Click on the cover to buy your copy from Amazon.com!
THE COMPLETE IDIOT'S GUIDE TO PUBLISHING CHILDREN'S BOOKS SECOND EDITION by Harold Underdown Alpha Publishing 2004 ISBN: 1-59257-143-3 $16.95
Harold Underdown is an editorial consultant who has worked with some of the most respected houses in children's publishing. In his spare time, he runs The Purple Crayon (www.underdown.org) and is the webmaster for Kindling Words, an annual retreat for children's writers, illustrators, and publishing professionals.
Beginner and intermediate children's book creators will learn all kinds of things that will help them build their careers, from the basics of manuscript and portfolio submission to tips and tricks for building a book sale into a career. Using his own experience and that of other more experienced authors and illustrators, Underdown treats readers to great advice on publicizing their own work, getting the most out of their story ideas - is it a series? - and practical knowledge like vocabulary and other sidebars that will help even the most neophyte rookie learn how to present themselves as a professional.
You can read some sample chapters at Underdown's site: http://www.underdown.org/cig.htm If this isn't already on your professional resources bookshelf, it should be.
~ Roxyanne Young
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Order this book and help support SmartWriters.com. Just click on the cover to learn more!
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GREAT BOOKS FOR WRITERS
TAKE JOY: A BOOK FOR WRITERS Jane Yolen The Writer Books ISBN: 0-87116-194-X $16.95
"I am one of those people who makes a distinction between being a writer and being an author. A writer puts words on a page. An author lives in story. A writer is conversant with the keyboard, the author with charater." So begins a wonderful journey with one of the best loved and most widely read of children's authors publishing today, Jane Yolen. Yolen speaks of children's writing with such passion that it sounds at times like a religious calling, which for many of us it is. She writes about craft - uncovering the voice of a piece of writing, story structure, point of view. Yolen encourages writers to write with honesty and integrity, to always keep the reader in mind, and to be true to our own stories.
I loved the last chapter, "The Alphabetics of Story," where Yolen writes short bits in alphabetic order on everything from the Architecture of a story to having Zero expectations - in other words, don't focus on publication, money or awards. Rather, "Write the damn story. Nothing else matters."
PICTURE WRITING: A NEW APPROACH TO WRITING FOR KIDS AND TEENS Anastasia Suen Writer's Digest Books ISBN: 1-5829-70726 $16.99
Although she's famous for her online picture book writing workshops (see http://www.asuen.com/ for details), Suen addresses all levels of writing for children in this book, from toddlers to young adults. Readers will find practical exercises that will help them improve their writing, plus advice on keeping a writer's journal to help develop the free flow of ideas, a reader's log to keep track of your reading (and all great writers must read, read, read!), and truly useful information on markets and the practical side of submitting your work to editors.
Suen has a gift for explaining the finer points of craft while inspiring her readers to develop their own talent and skill set necessary to be a successful children's writer. The mechanics of writing is important, but so is persistence and knowing the markets. Suen offers a great guide for all of this in one book.
THE WRITER'S GUIDE TO FANTASY LITERATURE: FROM DRAGON'S LAIR TO HEROE'S QUEST Edited by Philip Martin The Writer Books ISBN: 0-87116-195-8 $16.95
Philip Martin has pulled together the top names in fantasy literature for this marvelous guidebook for anyone who wants to learn the techniques that make authors like Ray Bradbury, Susan Cooper, Neil Gaiman, Urlsula LeGuin, Patricia McKillip, Jane Yolen, and Terry Prachett command such huge and devoted audiences for their books. What does it take? Imagination mixed with a fair command of the rules of creating fantastic worlds.
Liberal use of literary examples and essays from some of today's top fantasy writers offer readers invaluable advice on generating ideas and creating mythic worlds and the characters that people them. Here, too, is practical advice on the craft of writing and the business side, too, with how-to's on formatting and submitting your work.
This one is highly recommended for anyone seriously considering writing fantasy.
Creating Characters Kids Will Love by Elaine Marie Alphin
CREATING CHARACTERS KIDS WILL LOVE By Elaine Marie Alphin Write for Kids Library from Writer's Digest Books Copyright 2000 ISBN 0-89879-985-6
Many novice writers--and a few professionals--confess to believing their intricate plots or lofty themes will carry their children's books, only to find themselves victims of sagging middle-itis or the rejection form blues. What is lacking in their writing? Elaine Marie Alphin, in her fine book, Creating Characters Kids Will Love, reminds us that it is not as much the story or theme of a book that matters to most children as it is the characters. The characters capture children's minds--and hearts--and make them remember a book long after they have put it back on the shelf. Alphin should know; she is the author of 11 books for children and the winner of numerous awards.
Over and over, in the many books I've read on the subject of writing for children, authors are instructed to remember that most books for children are character-driven. It should be elemental--what do we remember about the books we read as children? We remember the characters: Nancy Drew, Huck Finn, Superfudge, Pippi Longstocking, Harriet the Spy, Willy Wonka, the Grinch, and Max and his wild things. What makes Alphin's book different?
