Today’s release of the hands-on how-to book for middle grade and young adult writers Writing Irresistible Kidlit (Writer’s Digest) gifts Moveable Type literary agent and KidLit.com creator Mary Kole with yet one more title: Teaching Agent-Author.
Subtitled The Ultimate Guide to Crafting Fiction for
Young Adult and Middle Grade Readers, Mary’s
interactive book offers up a bevy of agent-learned tricks, treats and best of
all tools certain to help writers learn and hone their craft as well as their
world. She shares writing exercises,
candid commentary and a collection of book excerpts and personal insights from bestselling
authors and editors who specialize in the children’s book market.
Mary joined Movable Type from the Andrea
Brown Literary Agency where she distinguished herself as an inventive and
entrepreneurial agent. Her books include
author-illustrator Lindsay Wards’ When Blue Met Egg (Dial),
Emily Hainsworth’s YA debut Through to You (Balzer + Bray) and Dianna
Winget’s A Smidget of
Sky (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt). KidLit.com was named one of Writer’s Digest’s
Top 100 Websites for Writers; over 50,000 readers visit the site monthly.
This being Halloween, a favorite holiday of
just about every children’s book writer and teacher I know, I consider Mary’s
answers to my questions both below delicious, calorie-free Treats and
writer-friendly Tricks, plural.
For one more Treat, be sure to read my P.S. for news of our TeachingAuthor Book Giveaway of the 2013 Children’s Writer’s & Illustrator’s
Market (Writer’s Digest) which includes two of Mary’s
articles - “Crafting
a Query” and “Building Your Author Platform.”
(1) How did you become
a Teaching Agent-Author?
I became an agent after reading for free at an agency to learn more about the
publishing business. But I've always been passionate about teaching others, so
I knew that I wanted to pass on what I was learning to writers. The publishing
business is often difficult to wrap one's head around, so I wanted to pull back
the curtain a little bit. I understand things better once I articulate them and
explain them to others, so the teaching aspect of my work has also been
invaluable to me.
(2) Why and how did
your book come to be?
I started out as a writer, so part of it was definitely yearning to be a
published author. But the book also became a personal challenge: Do I have
enough to say about the writing craft and can I say it in a way that it earns
its keep on my readers' writing reference shelves? I hope the answer to both
questions is "yes," of course, and I'm excited to see the reactions
once the book is out in the world. Since I was doing a lot of programming and
teaching for Writer's Digest, publishing the guide with them was a natural fit
and the process of actually getting the book deal was easy. The process of
writing it, though, took a lot more stress and work, but I'm very happy with
the finished product.
(3) What are the Top
Three problems you note in manuscripts when you’re reading as an agent?
Beginnings are tough to do well, and I often notice that writers don't start
with a strong sense of the present moment and present action. A lot of
beginnings have tons of backstory and info-dumping and not enough conflict to
hook a reader in. In terms of character, writers can always work on motivation
and objective--a really strong reason for characters to be doing what they're
doing, and an overarching goal that they work toward in the story. In a prose
sense, I often find myself giving the following note: "You are saying
something fundamentally simple in an overly complicated way." Not
everything needs to be a showcase for Writing-with-a-capital-W. Sometimes
there's style in simplicity.
(4) What are the Top
Three writers’ questions you receive at www.kidlit.com?
Questions about query letters are always popular, and this is the first
resource I end up sending to writers:
http://kidlit.com/2009/08/05/writing-a-simple-compelling-query/
Other than that, I've been answering writing questions on the site since 2009 and there are a lot of different concerns that writers have. I don't know if I can pick the runners up in terms of popularity.
To really help writers individuate characters and think about voice, I like to
ask them to describe the same scene or landscape from the POVs of two different
characters. Think about syntax, word choice, what each character notices and
how. This often drives home the point that each fictional person is unique and
has a very distinct lens that should inform every choice that a writer is
making.
I'd love
to say "reader" but, to tell you the truth, there is no better way to
frustrate one's love of reading than to actually work in publishing, where you
are reading more than you ever thought possible and under time constraints. So
I'll say that my favorite hat is "cheerleader," because there's no
better feeling than believing in a project and championing it through to
publication.
Thanks, Mary Kole, for the opportunity to bring you and your
new book Writing Irresistible Fiction to
the attention of our TeachingAuthor readers.
Happy Halloween!
Esther Hershenhorn
P.S.
Trick or treat? You
bet! We’re giving away one copy of the 2013 Children’s Writer’s & Illustrator’s
Market (Writer’s Digest)!
You must follow our TeachingAuthors blog to enter our
drawing. If you’re not already a
follower, you can sign up now in the sidebar to
subscribe to our posts via email, Google Friend Connect, or Facebook Network
blogs.
There are two ways to enter:
1) by a comment posted below
OR
2) by sending an email to teachingauthors [at] gmail [dot] com with "Book Giveaway" in the subject line.
Just for the fun of it, and since we’re offering a Writer’s Book, share your #1 chocolate Trick or Treat candy. J
1) by a comment posted below
OR
2) by sending an email to teachingauthors [at] gmail [dot] com with "Book Giveaway" in the subject line.
Just for the fun of it, and since we’re offering a Writer’s Book, share your #1 chocolate Trick or Treat candy. J
Whichever way you enter, you MUST give us your
first and last name AND tell us how you follow us. If you enter via a
comment, you MUST include a valid email address (formatted this way: youremail
[at] gmail [dot] com) in your comment. Contest open only to residents of the
United States. Incomplete entries will be discarded. Entry deadline is 11 pm
(CST) Wednesday, November 7, 2012. Winners will be announced Friday, November
9, 2012. Good luck to all!