When we write fiction, we see the story in our mind long before it’s down on paper. We know why our characters are acting the way they do because we are familiar with their past and in control of their future. We understand the significance of every event in the plot. But sometimes we forget to tell our readers.

Successful fiction is dependent on a logical progression of cause and effect. In real life nothing happens in a vacuum; feelings are a response to an event, action is followed by reaction. The same is true in fiction. Three areas where cause and effect are most important are in the presentation of the main character, the structure of the plot, and the story’s resolution. Read more

The finalists for this years National Book Awards were announced this morning in Chicago.  The winners will be announced on November 19.

Here are the finalists in the Young People’s Literature division:

Chains, by Laurie Halse Anderson (Simon & Schuster)
The Underneath, by Kathi Appelt (Atheneum)
What I Saw and How I Lied, Judy Blundell,  (Scholastic)
The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks, E. Lockhart  (Hyperion)
The Spectacular Now, Tim Tharp  (Alfred A. Knopf)

For more details, visit http://www.nationalbook.org/

Well, this certainly made my morning:

Susan Gray’s wonderful Gottawrite Girl blog has an interview up with yours truly, entitled “SuperSite SuperStars”.  Finally, someone has acknowledged my proper status! 

Many thanks to Susan for this.

Go have a look — and be sure to bookmark Gottawrite Girl!

http://gottawritegirl.blogspot.com/2008/10/supersite-superstars.html

I got my first solicitation from AARP yesterday. I’m not 50 — not even close. Well, I can see 50 peeking over the horizon, but it’s still blurry unless I’m wearing my reading glasses.

Whenever I’m feeling more mature than I’d like, I read children’s books. A great book for kids pulls me right back to my childhood. A stellar novel for young adults makes me feel like a teen again, only now I’ve got some perspective on the experience and can actually laugh about it. And interestingly enough, many of the most popular authors, the ones who really get their audience, are old enough that their own childhoods would be considered historical fiction by their readers (or at the very least, retro).

Two of my favorites are Lauren Myracle, beloved author of contemporary middle grade and teen fiction, and Mo Willems, hero of the picture book and easy reader crowd. Lauren and Mo have got it — they know exactly how to speak to their audiences without sounding like stuffy grown-ups, and yet we could have all gone to school together (OK, just to clarify, I would have been in sixth grade when they were in kindergarten, but I’m sure they were so cool even back then that I would have hung out with them). Read more

As I read this story in today’s paper, my first though was “what a wonderful children’s book this would make”.  Turns out, someone beat me to it.

Angel Girl by Laurie Friedman, illustrated by Ofra Amit (Carolrhoda Books) recounts the story of Herman Rosenblat, a teenager held at a death camp in Schlieben, Germany, and Roma Radziki, a girl living free in the village while her family posed as Christians.  Each day, Roma tossed Herman an apple over the barbed wire.  They never spoke, they never knew the other’s name.  They simply shared a daily act of humanity and kindness in the midst of insanity.

More than a decade later, the two were reunited by pure chance on a blind date.  They married and this year celebrate their 50th anniversary.

This is a story almost perfectly suited for a picture book, where it can be relayed simply and without adornment.  No need to pad the story to 300 pages or come up with enough “backstory” to reach a 90 minute running time.  Just keep it simple and let the events speak for themselves.

Here’s a preview:

Let’s continue our series which will take us, step-by-step, from absolute beginner to published author. The topic of the previous issue: How Do You Define Success? If you missed it, you can read it here.

Today we’ll work to nail down just who our audience really is.

Too often, when we think of “writing for children”, we imagine we’re doing exactly that: writing for all children. Or perhaps we’ve narrowed it down to an age group. But, if you say you’re writing for middle schoolers, are you really writing for all middle schoolers? Pretty unlikely.

Consider this: The best advice for creating a character for your book is to have a full dossier on that character crafted in your head, or perhaps even on paper. How old is she? What kind of clothes does she wear? Does she live in a particular part of the world? What does she like? Dislike? What’s her favorite school subject? What does she like on her pizza? and so on.

Now the character is more than an abstraction, she starts to become real flesh and blood.

So here’s the trick to finding your target reader:

DO THE EXACT SAME THING.

