February's Inspirational Quote

"One Hour at a Time"
~ Laurie Wallmark.

Dear Laurie,
You might not recall saying this and perhaps I won't remember the specifics but you are our inspiration for the rest of February and maybe even March.

You and I were on the phone and talking about how hard it is to write a novel and as usual I was whining and feeling sorry for my long-a$$ journey. And you told me about how you were working and how busy you were so you wrote your novel one hour at a time. Astounded I said, "You wrote your novel one hour at a time?" And you said, "Yup." And I thought, "Wow... ... ..."

Often times we think we need - or I think I need - huge chunks of time set aside so I can write. Do you do that too? What if we gave ourselves one hour of each day? If it turns into two, well then fine, but if not, at least you still had your One Hour at a Time. So that is the motto of the month, thanks to ours truly, Laurie Wallmark.

We love you, Laurie!

Showing posts with label the 2008 NJ SCBWI June Conference. Show all posts
Showing posts with label the 2008 NJ SCBWI June Conference. Show all posts

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Still Reeling from the NJ SCBWI Conference???

NJ SCBWI RA, Kathy Temean with Jerry Spinelli and his Stargirl, Eileen Spinelli

It was so wonderful to see so many of you representing HCCWIG at the June conference this year (we've added the I to our name for all our Illustrators out there, btw) .

I thought it would be really fun to open up a session at a time to discuss here in the comments section. After I feel we've had a scintillating enough discussion, we will move on to another session, etc.

So please, DO NOT FEEL SHY. We want to hear about your experience conference-goers.


So let's start with Friday - Jerry and Eileen Spinelli. What an adorable writing duo and so down to earth and not full of themselves one bit. They could have said, "We're gardeners," with the same amount of non-egotism then we are multiple award winning authors...
For me my top three take-aways were...
  • when Jerry said he doesn't do rewrites. He begins each day by reading yesterday's pages and then writes forward and repeats until the end. And only then will he read the whole thing. I loved this because it validated for me my process - well at least the reading of yesterday's pages and then writing forward. I have read and re-written my story countless times and I still haven't reached the end. But hey, maybe I'm a Spinelli in the making...

  • when Jerry said, it is a different market now. Writers today are smarter about their craft so it is harder to break in. (I don't know if that made me feel relieved or like throwing up!)

  • and when Eileen read her book aloud to us. I was moved to tears!
  • Oh and (I know I said three, but...) the fact that I probably have one of the coolest end-of-school-year gifts to give to my daughters' teachers - autographed Jerry Spinelli books. How cool a gift is that for a teacher?!

So what about you? What was your take-away from that session?

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