Great news for Kiki!

 Author Kiki Hamilton is proud to announce that her YA novel, THE MIDNIGHT SPY (first book in a series), was named one of the BEST BOOKS OF 2015 by Kirkus Reviews!

Hamilton's popular books include the four-book FAERIE RING series, and the contemporary novel THE LAST DANCE.

Congratulations, Kiki! Well deserved!

YA novel course at UW

Karen Finneyfrock, author of the YA novel THE SWEET REVENGE OF CELIA DOOR, is the instructor for this year's UW certificate course in YA fiction.

If that doesn't already make your heart swell with longing, then hear this: She's trying to rope more folks into the class!

It's a year-long commitment, beginning SEPTEMBER 17. Held each Thursday. What are you waiting for, people? Opportunity knocks!

To register and learn more about the course, please click here.

Dork and stormy nights

Frank Portman, a.k.a., Dr. Dork and the author of the YA cult hit King Dork and also Andromeda Klein, has just released King Dork Approximately, the continuing story of the Catcher In the Rye-obsessed teen musician Tom Henderson, a.k.a., King Dork.

Portman, who is also a musician, will appear at Secret Garden Books on Friday, December 12 at 7pm, and again at University Book Store in Seattle on Saturday, December 13 at 9pm.

Where the wild books are

Attention, YA writers, bloggers, and teen-reading enthusiasts!

The 6th annual Operation Teen Book Drop/Rock the Drop celebration in honor of YALSA's (Young Adult Library Services Association) Support Teen Lit Day is coming up on April 17.

Here's the deal: Writers, librarians, educators, readers, and other bookish people are encouraged to "drop" a YA novel somewhere in the wild for a lucky reader to discover and enjoy, then tweet about it with the hashtag #rockthedrop to keep the enthusiasm going.


In honor of the seventh anniversary of the founding of readergirlz, we’ve teamed with Justine Magazine and I Heart Daily in directing participants to seven worthy literacy philanthropies that would benefit from a donation in honor of Support Teen Lit Day.


How can you participate?


1. Check out http://readergirlz.blogspot.com/p/operation-teen-book-drop.html to snag a banner and bookplate you can use to help spread the word. (Please note that the previous years' banners are up on the blog, so make sure the date reads 2014!)

2. Visit our Facebook page to add any favorite literacy philanthropies of your own.

3. On April 17, visit the readergirlz blog, download an adorable 2014 bookplate, and stick it in the YA book/s of your choice.

4. "Drop" the book/s someplace public for some lucky reader to find!

5. Snap a picture of your book/s in the wild, and tweet or post to our Facebook page with the hashtag #rockthedrop (and we're always on the lookout for any dropped books found by others).

It's fun! It's sneaky! It's putting great reads into the hands of unsuspecting readers, who could be changed from the experience with a story or a character! It's what reading is all about: spreading those words far and wide!

Free workshop series with Stasia!

Attention all YA writers (beginning to experienced)! Member and author Stasia Ward Kehoe will be leading a free (you read that right!) three-session workshop series at the Woodinville library starting next weekend. Join her to discuss the business and craft of writing. She says, "At each session, we will analyze passages from some standout YA fiction, apply our insights to our own work through writing exercises, and share insights on the process of submitting your work for publication. Attend one, two or all three sessions – and bring paper and pencil!"

The public workshops will be held on Saturdays, 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., on the following dates:

• January 25
• March 22
• May 24

This month's session is called Reader to Writer. We are often told that to be good writers, we must read. But what does this mean? Specifically, how and what can we learn from books we admire and how does this translate into our own words on the page?

Questions? Contact her through her blog.

Local YALSA honorees

Time for some better-than-great news!

Several of our very own fellow SCBWI-WWA writers have been included in the 2013 list of Best Fiction for Young Adults, as selected by YALSA (Young Adult Library Services Association).

 

And the honorees are:

Janet Lee Carey, Dragonswood

Marissa Meyer, Cinder

Suzanne Selfors,  The Sweetest Spell

 

 

Congratulations to you three! 

 

For the complete list of honorees, click here.

The Monday Scoop.....

Happy Monday. Here's a smattering of things to get your brains percolating....



First, if you are all signed up, don't be late for tonight's Great Critique!
When: 7pm 
Where: Seattle Pacific University, Demaray Hall
This event is closed. If you didn't register this time around, start working on something for next year. It's one of those amazing events that our chapter offers, but you have to register ahead of time.



Second, here's a lovely (if not sarcastic) link found on Twitter today. Don't we all just really need to know what The Next Big Trend in YA is?



Thirdly, Rebecca Van Slyke reports the following news from the Northern Network:

Last Wednesday the Northern Network was treated to an inspiring talk by Barb Davis-Pyles. She talked about “Bringing Balance into the Writing Life.” Those darn “little things”—laundry, house cleaning, surfing the ‘Net—keep pushing our “big things,” like writing and illustrating goals, aside.  How do you have time for both? Barb recommends these steps:

1.      Label the “big rocks” that fill up your jar: family, job, writing/illustrating goals, etc.

2.      Be specific with your goals: “I will complete a picture book manuscript by the end of this month.”

3.      Then think very small. Break your goal into smaller steps: “I will make a dummy of my book this weekend.”

4.      Commit to working toward your goal for 15 minutes a day. Remember, “I can do ANYthing for 15 minutes. “ Then if things go well, you can keep going. If not, quit after 15 minutes.