Before you start your manuscript, create two “characters” to represent your potential readership. One boy, one girl. Give each one a name. Imagine their age, their physical appearance, the way they speak and how they dress. Think about what they do with themselves in the hours not spent reading your book. Who are their friends? Who are their antagonists? What else do they read? In what kind of house or apartment do they live? And, most importantly, what are they looking for when they pick up your book? To be entertained? Enlightened? Scared? Tickled pink with laughter?

Don’t start writing your book until these two youngsters truly become real to you. Now, start writing your book for them. Forget the publisher, forget the editor, forget the (hopefully) millions of other kids that will ultimately read your book. Write this book for those two kids.

Not only will the task ahead seem less daunting, you’ll start feeling — almost immediately — a new connection with your readership. And that translates into something every good editor will pick up on immediately: a writer who can reach across space and time and connect with young readers on a one to one basis.

Young adult fiction is hot right now, especially for older readers ages 14 and up. New publishers and imprints are popping up all the time. Be sure to check out our exclusive interview with Evelyn Fazio, publisher of WestSide Books, in the November issue of Children’s Book Insider. WestSide will debut its list of contemporary, realistic teen fiction in Spring 09.

When I teach writing workshops around the country, I meet aspiring authors who want to try their hand at YA, but sometimes feel a disconnect with the grittier, more realistic fiction being published today. They want to study the market, they want to understand the genre and try to write it, but it’s so different from the novels they read as teens that it feels alien to them. Of course, I’m speaking to those of you over 40 right now. You youngsters can just skip to the next post.

Check out Monica Edinger’s Educating Alice blog post about putting aside her personal prejudices and tastes while serving on the Newbery and NCTE Notable Books committees. Judges have to read outside their comfort zones all the time, and they learn to appreciate literature that they don’t think they’re going to like. If the new crop of YA books makes you squirm, but you’re open to learning what they’re all about, Edinger’s advice may be just the ticket.

Here, according to a recent poll we conducted*, are the top three problems facing this nation:

1.  Economic meltdown

2.  Global warming

3.  Lack of podcasts that teach you how to write children’s books.

We can’t do anything about the first two problems, but we’ve got the third one licked.  Introducing the Write4Kids Podcast!   Now you can take our advice with you on your mp3 player, or just listen here at the blog.   It’s free and you get to hear my dulcet tones as an awesome bonus.

Here’s the first installment:  5 Reasons Why You Can’t Become a Writer….and Why None of Them are True

Give a listen, and let us know what you think!

*(margin of error = 99.9%)

Download the podcast by right-clicking this link and selecting “Save as”

So, upcoming movies get their own coming attraction trailers, why shouldn’t upcoming children’s books?

I’ll admit, it never occurred to me before, but having seen this video by author Laurel Snyder promoting her book Up and Down the Scratchy Mountain I’m amazed there aren’t such trailers all over the web.

Get a camcorder, some images from your book and some music and you’ve got yourself a potentially viral video that can help sell your book. Smart, smart, smart.

[Update: I've been taken to task by another blogger for being "behind the times" in the crafting of this post. Yes, book trailers have been around for a while, but I was speaking in the context of children's books, where it's a technique that hasn't really taken off. So when I say "it never occurred to me before", what I meant to say -- I sound like a politician now! -- is that it hadn't occurred to me to use these for a children's book. Laurel's trailer opened my eyes to the possibility, although I'm still not fully sold that a book trailer will be as effective in selling a kids book to a parent as a trailer for, say, a mystery would be in selling it to an adult end-user, but it's worth a shot.

In general, please remember that this is a blog about children's lit, and my observations are crafted through that prism, not through the prism of the adult lit market, which is a very different beast.]

http://laurelsnyder.com/

For many writers, description is a real stumbling block.  Either they offer too little, and fail to create an interesting world for their characters, or they offer too much, and swamp the plot with meaningless detail.

If you’re struggling, I suggest you think about each element of description you provide, and decide whether it adds depth to your story.   Here’s one way:

I happened to overhear my son’s social studies teacher giving advice about a paper his students are currently working on.  The kids are learning about the African slave trade and are assigned to write a few paragraphs from the perspective of a captured man or woman awaiting placement on a slave ship. Read more