Unlike most books on writing, Creating Characters doesn't spend a lot of time explaining the elements of writing. Creating Characters concentrates almost exclusively on characterization. It presents a wealth of advice and strategies for bringing your characters to life on the page and, most importantly, in the imaginations of the children who read your books. The book is organized around the principle that while story, plot, theme, setting, conflict and characterization are all-important elements of a book, it is the characters that engage young readers. And Alphin doesn't just present her beliefs about the importance of characters and leave the reader to wonder how to make it all happen. She offers page after page of solid, practical and easy-to-follow (and fun) guidance.
Part I of Creating Characters, "Characters in Search of a Plot," is comprised of four chapters on finding story characters through our memories of childhood and by observing real kids, and how to turn the child you were or the real kids you know into fictional characters. Alphin reminds us that believable characters act, think, feel and speak. By using our own childhood memories, we can return to our pasts and explore our feelings, an empathetic tactic that gives our work immediacy for the reader.
Part II, "Give Those Characters the Story They Need," is a primer on the intertwining of character growth and plot development, how characters given a problem or obstacle to overcome will grow and change as they resolve their conflict or achieve their goals. Without a story problem, even the most well-rounded character will send kids scrambling for the TV remote, but a great character with a compelling problem gives your writing the kind of tension that keeps kids turning those pages. Alphin uses this section of the book to show you how to build your story plot through a series of escalating obstacles, and how to choose and use a point-of-view to draw the reader into the world of your protagonist. Also included in this section is a helpful chapter on character development for shorter works such as magazine pieces and picture books.
In Part III, "A Story in Search of a Cast," strategies on developing heroes, villains, secondary characters, special characters and adult characters help you up the ante in your writing. Part IV, "Bringing Nonfiction to Life," discusses real-life kids, adult role models, kid-friendly biographies and fictional characters from history. This section of the book provides practical tips on interviewing, researching and dramatizing real-life characters, both living and dead.
Two features of Creating Characters that hammer home the lessons presented by Alphin are the "Try It Yourself" exercises and the "Read the Pros" suggestions. The "Try It Yourself" exercises get you writing and help you practice the techniques outlined in the book. The "Read the Pros" suggestions provide published examples of the techniques Alphin has outlined. Creating Characters--the exercises, examples and Alphin's excellent ability to impart information--is an excellent self-teaching tool for the beginning writer and a wonderful resource for the established one.
Madeleine L'Engle Herself: Reflections on a Writing Life, by Madeleine L'Engle, compiled by Carole F. Chase
MADELEINE L'ENGLE HERSELF: REFLECTIONS ON A WRITING LIFE By Madeleine L'Engle, compiled by Carole F. Chase WaterBrook Press, October 2001, 384pp., ISBN: 087788157
Madeleine L'Engle has written over fifty books for children and adults, including the Newbery award winner, A Wrinkle in Time. Madeleine L'Engle Herself, Reflections On A Writing Life is a compilation of her thoughts on the writing life collected from speeches, workshops, and a lifetime of experience. Each insight is self contained on one page, like a journal, which makes it a book that you can open up at any point for a moment of reflection and inspiration. Her gifts of wisdom are borne from a lifetime of hard work, discipline, faith, and her share of disappointments and trying times. For instance, this:
"I struggled to write under the worst possible conditions, after the children were in bed . . . Like most young mothers I was constantly tired. Added to fatigue was struggling to cope with failure, which looked as though it would have no end. I was trying to develop as a writer, but I received from editors nothing but a long stream of rejections, mostly the impersonal printed ones, although I had already had several books published . . ." "I had accepted myself as a failure, at least a failure in the world's eyes. I was writing because I had to."
L'Engle shares her perspective of writers as artists who "serve the gift." Her faith is inseparable from her writing life, and yet her wisdom is inclusive of all faiths, speaking to all writers, artists, who are compelled to share their gift.
Writers can identify with L'Engle too, as she shares the mundane and practical. "For me, to work on a book is the same thing as to pray. Both involve that unpopular word discipline. If an artist works only when he feels like it, he's not apt to build up a body of work. Inspiration comes far more often during work as things get rolling than before you sit at the typewriter."
"The most difficult part of each day is starting to work. I will sharpen pencils. I never write with pencils. I'll line up my black felt pens. If the worst comes to worst, I'll change the typewriter ribbon. And finally I begin."
She shares her love of words and language, the "paints of the writer's pallette" as she refers to them. "Without words we cannot tell stories. We can hug and kiss, but we cannot say, ?I love you.' We can look at the glory of the sunrise or the brilliance of the stars, but without words we cannot ask, "Who made you?"
" . . . I am a storyteller, and that involves language, for me the English language, that wonderfully rich, complex and ofttimes confusing tongue. When language is limited, I am thereby diminished, too."
This book combines the practical, with the inspirational, in a format that makes it easy to pick up and enjoy a dose of reality or a moment of reflection. L'Engle's wisdom and reflections in Madeleine L'Engle Herself have "served a gift" to every writer.
- Mary E. Pearson, is an acclaimed Young Adult novelist and author of David v. God and Scribbler of Dreams. She lives in Carlsbad, California.
