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Michael Hyatt, CEO of Thomas Nelson Publishers is someone who truly gets it.  Rather than run from the future, he's embracing it — and he's got some great advice for writers who want to succeed in this changing landscape.

He recently sat down for a fascinating interview with David Siteman Garland on his web show Rise to the Top.  It's well worth your time, as it's filled with tremendous insights and encouraging words.

Some examples:

• On his outlook for the future: "This is the best possible time to be in the publishing business"
• On why social media makes it easier to find readers and buyers "Now, you can know who they (your readers) are, you can connect with them directly.  It's unfiltered and, best of all, it's mostly free."
• On e-books vs. printed books:  "I'm format agnostic. I just want to get the content to the most people."
• On what he looks for in new authors:  "After content, I look for the authors 'platform'"   (He's referring to the author's reach through blogging, Twitter, Facebook, e-mail lists, etc.   That's important to know — publishers will look kindly on authors who can reach buyers quickly and in large numbers.)
• On his philosophy: "Change is inevitable.  You can lean into it or lean away from it."  Needless to say, he's a big fan of leaning into it!

Watch the interview here:  http://blog.therisetothetop.com/2011/01/michael-hyatt-on-the-future-of-publishing-publishers/

Whenever a group of children's book authors gather together, the conversation inevitably turns to the current state of publishing. More to the point: What exactly is a children's book these days? And — perhaps the most important question of all — Do I have to join the e-book craze?

No, you don't have to jump into the deep end of the cyber pool, but it wouldn't hurt to get your feet wet. And don't despair; you'll have lots of company in the shallow side. Authors of all levels (along with agents, publishers and bookstores alike) are trying to get a clear picture of the growing and evolving electronic publishing industry. Some embrace it and manage to weave every new development into their publishing platforms; others are content to let their publishers issue electronic versions of their current print books. But everyone can agree on one thing: e-books are here to stay.

The way I see it, authors have two choices: wring their hands and wax nostalgic about the good old days when there was one sanctioned way to get published, and an author's job was to write, period; or open their minds to e-publishing and use it to their advantage. We're on the brink of a revolution here, one that will change who's in control, how much power the gatekeepers have, and how level this new playing field really is.

This conversation's just beginning, and it won't end for a long time. But to get things started, author Laura Ruby elegantly sums up the newest e-publishing trends, statistics, pros, cons and fears of the apocalypse in her post "It's the end of the world as we know it, and I feel…?" on the e is for book blog. Read her post, follow the terrific links, and then think about where you fit into the revolution.

Oh, and the writing part? Authors still have to learn their craft, polish their prose, and revise like crazy, just like in the old days. Some things, thankfully, never change.

My eight-year-old daughter is a scientist. This isn’t a career choice. This is just a fact of her being.

When she was 18 months old, she accidentally pulled on her sensitive big brother’s hair.

He cried!

Another child might have felt guilty or might have been upset. Not my daughter. She had only one possible reaction:

I wonder what will happen when I do that again!

And again and again.

Fast forward seven years, and she’s a regular exhibitor at our county science fair. If I want her to practice her penmanship, we do science. If she learns new words, it’s through science.

In the midst of this we had an accidental book club. We’re homeschoolers, and we do a lot of driving. Those two combined mean that we love audiobooks. I balk at the high price tag, so we get most of our audiobooks from the library. This means that more often than not, we listen to whatever happens to be on the shelves.

Unintentionally, two of the books we listened to were about girls who love science.

The first was The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate. This lovely book by Jacqueline Kelly covers nearly a year in the life of a girl living in rural Texas at the turn of the 20^th century. She forms an unexpected alliance with her grandfather, an amateur naturalist, and becomes entranced with science the way that some girls now become entranced with teen idols.

This positive portrayal of a girl scientist in a place where she is so completely out of place is riveting. Not only did it inspire more interest in evolution and botany in my already science-loving kids, but it presented the role model of a girl who is a scientist against all odds.

