily, Emily, Brodi, and I decided that instead of letting the negative things people said about our books cripple our writing; we would just put our bad reviews on t-shirts and “own” them. Our bad review t-shirts have been a lot of fun to wear. People love to stop us to talk about our shirts, which always leads to discussions about our books—and Sherman Alexie even remembered our names because of them!

www.breedespain.com

Exclusive SCBWI TEAM BLOG Pre-Conference Interview: Tina Wexler...

Tina Wexler is a literary agent at International Creative Management (ICM), a full-service agency and home to Dr. Seuss and E.B. White. Her list includes fiction and nonfiction for children and adults, with a focus on middle grade and YA.

Recent and forthcoming titles represented by Tina include Donna Gephart's As If Being 12 3/4 Isn't Bad Enough, My Mother Is Running For President (winner of SCBWI's 2009 Sid Fleischman Humor Award), Sara Lewis Holmes' Operation Yes (Arthur A. Levine Books), Mara Purnhagen's Tagged (Harlequin Teen), Laurel Snyder's Baxter, The Pig Who Wanted To Be Kosher (Tricycle), and Sanjay Patel's Ramayana (Chronicle).

Please tell us about how you got into agenting and how you ended up at ICM.

After getting my MFA in poetry, I applied for a job as an agent assistant to Louise Quayle and Elizabeth Kaplan at the Ellen Levine Literary Agency. There, I cut my teeth on permissions, audio and serial sales, and foreign rights. Around the time ELLA merged with Trident, I moved to the Karpfinger Agency to continue with foreign rights but soon left to start building my own list at ICM.

What are the advantages for you working at a big agency? What are the advantages for your authors?

The advantage of being at a big agency is that everything is kept in-house , which means having more control of what is happening with my clients' projects (and for the client, only one commission). We have the Los Angeles office shopping our books for film/TV; we have the London office securing UK and translations deals; we have an in-house lecture department; an agent who sells audio, ebook, and serial rights; and a theater department ready to negotiate stage adaptations of our books. I'm able to pull from a number of resources: our in-house attorneys, our tax and royalty departments, the knowledge and experience of the ten other agents working in our literary department. All of these elements come together to make my office run smoothly so I can focus entirely on my clients and their needs.

Do writers of books for young readers really need to have agents?

I think the benefits of having the right agent--whether you write for the adult market or the children's market--are immeasurable. Certainly, there are books that get published without the involvement of an agent, but that's not the route I would go were I a writer. Having an agent is a real asset, and in most circumstances, an absolute requirement just to enter the ring. (Don't ask why a boxing metaphor is cropping into my answer. We can debate whether writers need to have agents, but there's no doubt everyone could use an editor!)

If a writer is unsure whether she needs an agent, she will want to assess how comfortable she feels mixing business dealings with the creative process. How contract-savvy she is, how great she is at negotiating. How many doors are open to her at the various publishing houses. How capable she is of selling subrights such as audio, film/TV, and UK/translation rights to her book on her own. And for agents like me who can be very hands-on when it comes to getting a manuscript into the best possible shape before submission, how strong is her revision process. If she feels that she'd like a partner to help her in any or all of these areas (and there are so many other things that agents do each day for their clients), she needs an agent.

What type of material do you represent? Are you open to queries?

I represent mostly YA and MG (and adult non-fiction too). Within those categories, I'm interested in most everything: magical realism/paranormal, mysteries, adventure, suspense, contemporary, and some non-fiction for teens. I tend to shy away from high fantasy and poetry collections, but I love novels-in-verse. In short: make me laugh, make me angry, make me cry, make me pause. Also, I do not represent screenplays. I am accepting queries at twexler[at]icmtalent[dot]com, despite what ICM's website says about unsolicited material.

Would you offer some general advice on approaching agents?

First, do your research. I know it's tempting to query every agent you find info on--the old "throw it at the wall and see what sticks" approach--but doing so only results in slower response times and fewer agents responding to queries at all, which no one wants. So do yourself and your fellow writers (and agents) a favor and be selective. Second, be professional but know that I'm in this business because I love the written word, I love stories, and I really do want to hear from you if our interests overlap.

What will you be talking about at the SCBWI Winter Conference?

I'll be doing an agent panel ["Ask the Agent: 3 Agents Analyze the Market"] with George Nicholson [Sterling Lord Literistic] and Rosemary Stimola [Stimola Literary Studio], talking about the market and addressing any other questions thrown our way.

Why do you recommend writers attend conferences? Have you found clients at such events?

Conferences are a great way to connect with other writers, to meet editors and agents, and to get a sense of what is happening in the business all while being inspired creatively by the workshops and speakers. I am working with several writers whom I met through conferences, and a majority of my clients are SCBWI members.