London Book Fair 2011: Confessions of a Badly Dressed Author

by Teri Terry

This year marks the 40th anniversary of the London Book Fair. The website touts it as 'the perfect place to meet with over 23,000 industry professionals... for three days of education, networking and business opportunities dedicated to making words go further.'

The entrance to the 'deal or no deal' of the publishing industry

And it’s big. But what is it all about? What is in it for the slush pile resident?

I’ve gone for a few years now, and should fess up at the start that I go with two hats on: wide-eyed writer, and because I work as a library assistant. So I go to things like the Children’s Reading Partners roadshow aimed at library professionals (for some reason, they let me in). So I have another reason to be there.

But from the slush pile point of view, I’d say there are three good reasons to go.

One is the seminars. This time I went to two, plus the roadshow mentioned above. Where else can you listen to Philip Pullman talk about the importance of prizes in children’s literature, then realize Malorie Blackman is sitting next to you in the audience?

Another is it is a great place to meet up with other writers you know, or know on-line – eg SCBWI-ites have done this the last two years. It is funny to meet people you’ve only known on Facebook: sort of like blind dating.

A third is really just for the whole experience: to wander past the endless exhibits, see who is who and what they are trying to sell, to get a sense of the scale of the industry we are trying to crack. It is a bit intimidating, but in a good way.

A few things I learned at this year’s LBF:

• Philip Pullman says making the shortlist of a writing competition is an accomplishment; winning is a 'random kindness of providence', dependent on who the judges are and a good dose of chance.
• 90% of searches done by teens on the internet are not done on Google. They are done on YouTube! Must admit I was very surprised at this statistic. It has obvious implications if you write for teens and want them to find you on line.
• if I'm going to keep up this blogging thing, carrying my camera around in my bag isn't good enough: it must come out now and then. Sorry about the lack of visuals!
• it is very entertaining watching how representatives of multiple publishing companies deal with total powerpoint failure.

The Children's Reading Partners Roadshow was brilliant again this year, despite the lack of powerpoint. Each of ten publishing company representatives had five minutes to tell an audience of mostly librarians about their favourites of the year, and there was a warning bell if they got carried away.

It is always very interesting to hear what they pick to talk about. Some had a long list and a few words on each; some only mentioned a few books; some just one, complete with an author in tow to entertain. I did learn the correct way to peel a banana from Andy Briggs, author of a retelling of the Tarzan legend. New books that particularly stuck out to me? I am dying to read Ultraviolet by R.J. Anderson. And, sadly, Eva Ibbotson's last book is out in May: One Dog and His Boy.

And this event was chock full of freebies. This year I sat at the right side of the room - the side with the table of books. I even made the supreme sacrifice of sitting in the front row so I could see what was there, and plan my attack.

What I got: books, proofs & sample chapters: hurrah!

(though all goes to my library, since they let me have the day off)

And we got a few goody bags on our chairs with loads more stuff in, too:

'Stuff'

A final word on the LBF for slush pile residents who may be thinking of going next year: should you come armed with manuscripts? Probably not. Business cards, if you have them? Of course. You never know when you might bump into somebody – an editor in a tea queue, an agent sharing your table at lunch. You might happen along to a publisher's stand just as they have a free minute, and if you're good at schmoozing, it is worth a try.

And finally: I just have to comment on Daisy Frost. I can't help myself. At the end of the Bookseller Daily at the LBF on Tuesday she wrote Agent Provocateur. This is part of what she had to say: 'Outside the rights centre, I spied some badly dressed people holding manuscripts and looking lost. I asked if they needed help. "Yes please - we are authors and we want to get agents. What do we do?" Authors at a book fair? That's like finding a herd of cows going on a daytrip to an abattoir.' And it went on.

OK, while my manuscripts were at home, I did spend a reasonable portion of the day getting lost. And I was in my favourite faded jeans, and will even confess to wearing a hoody. But I love books. As a writer I may look at things differently than many of the busy professionals scurrying from appointment to appointment at the LBF. But to me, this is what is important: the book, and the reader. How you get the book to the reader is what the LBF is all about. But where would all the busy professionals be without the book in the first place? And who knows which badly dressed author may be clutching it: the next big thing that they will be scurrying about trying to sell or acquire at next year’s LBF?