Story Sparkers: A Creativity Guide for Children's Writers by Debbie Dadey and Marcia Thornton Jones
STORY SPARKERS: A CREATIVITY GUIDE FOR CHILDREN'S WRITERS By Debbie Dadey and Marcia Thornton Jones Write for Kids Library Writer's Digest Books Copyright 2000 ISBN 1-58297-019-X
Many books on writing are great in theory, but disappointing in practice. Not so with STORY SPARKERS: A CREATIVITY GUIDE FOR CHILDREN'S WRITERS. Debbie Dadey and Marcia Thornton Jones, authors of over 75 books for children, offer practical advice and fun exercises in their aptly named "creativity guide." STORY SPARKERS helps you recognize that each writer has a cache of great ideas, how to mine those ideas, and how to transform those ideas into entertaining stories for children.
Each chapter of STORY SPARKERS builds on the previous chapter, and provides information in a logical sequence. This set-up allows a beginning writer to gain an overview of the world of writing for children, along with some basic tools for writing, and it provides the more experienced writer with a refreshing primer that can be dipped into at any point along the way.
Dadey and Jones explain how the logical, linear and literal left hemisphere of our brain (our personal critic) and the creative, random and metaphorical right hemisphere of our brain (our muse) can be provoked into working together. They offer and explain a number of strategies that can help a writer generate ideas. Exercises range from the typical, such as brainstorming, webbing, freewriting and listing, to the unique, such as "thinking small," "pet peeves," "in my shoes" and "musical muse."
Okay, your mind is sparking! But what next? Before launching into the elements that comprise a fiction or nonfiction piece (such as character, plot, setting or conflict), Dadey and Jones offer a reassuring chapter called "A Famous Author Once Said . . ." -reassuring because published authors relate how they took their ideas and turned them into stories, a process believed to be a daunting task by most new writers. The stories these authors share are inspiring because they illustrate how you can take the everyday details of your own life and turn them into delightful books for children.
As with most books on writing, a number of chapters in STORY SPARKERS deal with the process of writing, revision and manuscript preparation. Dadey and Jones take these "nuts and bolts" of writing and explain why it is NOT just good ideas that make good writing. As with any creative endeavor, the fundamental tools help you write with confidence. Dadey and Jones assert - and rightly so - that ideas and talent might help you develop a vision of what you want to create, but wielding the fundamental tools "help you sculpt your story into a solid piece as you write." Always good advice.
In every chapter, STORY SPARKERS offers charts, lists, examples and summaries that take the instructional aspect of the book and make it more palatable for the reader. Especially helpful are the "Try It Yourself" exercises offered every few pages. These exercises take the theories presented and offer concrete ways to put them to practical use. Instead of spending time only reading about writing, STORY SPARKERS - and the "Try It Yourself" exercises - will help any aspiring writer take their own ideas and run with them.
- Candace Browning Moonshower is an Army brat who taught herself to type the summer she turned eight, knowing even then she would write. Now a graduate student, she studies English and writes both fiction and nonfiction, with a particular interest in the cultural aftermath of the Vietnam War.
It's a Bunny-Eat-Bunny World by Olga Litowinsky
IT'S A BUNNY-EAT-BUNNY WORLD by Olga Litowinsky Walker & Company, 218 pp., $14.95 ISBN 0-8027-7523-3
Review coming soon.
Click on the cover to buy your copy from Amazon.com!
FEATURED REVIEW
THE COMPLETE IDIOT'S GUIDE TO PUBLISHING CHILDREN'S BOOKS SECOND EDITION by Harold Underdown Alpha Publishing 2004 ISBN: 1-59257-143-3 $16.95
Harold Underdown is an editorial consultant who has worked with some of the most respected houses in children's publishing. In his spare time, he runs The Purple Crayon (www.underdown.org) and is the webmaster for Kindling Words, an annual retreat for children's writers, illustrators, and publishing professionals.
Beginner and intermediate children's book creators will learn all kinds of things that will help them build their careers, from the basics of manuscript and portfolio submission to tips and tricks for building a book sale into a career. Using his own experience and that of other more experienced authors and illustrators, Underdown treats readers to great advice on publicizing their own work, getting the most out of their story ideas - is it a series? - and practical knowledge like vocabulary and other sidebars that will help even the most neophyte rookie learn how to present themselves as a professional.
You can read some sample chapters at Underdown's site: http://www.underdown.org/cig.htm If this isn't already on your professional resources bookshelf, it should be.
Grants for the Serious Writer, 3rd Edition - $8.95 (138 pp)
Publishers for Poets - $7.95 (100 pp)
Funds for the Fiction Writer - $7.95 (102 pp)
Funds for the Essayist - $7.95 (90 pp)
The No Fee Contest Book, 2nd Edition - $7.95 (68 pp)
'Tis the Season - $4.95 (68 pp)
The Freelancer's Guide to Finding Writer's Markets - $12.95 (110 pp) Includes online writing markets, writers' guidelines, and a directory of over 100,000 publications!
