The Writer's Journey - How Long!?!

by Em Lynas

Last year was weird. I signed with agent Amber Caraveo of Skylark Literary and landed a 3 book deal with Kate Wilson of Nosy Crow.

Next year is set to be weirder as I write two more books in the Toadspit Towers series and promote the first.

It feels weird because it’s led me to do a bit of thinking and wondering about time: how it’s passed and how and why I kept writing over...

EIGHTEEN YEARS!

Eighteen years from ‘I think I’ll become a writer!’ to ‘I have a book coming out in August!’

Why did it take me so long? What were my steps? What led me to here? What led me to Toadspit Towers, School for Witches and the deal with Nosy Crow. If I'd known it would take so long would I have even started?

Let’s go back to 1999. Yes, the last century! Before the millennium! I was a teacher. A reception teacher who needed to get out.

I had A PLAN! Become a picture book writer and never suffer an OFSTED ever again!

I was obviously an expert in picture books (reception teacher remember) so, I wrote lots of picture books. They were bad picture books. They all lacked something. But not always the same something. They were amateurish.

Some of these books had:

No lead character, tick; no conflict, tick; no plot, tick; no theme, tick.

Comedy? Tick. Yes. They all had comedy.

I kept writing because:

I had great feedback from agents and editors. I even had a near miss from a big publisher. They kept Maybe the Baby for a year and then said no. That was a bad ending. The book’s ending was bad too.

What next? Stick to picture books and learn my craft? Of course not. Picture books were obviously far too hard (everyone said so) and I needed to try something different, something easier.

Aha! PLAN 2 Become a comedy sketch writer.

Link provided to
Lily's Tassels
 on request.

I signed up for a comedy class. It turned out to be less a class and more a boozy gang of very sweary comics (think VIZ but actual live people) led by a not-very-funny outspoken woman with a not-very-funny act that involved extreme piercing and tassel twirling. 

I kept writing because:

This group led to my friend and I meeting with a local comedian who had an idea for a comedy drama script.

Aha! PLAN 3 – Become a script writer.

We wrote the script for From Fags to Riches. Six episode outlines and one full script of episode one. That script is waiting to be discovered. It’s good. One day it may find a home.

This script has:

An interesting premise, tick; a well-structured plot, tick; believable characters, tick; loads of peril, tick; comedy and pathos, tick; well-known actors and actresses interested in taking parts, tick.

No production company deals, tick; it’s not my voice, tick.

I kept writing because:

I was getting a sense of my voice. I had my own ideas. They wouldn’t go away. I’d learned a lot about structure while we wrote the script. But what next? Stick to scriptwriting? Nope. I love books. I love comedy. Mmm. Comedy.

Aha! PLAN 4 Write a book. A comedy for adults.

Mother on the Mantelpiece. I still like this book. Brenda, school secretary, is a middle-aged woman being haunted by her mother who still ‘knows best’ and is ruling her life from the grave.

This book has:

an interesting premise, tick; an unrequited romance with the bloke downstairs, tick; believable characters, tick; comedy and pathos, tick; a beginning, tick.

No plot, tick; no ending; tick.

By now I’d been to a few scriptwriting courses and creative writing courses, and had begun to engage with other writers. I joined the online critique group You Write On and Harper Collins critique site Authonomy.

What a great procrastination! What an emotional rollercoaster. What a waste of writing time. BUT I did learn lessons. It was an introduction to objectivity versus subjectivity. ‘Your characters are so believable!’ ‘Your characters aren’t believable.’ ‘Love your premise.’ ‘Hate your premise.’ ‘Your plot is so well paced.’ ‘Your plot is too frantic.’

I kept writing because:

People at courses and online laughed. They found my writing funny. That was amazing.

Aha! PLAN 5 Write a different book. A really silly book for kids. The daftest book I can write.

I loved Tony Ross’s book Don’t Do That! About a kid who gets their finger stuck up their nose and it reminded me of the saying – If The Wind Changes You’ll Stay Like That! A warning not to pull faces.

And so Gurner Gobbit and the Bloodcurdling Bug-Eyed Jawbreaker was born. This was the first novel that I actually completed. I loved it. I loved Gurner and his recklessness, and his best friend Pete who was obsessed with reporting Gurner’s antics. It was whacky – set in an alternative Lancashire where extreme face pulling was the norm. But certain faces were BANNED as too dangerous. Pulling the BANNED faces had consequences.