5.      Schedule your 15 minutes into your day. Studies show that earlier times evolve into habits easier.

6.      Stay on track. Get an accountability partner or reward yourself for goals met.

7.      If you fall off the wagon, get back on again.

Remember, a balanced life is all about creating good habits!

Dana Antrim shares an important link for all illustrators on how to price your artwork. It's well worth the look and listen.

HarperCollins Voyager imprint wants YOU!

This just in from Lois Brandt:

In case you haven't seen this already, HarperCollins Voyager imprint is going to accept unagented manuscripts for two weeks in October!  This may be an opportunity for YA science fiction writers.

 

For more details and links to submission guidelines, click here.

 



Andrew Karre: From Controversy to Craft

Andrew Karre, looking slightly
blurrier than in real life

Andrew Karre is the editorial director of Carolrhoda Books, Carolrhoda Lab and Darby Creek, divisions of the Lerner Publishing Group.

He publishes everything from picture books to YA, but focused his conference talk on YA lit, which is a cultural force these days. In a way, he wants to keep that a secret, to keep the excellent collegiality of our industry free of adult authors who will want in.

He opened by talking about the two sure-fire ways of getting attention: launching a new Apple product or bashing YA literature.

"It feels silly when there are so many remarkable things happening in this community, and the variety and power and meaning of the art is substantial," he says. (For more on this and why actually like Apple, read his Hunger Mountain essay.)

Where he started at Flux, they had a tagline: "Young adult is a state of mind and not a reading level." He believes YA is a genre about teens and the teen experience, not reading level. It's about teens, not necessarily for them (because that's more something people who run malls think about).

"Like many of you, I have not recovered from my adolescence," he says. "It you have, you did something wrong. Or not enough wrong."

In other times, adolescents were full-bodied adults. Until the 20th century, teens were as educated as a person would generally get. Now, they're in the waiting room for adulthood. "What a gift for YA writers that is," Andrew says.

So what do you do with outrage and controversy if you're an artist? "If you set out to write a book to save a life, you will write a bad book."

In a way, all the controversy and disapproval of YA work is like adult condescension toward teens. It's proof that it matters. "This must be a bit what teenagers in England felt like around the birth of rock 'n' roll. Disapproved, misunderstood, marginalized. Interesting things came out of that. At the end of the day disapproval is a powerful motivator of any work."

Writing for Teens with Kathryn Erskine and Rich Wallace

In order to connect with young-adult readers, adult writers must reconnect with their teen years. Both Kathryn Erskine and Rich Wallace have mastered the ability to jump back in time and give their readers the honesty and emotion of a teen perspective.

Kathy's successes in the YA genre include her National Book Award—winning, MOCKINGBIRD. Kathy is praised for her authentic teen voice and complex, yet well developed, characters. Rich's books reveal the struggles between and within every teenager. For many of Rich's YA fiction titles, he taps into his athletic past, as he does in WRESTLING STURBRIDGE, named a YALSA 100 Best Books for the 21st Century.

Rich and Kathy share with us why they write for the young-adult audience, and how you, too, can write for teens.

Rich Wallace: I started writing about teenagers because I felt strongly compelled by my own teenage years. There were things I wanted to work out, and I did that by writing about them. Gradually, I learned how to take a few steps away from "what really happened" and craft stories that more kids would relate to.

For me, it's all about reconnecting with that part of my life, most notably the up-and-down emotions that are such a part of that age. Even if you're writing about a character very different from yourself, you'll connect with your readers more effectively by conveying believable emotions.

Kathy Erskine: It's a great age. The whole world is opening up for you. You're experiencing freedoms you never had. You're on the brink of adulthood, deciding what you're going to do with your life. Wow! Plus, young adults have a sophisticated sense of humor, which is fun to incorporate into writing! We're all just teens in grown-up bodies. Even when we're old it's easy to remember being a teen—it's such a significant, powerful, memorable part of life.

I think [the young-adult book market] is strong. Younger people are reading YA and many adults are, too, and are no longer afraid to admit it. I read more YA literature than adult, and not just because I write for that market. There's some fantastic writing out there in the YA realm.

Rich and Kathy will lead the Highlights Foundation YA Bootcamp: What Young-Adult Readers Expect from You, June 7-10, 2012. Learn the ins and outs of writing for young adults through lectures, hands-on writing sessions, and one-on-one manuscript critiques.

For more information about this workshop, which takes places near Honesdale, Pennsylvania, or to request an application, please visit our website or contact Jo Lloyd at Jo.Lloyd@highlightsfoundation.org.

How to Make a Book Trailer

A great post on Darcy Pattison's blog Fiction Notes. It's about how to create a book trailer and also celebrates the second launch of WRITING YOUNG ADULT FICTION FOR DUMMIES. A great link to check out. Thanks to Laurie for sending the link!!