Check out the cover for The Alarming Career of Sir Richard Blackstone by Lisa Doan (Sky Pony, 2017). From the promotional copy:
A funny middle grade mystery adventure complete with an unconventional knight, a science experiment gone awry, a giant spider, and a boy to save the day!
Stephanie Lyons is the first-time author of Dating Down (Flux, 2015). From the promotional copy:
At Café Hex, Samantha Henderson can imagine being the person she really wants to be.
It’s her place to daydream about going to art school and getting away from her politician father.
Linda at Cliffs of Moher
You’re a writer and an agent. Let’s start with Writer You. How did you come to literature for young readers?
When I was in middle school, I was obsessed with YA, like R.L. Stine’s Fear Street series (St. Martin’s Griffin), Francine Pascal’s Sweet Valley High books (Bantam),
Continue Reading Agent Interview: Linda Camacho on Prospect Agency »
By Ann Angel
Right about the time I pitched my first anthology, a writer friend said she’d hate that sort of work.
“It would be so time-consuming to read all those stories,” she said. “I can’t imagine having to edit all that content and you’ll have to write all that front and back matter and it will take away from your own writing.”
Even though everything she said is true,
Continue Reading Guest Post & Giveaway: Ann Angel on The Power of Secrets in Things I’ll Never Say »
Meeting young writers at The Voracious Reader.
In the spring of 1981, Space Shuttle Columbia completed a successful orbital mission around the Earth, my hometown New York Islanders won the Stanley Cup and eight-year-old me wrote my first fan letter. It was not a letter to Shaun Cassidy or Scott Baio,
Continue Reading Guest Post & Giveaway: Jennifer Wolf Kam on Words from the Past »
Cori McCarthy is the first-time author of The Color of Rain (Running Press, 2013). From the promotional copy:
If there is one thing that seventeen-year-old Rain knows and knows well, it is survival. Caring for her little brother, Walker, who is “Touched,” and losing the rest of her family to the same disease,
Continue Reading New Voice: Cori McCarthy on The Color of Rain »
As I’m writing this, it’s days before my second novel, My Not-So-Still Life is published. Without the Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA program in Writing for Children and Young Adults, I don’t think I’d have ever written a book.
The lectures,
Continue Reading VCFA Writers: Liz Gallagher on Character = Plot »
Mandy Robbins Taylor
A few years ago at a conference, I heard Erin Clarke, a Senior Editor at Knopf Books for Young Readers, reply to a question regarding voice.
“What is voice?” she ruminated. “Basically, voice is everything.”
Great. So I get to write a one-page blog post on “everything.”
Continue Reading VCFA Writers: Mandy Robbins Taylor on Voice »
Nobody liked my protagonist.
Well, not nobody. Editors didn’t like her. I had already cut her whining and made her helpful and friendly to her new stepfather in response to a harsh letter from an agent. But those changes didn’t make her any new editor friends.
As I began my second semester at Vermont College of Fine Arts,
Continue Reading VCFA Writers: Lyn Miller-Lachmann on Creating Likable Characters »
During my first 10-day residency at Vermont College of Fine Arts, I kept hearing the word “routine.” I knew they were talking to me. I was disorganized, and I needed to create a routine around my writing. I needed to figure out where and when I produced my best work,
Continue Reading VCFA Writers: Peter Patrick Langella on Writing Your Way into a Routine »