The second book, The Green Glass Sea by Ellen Klages, is also historical, set in Los Alamos as scientists work desperately to create the “gadget” that will end the war. Dewey is a born scientist also, in this case, an inventor. She loves to create her own gadgets, and largely ignores the taunting of the other kids. When she is unexpectedly required to spend a few weeks living with another family, she forms an alliance with another misfit girl, who is finding her calling as an artist.

Sea and Tate are very different books. In Tate, the negative pressure on the main character comes largely from adults. In Sea, however, adults are largely charmed by Dewey’s inventiveness, but the kids are just short of brutal to her.

In both books, however, today’s girl scientists can see girls sticking to science because it is what calls to them. Interestingly, both books almost ignore the girls’ schooling, which seems tangential to their real lives. Read more

Ever wish you could give your book's setting that "you are there" feeling, but can't afford the plane ticket to do the in-person research? Now you can experience the next best thing: virtual travel. If you have an iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch, the Live Cams app connects you to live web cams all over the world. Type in where you want to go and get an instant, live scene on your screen. You can even turn and zoom the camera!

Skeptical? Watch this YouTube demo and be amazed!

Wanna see something cool?  Have a gander at the Kno – a gadget that's currently being marketed to students and educators as a textbook/notebook replacement.  The current incarnation is pretty expensive and much more than an e-reader, but imagine the possibilities of this thing stripped down a bit and used for children's books:

Editor's note: Audrey is a 13-year-old student from California who is currently working on her own novel between school, sports and choir. She's also a Contributing Editor to Write4Kids, focusing on middle grade and YA literature. If you have writing-related questions for Audrey, or want to suggest a topic for a future column, please contact Laura at Laura@write4kids.com.

Hi!

Since I’ve received some questions from YA writers, I’ve decided to do a Q-and-A post. If you like it, I’ll do more in the future.

Elizabeth asks:

 Do historical mysteries appeal to you at all?

My answer:

I hate to have a cop-out like this, but honestly, it depends. The historical fiction we read in school is so darn boring. Everyone agrees about that. It’s because every single book we read in class has the exact same plot: orphan goes on a “quest” to find their remaining family/find out who they are. Seriously, all the books we read have the same plot, but just a different time period. The Girl Named Disaster (Nancy Farmer), Crispin and the Cross of Lead (Avi), The Sign of the Chrysanthemum (Katherine Paterson), The Winter People (Joseph Bruchac) are some of the books we’ve read, and if you are interested, choose a couple of titles out of that list, read them, and just see for yourself the oddly identical plots.

I know there is an influx of “glam” historical fiction coming into the YA market now. The Luxe (Anna Godbersen) is what, in my opinion, started this influx. But I apologize in advance, because some people now equate insulting The Luxe to dissing Twilight (but dissing Twilight has become somewhat PC now), but I really didn’t like The Luxe. Ok fine, it was superbly researched, but it was just boring, because once you get over the pretty cover picture and fluffy vocabulary, it’s like, “Plot? What plot?”

So I guess it depends. A historical novel I enjoyed was Wicked Girls (Stephanie Hemphill), which was a beautiful novel-in-verse about the Salem Witch Trials. I liked Wicked Girls because the characters were very interesting and entertainingly creepy, and the poetry was stunning. Another that I enjoyed was Abundance (Sena Jeter Naslund), a fictionalized account of Marie Antoinette and the French Revolution (Abundance is listed as adult fiction, but I’d say it is very YA). I liked Abundance because it was very intriguing, and painted the queen in a sympathetic manner. I also enjoyed the semi-insane cast of supporting characters. What I didn’t like about Abundance was that it got really boring and overly political in the middle/end parts.

History has always interested me, but I’ve yet to find a completely engrossing historical fiction novel, which is a shame.

Taurean asks:

What's Behind the Curtain anyway. What is it about Ty that's so irresistible?

My answer:

Behind the Curtain is a very well-written younger YA mystery by Peter Abrahams. Check it out.

Now that I’m over Ty (fickle, fickle teenage girls) I can tell you why I liked him without being all fan-girly.