This book has:

A ridiculous premise, tick; bonkers characters, tick; crazy events, tick; comedy conflict, tick; logical plot, tick.

Really poor set up of the events and ending, tick; a protagonist who can’t speak because his face is distorted, tick.

I kept writing because:

I joined SCBWI. Gurner won an honorary mention in The 2010 Undiscovered Voices. An editor saw the book on Authonomy and expressed interest. People thought it was funny.

Next plan. PLAN 6. 6! Get a book ready for the next Undiscovered Voices competition. Maybe twist a traditional tale?

To Destiny or Death! Prince Bob is turned into a frog by the evil Hagatha and it’s all King Fred’s fault!  I love King Fred and his food related idiolect. Another completed book! And it’s in my voice.

This book has:

A big heart, tick; strong characters, tick; a structured plot, tick; conflict and peril, tick; logical set up and motivations, tick; funny dialogue, tick.

A protagonist who can’t speak because he’s a frog, tick. There is now a pattern of non-speaking protagonists. If 2 makes a pattern.

I kept writing because:

To Destiny or Death! won a place in the 2012 Undiscovered Voices competition. I signed with an agent. I had publishers interested. It failed to get past sales and marketing.

Note the date. 2012

We’re now thirteen years into the journey to publication. I haven’t mentioned the other picture books I’ve written, the two teen books planned and not written, volunteering for SCBWI, setting up the poetry website the funeverse with SCBWI friends, joining the blog Notes from the Slushpile with even more SCBWI friends. I'd become very busy at being a writer.

Back to the timeline.

This was a dip time. A bit of a depressing time. I considered not writing. I felt I knew what I was doing now. I understood structure, set up, characterisation etc etc etc but I was failing at the last hurdle – being published. It was very difficult to maintain any enthusiasm for submitting and sharing my work with the publishing industry.

I kept writing because:

I still loved writing and I had another story. A story that still makes me smile. Florence and the Meanies – Cupcake Catastrophe! I also wrote book 2 Canine Calamity!

Based on the Cinderella dynamic, Florence and her two fairy godmothers must save the princes from the evil Meanies. Florence was a lot of fun to write, especially because the two fairy godmothers Hatty and Dotty are such contrasts of good and naughty. But having parted company with my agent I wasn’t sure I wanted to put Florence (and me) through the submission process. So I worked with my daughter Katherine Lynas to produce an illustrated version for the kindle and we did the layout for a createspace book too. I’ve since withdrawn the book because ... I have a plan for Florence.

These books have:

Everything I want them to have especially warmth, heart, my voice and my daughter's fabulous illustrations.

I kept writing because:

A new character popped up with a very personal and unique story. Daisy knew what she didn’t want. She definitely didn’t want to go to witch school. I wrote her story. I re-wrote it. I wrote it again. That was in 2015.

Then, in 2016 Prince Bob won a SCBWI BI slushpile challenge with Amber Caraveo and she said the magic words – what else have you got? And I answered – I have Daisy! She’s an actress who’s been dumped at Toadspit Towers, School for Witches, by her granny. Amber fell for Daisy. She fell for the voice.

Pg 93 in the catalogue! Click here!

You can read about Daisy on the Nosy Crow website. In August 2017 she will have her book birthday and I will be a published author.

So, EIGHTEEN LONG YEARS! Could I have done it sooner? Was there a short cut I missed? What if I’d done a creative writing degree? What if I’d done an MA? Would I have climbed the learning curve faster? Would I have been published faster? I don’t think so. No. Not me. There was so much to discover and learn. Not just about the techniques of writing but I had to discover my voice, discover what I cared about and discover what motivated me.

I thought comedy was the motivation, I thought I just wanted to make children laugh. But comedy is just the genre I use to write about the things I care about. It just took me a while to discover what those things were. 

What was the main thing that gave me the confidence to keep writing? SCBWI BI. Winning Undiscovered Voices and the Slushpile Challenge was incredibly motivating. I had to be doing something right if I'd won those. And you should never underestimate the power of SCBWI friendships. They just won't let you give up!

If you're writing for children and are a member of SCBWI BI (or Europe) you can enter these amazing competitions for free. Do it.

