Sometimes discouragement comes in the midst of celebration. Re-reading something I wrote I was delighted with how good it was. Then I thought how much I am enjoying this journey into children’s book creation and publishing. After that, however, I hit a bump. I thought “why?” I wondered if it was worth it. It may…
My reading list is getting longer. It feels like the more I read, the more I have to read. Books I need to purchase to read, all winners of the Caldecott: 2019: Hello Lighthouse illustrated and written by Sophie Blackall (Little, Brown and Company, a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc.) 2018: Wolf in the Snow by Matthew…
I purchased an “uncorrected partial proof/cover not final” of Emily Arnold McCully’s book She Did It! 21 Women Who Changed the Way We Think. It said Caldecott Medal Winner on the cover. So a book that hadn’t yet come out or even finished proofing won the Caldecott? (See update at the end of this post.) I…
I love hats. My husband is not as fond of them–or he wasn’t. Now he owns five and wears them all the time. At the Austin SCBWI conference one author said that she has different hats for different… I want to say kinds of books, like middle grade or picture books, but it could have…
One of my character’s is a Third Culture Kid (TCK). Merriam-Webster has a good (and long) definition. While I do not agree that Obama is a TCK (having a foreign parent only makes a difference if they raise you), I think they are very accurate in other ways. When I was teaching I had a…
I am getting a lot of encouragement to 1. send the manuscript NOW and 2. not send the manuscript until I have had a serious critique of it by someone who doesn’t know me. Honestly, I was leaning toward the NOW version, but when I went to look up what the editor specified she preferred…
Many years ago, 13, I wrote a book because I couldn’t not write it. Then I had a few people read it and give me feedback. I wrote it again and it grew longer. Characters showed up and stayed. The world became more real to me. BUT something was wrong. I didn’t know what and…
In The Artist’s Way, Julia Cameron gives assignments. An early assignment (repeated often) is to describe five other lives you would live. An early one of mine said “children’s author.” That was the key to unlocking my journey and letting lose my creativity and my artist. I’m not there yet, but I am on my…
I call it confluence, but Jung called it synchronicity. It’s when things come together to push you in a certain direction. A friend and a book both told me I needed to start my day with affirmations. The book was The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron. She gives many to choose from and, one presumes,…
“Very often audacity, not talent, makes one person an artist and another a shadow artist.” –Julia Cameron, The Artist’s Way, p. 27