Ty was awesome because he was a normal badass. Like, he didn’t carry around a switchblade and he couldn’t fly. He was also pretty detached and had his own life, but he was super sweet and/or protective (NOT in a creepy Edward stalker way) to girls. Also, he was the only freshman on varsity football and I found that cool, because, I don’t know, athletic guys are usually pretty cool.

But he did have his issues. He was on steroids for a lil bit there, but he got it all sorted out.

And also somewhere it said that he looked like an Abercrombie model, and that’s always a plus.

So, yeah. That’s why I liked Ty Levin-Hill.

Nancy asks:

From your last post: “A lot of times, the language in YA books seems really dated and not authentic…." Not to split hairs, but a sincere question: Do you mean to refer to YA manuscripts? Or do you actually find recent, published YA books to be dated/not authentic?

My answer:

Both. I remember reading a book a few weeks ago aloud to my mom, and laughing about how out-of-touch it was. And it was published in February. One of the many examples is, “'Oh, nuts,' she sputtered, looking down at her once perfectly creased tan slacks that matched the stripe in her violet sweater vest.”

Actually, I’ve researched, and turns out it’s an entire series of books (I only read the first one). So yeah, books with awfully outdated slang have been published.

Also, I read another book (published last year), and the only sort of slang it had was an abundance of swearing. And trust me, swearing isn’t slang.

Amber-Dawn asks:

You mentioned that you hate it when young people in books have dialogue that sounds like they’re from another time period. Do you feel the same way if a book is written in a fantasy world that is supposed to be from, well, you know, a long time ago? And also, I’ve never tried to do accents before, but you mentioned it’s a pet peeve of yours for writers to sound out the words like an accent would sound. So is it ever cool to try and write a character’s dialogue in the accent where they’re from?

My answer:

I meant that I don’t like it when books that take place in modern times have characters who speak like they’re from another time period. If you are writing a book that takes place in a fictional world or is set in 1853 or whatever, you should definitely have the characters talk like they’re from the past.

I don’t know what you mean by accent. If you’re writing about a character from the South, you should definitely have the stereotypical Southern-isms in it, such as “y’all”. But please don’t write the character’s normal speech like “can yah pah-lease tell me the tahme?” That would be really annoying, like, trust me, as annoying as reading a The Clique book. Because that’s how they talk in those books (for example, “'Uh’v koursse!' said Ah-nna.”)

Tobi asks:

What’s your take on the incursion of “dark” young adult novels?

My answer:

I hate vampires. Sorry. They’re lame. Like, Edward Cullen is the most stalkerish, creepy, epic fail at badass-ness character ever. So he basically killed all curiosity in vampires that I could potentially have. And all my friends feel the same way. Also, Stefan, from the Vampire Diaries, really annoys me because he’s all sensitive but tries way too hard to be a tough guy. And I don’t particularly like werewolves either, but everybody knows they’re dead by now.

Also, the Ellen Hopkins novels (Fallout, Glass, and others) are something that I have absolutely no interest in. People with serious and creepy mental problems don’t interest me. Same with Wintergirls. I don’t particularly like books about mentally disordered people (such as cutters or anorexics), but I do enjoy the books by Mary Downing Hahn, which are interestingly scary.

Don’t follow trends, because trends will be dead and gone by the time your novel is out on the market. So, if you’re writing a book about vampires (dead last year) or werewolves (dead last summer), stop now, hit the Control-f keys to find and replace the word “vampire” or “werewolf” with “guido” and the word “pale” or “furry” with “orange”.

Any other questions? Comment or email!

Audrey

The folks at OnlineCollege.org alerted me to their newest post, 10 Biggest Predictions for the Future of Book Publishing. I'm listing their predictions below with my take on how they apply to children's books (click on the link to read the whole article with additional links):

1. Vanity presses and self-publishing will swell in popularity. As it gets easier (and cheaper) to self-publish, more authors are choosing that route. With children's books, authors who enjoy marketing (especially visiting schools and communicating with their readership via blogs and web sites) find they prefer to cut out the middle man of the traditional publisher. But before you self-publish, do your homework. Know exactly what you'll need to do to promote yourself, and figure out some creative ways to reach your market.

