The official mentoring element of the 2022 PBChat Mentorship experience has come to an end. My relationship with my mentor, Ana Siqueira, isn’t over. And the showcase is still coming up. But for now, I wanted to reflect on what I’ve learned during this amazing 3-month mentorship. For anyone unfamiliar with the PBChat Mentorship, you can find out more on Justin Colón’s website.
Continue reading “My Top PBChat Mentorship Takeaways”
I attended my first in-person SCBWI conference this month. The “Reunited and It Feels So Good” conference was also my first Florida regional conference. I thought I’d write a quick post about my 5 major takeaways from the conference, both in terms of content and in terms of the conference experience. Feel free to share your own takeaways in the comments!
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October seems to be a huge month for aspiring authors, so I thought I’d compile a list of events to check out and participate in. If you’re an aspiring children’s and young adult literature author, and are not agented yet, this post is for you.
Continue reading “KidLit Events in October”
I recently saw a social media post by an aspiring author at the very very beginning of their journey. They were unsure what the next steps were once they had a picture book manuscript written. So, I thought I’d go over the usual next steps taken at this point. If you’re completely new to traditional publishing, here’s a post to get you started.
Continue reading “First Steps: You Have a Picture Book Manuscript Draft. Now What?”
There are two pitch parties coming up next month: PitMad and LatinxPitch. I’ve already participated in a couple parties, but I have more polished manuscripts to work with now. I’ve been doing even more research than usual on how to create strong pitches and participate in these events. Thought I’d share what I’ve learned and some resources.
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I’ve been doing a lot of research these past few months, and I thought it’d be helpful to create a running list of publishing terms. This list isn’t exhaustive, but it’s a good start for anyone new to researching kidlit publishing. Also, I can only promise that these definitions are how I understand these terms. I might be missing some nuances.
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I decided to pitch at this year’s SCBWI Summer Conference. It was a digital experience, where 10 pitchers were in a Zoom call with the editor or agent we signed up to pitch to. We each had 2 minutes to pitch, and 4 minutes of feedback. We could pitch our story or read the first manuscript page (250 words). Here’s how it went…
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I attended my first SCBWI conference this weekend, and it was a fantastic experience. I really appreciated the opportunity to attend, as it was a fully digital conference this year. I pitch one of my picture book manuscripts to an editor tomorrow, which I’ll create a separate post about. But for now, here are some of my takeaways from the editors and agents that spoke at this year’s conference.
Continue reading “Insights Gained from the SCBWI BigFiveOh Summer Conference”
I joined the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (aka SCBWI) in April of 2021. Since then, I’ve used quite a few resources on their website. So, I thought I’d share some of my favorites, in case you’re new to the group or are considering joining but don’t know if it’s worth the annual fee (hint, it is).
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