Em Lynas

Feel free to follow me on twitter and facebook if you are at all interested in books and writing for children. You can nip over to my website emlynas but I'm not often in.

How Big Is Your Slushpile?

By Maureen Lynas

Are you embarrassed by the size of your slushpile? Do you hide it, ignore it, lie about it? DON'T! Be PROUD of it! SHOUT about it. I'm telling you now - MINE IS HUGE!
Why am I telling you now? Well, after reading Candy's latest blog post on the trauma of completing her second book, and seeing ex-lurker Tamsin's comments about writing for six years and not giving up, I was inspired to come clean and reveal all. This is my writer's journey. From 2000 to 2012.

THE WRITER'S (HERO'S) JOURNEY

THE ORDINARY WORLD (2000)

My world was teaching in a primary school. A story lover, child lover, OFSTED hater. A wanna be writer of children’s fiction.

SCBWI Undiscovered Voices 2012: The Launch Party, or The Tale Of The Level Playing Field

by Jo Wyton and Maureen Lynas

Thursday evening saw the launch party of the third Undiscovered Voices anthology. In the anthology are twelve novel extracts (written by thirteen unpublished, unagented authors - including both myself and Maureen) and gorgeous illustrations by six very talented illustrators. Katie Dale has already blogged about the event here, and we don't want to get repetitive! So instead we'll focus on something else, something which came up in conversation a few times during the night.

It seems that one thing agents and editors want, what they really, really want is...

A level playing field.

Or at least they'd like, every now and then, for writers to act as though they're on one.

Because here's a secret (shh... don't tell anyone): agents and editors are people too. I know, shocking news.

The thing is, as writers we are used to sitting behind our laptops and sweating over every sentence, every word, until we don't think we get it any better. Then we send it out, and although we hope against hope for something positive, we inevitably expect to be rejected. If there is the merest sign of anything positive, we climb up to the nearest rooftop and dance a jig.

Now the UV launch party was great for a lot of reasons, but the main one for me was the intermingling of agent, editor and writer. There were no barriers in that room. If we wanted to approach people, we could. If people wanted to approach us, that was even better. So many surprises were had because of that breakdown of the neuroses which normally get the better of writers. Conversations were had that bore no relation to writing, or at least the anthology to hand, and more than that, they were enjoyed. This was a very different world than the one we are used to.

And here’s why. To a writer, the Industry Professional seems a mysterious creature. When we submit work, we think about what the person on the other end might say if they do like it, if they don't, and if they detest it with everything they have. Even if we know what the Professional looks like, we don't tend to think of them in that way when we know they have our work in their hands. We don't think of the person sitting at the other end of the e-mail, we only think about their reaction.

Will they like it, or won't they?

A number of times during the launch party, conversation turned to not only how intense the evening was for both writer and agent/editor, but to how much they were enjoying themselves. Partly, we imagine, this was due to the copious amounts of Prosecco that disappeared strangely fast. But it was also because agents and editors were surrounded by writers who weren’t afraid to talk to them.

Think about things from their point of view. Every month they receive hundreds of submissions. They know that with most of them, they either won't fall in love, or won't think that the book is ready to move on to the next stage. And yet they continue to fight through those slushpiles, because somewhere in there is the writer they would love to represent.

The reason we say 'love' is that for somebody to represent you, they have to LOVE your writing. Agents have to be able to walk in to a room and convince somebody to put money behind you and your book. Editors have to be able to face an acquisitions meeting and convince them all that your book is worth backing. You don't want somebody who likes your book, you want somebody who loves it.

And that's all agents and editors are looking for - writing they love. They want to find writers as badly as writers want to find them.

We wouldn't mind betting that when an agent or editor finds something they can get behind - something they LOVE - they look for the nearest jig-worthy rooftop as quickly as we do.

So next time you are at a conference or workshop, and you are avoiding eye contact with an agent or an editor in the desperate hope that they won't talk to you, go and say hello. You don't have to pitch (although don't tell anybody we said that). You really can just say hello. Act like there's a level playing field, and you never know, one might appear as if from nowhere.

Undiscovered Voices 2012 by Maureen Lynas

Undiscovered Voices

I've just been to the 2012 Undiscovered Voices workshop at Working Partners to meet the team and the other authors who have won this years competition and I'm now all of a twitter so...