2. More writers and artists will experiment with motion comics. Don't know what I'm talking about? Read this. Motion comics are a natural evolution of the whole comic book and graphic novel craze.

3. There will be little need for gargantuan publishers. The big houses are becoming less relevant as authors and illustrators find new ways of directly reaching the consumer. In children's books, I believe this opens the doors to innovative new formats, subjects, and a redefining of what a "book" is. Kids are more open than adults to trying new things, and they'll embrace whatever clever artists and entrepreneurs create next.

4. More people will be authors. See numbers 1 and 3 above. In the children's/YA field, more teens will be authors in the coming years.

5. eBooks will only get more popular. The genie's out of the bottle on this one. And when you're talking about illustrated books for kids, the eBook format opens up all sorts of possibilities for multimedia and interactive experiences. Now that eBooks have been around a few years, the data should comfort those who predicted the print book was dead: eBook sales have been found to actually increase sales of the print version of the same book.

6. Authors will grow even more media-savvy. Authors don't have a choice, especially when your audience is kids and teens who have grown up on computers. They don't think twice about Googling an author, checking out a new book's web site, or blogging about their favorite reads or recommending titles to their friends on Facebook. Authors who aren't comfortable on these platforms will be left out of the loop.

7. Memoirs expand as a genre. This has always been a more adult-centered genre, but it makes sense that memoirs geared to middle grade and young adult readers will catch on. Kids are more aware of the world and different cultures than in past generations, and accounts of interesting lives by all types of people should be welcomed in schools and libraries.

8. Books will no longer have a minimum length. Word count and page length in children's books are more important than adult books, because we're dealing with shorter attention spans and different reading abilities. However, I do believe that the strict page lengths of picture books will be changing as it becomes easier to print books more cheaply, and as more picture books are produced in electronic formats. This should be good news for authors and illustrators who feel confined by the traditional 32 pages.

9. eBook readers will move further away from E Ink. In other words, eBook readers no longer have to closely mimic the printed page. This is good news for illustrated and interactive children's books, and even novels that can include links, animation and audio within the text to enhance the storytelling experience.

10. More young adult books will hit the shelves. The proliferation of YA titles in the last few years, along with the arrival of new young adult imprints at the big publishers, speaks to the market share teen readers command. This is a generation that loves to read and talk about their favorite books, along with a generation of parents who read what their kids are reading. Who knows when this bubble will burst, but it's sure to be here for a while.

Thanks, OnlineCollege.org, for another thought-provoking article!

Most authors dread the task of writing a query letter. They're rather rewrite their entire novel than try to convey the essence of their story in a few paragraphs that convince an editor or agent to read the whole thing. It sure would be easier if you could see some actual examples of query letters, wouldn't it?

Never fear, help's here. Check out these links:

♦ YA author Corrine Jackson's blog post Query Me Crazy gives readers before and after versions of the query letter that helped her writing career turn the corner.

♦ See another terrific example of a query letter for Helene Boudreau's YA novel Real Mermaids Don't Wear Toe Rings, along with commentary from her agent on how she reacted upon reading the query.

♦ Author to Editor: Query Letter Secrets of the Pros by Linda Arms White, published by Children's Book Insider, offers examples of over 30 query letters for fiction, nonfiction, picture books, novels, magazine articles, book proposals, and letters to agents. The authors also discuss why each letter sold the project mentioned in the query. You can instantly download this e-book for $19.95.

When you read successful query letters, one thing that stands out is voice. If the query has a distinctive voice, chance are the manuscript will too. Query letters need to capture the unique tone and perspective of the work. Remember that you're selling with your query, so make your pitch convincing. Dry, leaden prose will only bring a rejection letter.

Do you enjoy writing poetry?  Are you captivated by lyrical phrases, fresh imagery, and the challenge of telling a story in a few lines?  Children find poetry appealing, and there are several magazines where you can market your verse.  Writing poetry might be your best chance to earn a byline; an editor can respond more quickly to a four line verse than to a 2,000 word article. Why not give it a try?

