The Writing Year Ahead
A fun year ahead with several conference assessments, pitch sessions and a writing bootcamp. First cab off the rank is my CYA bootcamp with Lorae Fossy an editor from Scholastic. For those who haven’t done a writing bootcamp before, it is basically a case of submitting a story or two for critique by an editor who provides feedback that you can then work on straight away for further feedback on how you have responded to the first round. It’s truly an exhilarating way to spend a day. I’ve done a bootcamp with Lorae previously and found her to be brilliant. I thoroughly enjoyed the process and am looking forward to working with her again.
After than I have two further CYA sessions ahead which are both assessments. One with Kate Chisholm from Five Mile and another with Dani Vee from Larrikin Press. I chose these two this year because I’ve not really crossed paths with them before other than to have heard them speak on publisher panels. Both publishers have quite strong flavours of work they produce, which I don’t feel I fit neatly into, but I think there’s a lot of value in hearing from people outside of your tracks. They often hold gems of wisdom that may spark a crucial change in the work or even a new direction.
It Anniversary Time!
20 years for CYA and 10 for KidlitVic!
Next comes the KidlitVic conference and a double pitch session with Alyson O’Brien and Pooja Desai. Alyson is the publishing director with Little Book Press and is one of those incredibly talented publishing professionals with a wealth of experience and all round humans I would love to work with. And Pooja will be the first design director I will have pitched to in one of these events. She is the Design Manager for that force of nature in publishing that is Hardie Grant, so I am very much looking forward to her views.
Other than these specific sessions the both conferences have a range of panels and masterclasses which I will attend as many as time allows. I’m a veteran of several of these conferences now and have always gained important industry insights both general and specific to my work. If you’re a newcomer I couldn’t recommend them more.
Other than these great boosts in the year I will be working on 3 more picture books, one of which is my first nonfiction! Exciting times ahead!!