#amsogratefulto @saragrant @sarao'connor @karenball @elizabethgalloway who did such a fantastic job organising the 2012 Undiscovered Voices competition.

Sara Grant

A few years ago BI SCBWI volunteer, Sara Grant, came up with the idea for Undiscovered Voices and pitched it to Sara O'Connor who said, 'Yes! Let's do it!' (My words not Sara's but I bet I'm close) 'If just one author achieves publication from the competition then it will be worth the time and effort!' (Their words, or nearly) And so the competition was held and an anthology of story beginnings was created which they sent to all of the agents and editors in the UK. Two competitions later and THIRTEEN authors have been published. Which is just amazing *gasps and smacks forehead*

This year the anthology was also opened to illustrators and six talented illustrators were chosen @juliaGroves @amberHsu @heatherKilgour @shanaNieberg-Suschitzky @nicolaPatten @rachelQuarry.

#amsothrilledtohavethebook

We were given our copies of the anthology as we arrived for lunch at Working Partners *is cool and collected, not!* and we read the judges comments for the first time. *musing on meanings* We were a bit like teenagers comparing texts – What do you think they meant by that? It's good, isn't it? I think so. Yes. Definitely. Hm.

Malorie Blackman

We also saw Malorie Blackman's foreword which shows such understanding and sympathy for authors who are as yet unpublished.  I shall attempt not to stutter when I say thank you. Or blush. Or gush.

I don't think Nick Sharratt has forgotten his early days either judging from his message to the illustrators. Perhaps that feeling always stays with you? *nods*

#amsohonouredtobeinthebookwithauthors @rosieBest @veronicaCossanteli @sandraGreaves @janeHardstaff @deborahHewitt @davidHofmeyr&zoeCrookes @sharonJones @rachelLatham @richardMasson @rachelWolfreys @joWyton

The winners were given a pdf of the UV2012 book to read a few weeks ago *struts at first official proof read*and then *gulps* - the stories were so good! How was I in this book? Was Prince Bob up to it? So many themes covered, so many characters jumping off the page. No one was telling, everyone was showing, everyone was so talented! *faints in disbelief*

#amsonervousaboutmeeting @agents and @editors

The invitations for the book launch haven't been sent out yet but agents and editors are responding to the 'save the date' cards in such numbers that I'm hoping there won't be enough space in the venue for author collywobbles or knocking knees. We could be so squashed there'll be no danger of swooning either. *swoons today to get it over with* then *freezes with fear* at the thought of how many pitches must be made! Jo's going to blog about pitching soon.

#amhavinglotsofquestions for @saragrant and @sarao'connor

Sara and the team took us through each stage of the publishing process so that we knew what to expect if our books were picked up. From 'Hello, Lovely Agent/Editor' to 'Your Book Launch'. They very patiently answered all of our questions (I think I asked a lot!) and reassured us that the agents/editors would be very kind to us on the launch night. *shoulders down and deep breaths*

#amsopleasedtomeetyou @UV2008 and @UV2010 winners

While Sara O'Connor and the rest of the team stuffed envelopes with books Sara Grant took us to meet some of the previous winners who had generously turned out to meet this year's batch for dinner and drinks. They shared their experiences, their high, their low, their inbetweens. They showed their books, accepted our congratulations, wished us well. They hugged, we hugged. They laughed, we laughed. We hugged, they hugged. We laughed, they laughed. Until eventually, full up on bonhomie, we parted company with promises to keep in touch.

#amfinished

And so at the end of the day, we Undiscovered Voices winners of 2012 recognised that the UV team of volunteers had worked incredibly hard to create an amazing opportunity for us and, whatever happens at the launch on the 9th February and in the future, whether we achieve publication or not - a good time was had by all. *smiley grins* Thank you.

#amdoingaPS - @saragrant has a book out! Just in case you didn't know.

Sara Grant

Maureen Lynas also blogs on her own blog which she creatively named - Maureen Lynas

Countdown to Christmas: Our Wishes for Undiscovered Voices Everywhere

Undiscovered Voices

Today is the day twelve undiscovered voices will be revealed ...

We send them huge

congratulations 

and hope they will

leap off the slushpile 

and onto the shelves.

But for all who remain undiscovered 

we offer these good wishes