Many people think poetry has to rhyme. But some of the most memorable poems in literature do not have a strict rhyming sequence. For a helpful overview of poetry and its appeal to children, read A Child’s Introduction to Poetry by Michael Driscoll. Within Driscoll’s book, you will find an overview of famous poets who have appealed to young readers – from Lewis Carroll to e.e. cummings.

You don't need an MFA to tackle a nursery rhyme. It's important to remember that you do not need to use alliteration or other complex poetic techniques when you write for children. And you don't have to be an expert on poetry; you just have to be willing to study the craft and try your hand at it. But never forget that writing poetry for children is a complex and challenging task.

Here are a few tips for turning your rhyme into a publication.

1. Read children's poetry.  Read poems by Karla Kuskin, e.e. cummings, Mary Ann Hoberman, Jack Prelutsky, and Shel Silverstein. It’s important to understand the landscape of children's poetry, so studying a modern anthology is helpful. You’ll soon realize there is a wide variation in this format, and that the topics range from humorous stories to sensitive observations of humanity.

2. Read magazines that publish children's poetry.  Realistically, you can't expect to be the next Shel Silverstein right off the bat. But you can start by honing your craft and understanding the reading taste of children’s editors at magazines like Highlights, Cricket, and Ladybug.  Do these magazines suit your poetic style?

3. Read a specific magazine regularly. Get a sense of the general readership and the poems that have been published in this context during the past year.  But don’t write just for publication.  Write from the heart, and allow your muse to take you to a creative place.

4. Start with a single line.  Think about where this line can go.  Let the poem develop organically. Sometimes it is most effective to start with a topic that young readers can relate to — something to do with school, nature, home, family, fairy tales, or friendship.

5. Write a few rhymes.  See if your poetic style is better suited to a rhyming format.  And consider whether your content is appropriate for young readers.  If a magazine has a particular seasonal theme, consider writing to that topic.  Allow yourself to create verses that might be imperfect. Gradually hone your writing skills to a more professional level.

6. Read your poem aloud.  How does it sound?  Sometimes funny poems are particularly captivating to young readers, but you might also try a serious approach.  Eventually you’ll get a sense of your poetic voice and bring your best lines to the page.

7. Share your poem with a young reader.  How does it sound to her? 

8. Edit your poem.  Be realistic; don't expect to write publishable quality on your first try.  But at the same time, it is important to pursue excellence in your work.  Read your poem aloud again and again, omitting unnecessary words and phrases until it is the best poem you can write at this moment in time. Cut, cut, cut!

9. Study the guidelines of the magazine where you plan on submitting your poem.  Write a cover letter and make sure your work appears professional.  Proofread one more time.  Then submit your work with a self-addressed, stamped envelope, or whatever requirements the magazine requests of writers.

10. Don't play the waiting game.  Writing is an apprenticeship, not a one-time experience.  Continue to read and write poetry, and enjoy the experience.  Writing poetry is about a journey through the imagination, and the satisfaction that comes with bringing a fresh image to the page. Keep living a poetical and observant life!

Dr. Suzanna E. Henshon teaches full-time at Florida Gulf Coast University.  She is the author of several books for young adults, including Mildew on the Wall (2004) and Spiders on the Ceiling (2006).

If you write for young adults, you need to seize every opportunity to keep in touch with your audience. Figment.com is a new site that gives teens a free place to read and write fiction, comment on each others' work, and discover new authors. For a small fee, publishers can post opening chapters of new books, and teens can critique, comment and/or buy the book online. Authors of any age can post excerpts from works-in-progress and get feedback from readers ages 13 and up.

Even if you're reluctant to post your writing online, scroll through the comments readers post about excerpts from new published YA fiction, or read the writings of teens themselves (and offer constructive feedback of your own). You'll get some valuable insight into the teen mind, and you'll be pleasantly impressed at the thoughtful critiques and level of writing from the participants. This can only help you create more authentic YA characters of your own.