Undiscovered Voices: the Launch!

by Teri Terry

Undiscovered Voices 2012 is open for submissions! And it isn't just any writing competition. Thirteen of the twenty-four children's writers featured in the first two anthologies of winning fiction novels have since either published or are under contract. So join the SCBWI British Isles as quick as you can, and enter! The launch was Tuesday 5th April, and I was there.

We lurked at the bar, then staked out our seats. Waiting, and watching all arrivals: who would the judges be this year? When UV co-editor Sara O'Connor arrived, I was in awe at the number of computers she had secreted about her person to livestream the event for those who could not be there. In addition to being a computer whiz, a UV co-editor and senior editorial manager at Hodder Children's Books, she also introduced the judges and MC'd the evening.

And just who are the judges for 2012?

Apologies for the quality of my photographs! My photographer forgot her camera, so these were taken on my iPod. Left to right, we have:

Literary scout, Dagmar Gleditzsch; Catherine Pellegrino of literary agency Rogers, Coleridge and White, and Sara O'Connor running the show

Julia Churchill of the Greenhouse Literary Agency, and Amber Caraveo, editorial director at Orion Children's Books

Rachel Boden, commissioning editor at Egmont, and Jenny Savill, literary agent at Andrew Nurnberg Associates

Jasmine Richards, senior commissioning editor at Oxford University Press; Joanne Cocadiz, Foyles Children's Books buyer and seller; and reappearances by Dagmar and Catherine.

One big announcement of the evening is that the honorary chair will be none other than Malorie Blackman!

Sara O'Connor asked the judges questions, and we sat on the edges of our seats. Then questions were taken from both audiences - bums on seats, and livestream attendees, who may have been sitting, dancing, or in the bath. Details of the evening have been ably blogged throughout the known universe - I'll include some links at the end.

So I'll just touch on the things that really stuck in my brain.

• they'd really like entries across all age ranges - not just Y.A.
• Enid Blyton and titles with 'Tom' in had the most hits on the judges favourite books lists.
• I'm dying to read The Magnificent Moon Hare, by Sue Monroe (out in Spring 2012): Rachel Boden's favourite recent acquisition. And it isn't just because there is a bunny in it, and it is despite the fact that it is aimed much younger than my usual YA focus. In fact, I'm dying to have Rachel be my editor one day, even it means an age range switch: she described it with such animation and delight.
• books recommended to aspiring writers: Catherine Pellegrino picked one of my favourites, Meg Rosoff's How I Live Now; Jenny Savill, Neil Gaiman's The Graveyard Book; and Julia Churchill, instead of picking one title, said to read broadly - great advice!
• Rachel Boden is looking for solid adventure with humour for girls and boys aged 8 to 10, and survival stories; she is not looking for straight historical fiction or high fantasy (Tolkien copies).
• Dagmar Gleditzsch also wants adventure stories aged 8 to 10; also funny stories, but not too funny: humour must be able to translate to different languages.
• Amber Caraveo has a gap for middle grade adventure series, and is also actively looking for YA for new imprint, Indigo.
• beginnings are VERY important! - first paragraph, first page, first chapter.
• Jenny Savill says common author pitfalls are too many words, not enough words, or not the right words.
• Julia Churchill did FORTY rejections before coming along to the UV launch. She did look rather cheerful!
• in your 4000 word entry, end in a logical place even if that makes it less than 4000 - end of a chapter, or ideal is on a hook or gasp moment.
• Sara O'Connor will count the words in your biography (max 50 words) and synopsis (75 words): don't be tempted to try to squeeze more in, or you will be disqualified.
• I can't get over that 'never sit in the front row' thing. Candy made me do it; I tried it; I'm sorry. It just feels inherently wrong.

To enter the 2012 UV competition, you must be a member of SCBWI British Isles; you must be unagented and unpublished; you must follow all the rules, and send in your submission by 1st June. The judges are all volunteers; co-editors of UV are Sara O'Connor, Sara Grant, Karen Ball and Elizabath Galloway. It has the financial support of Working Partners.

Links to blogs on Undiscovered Voices: let me know any I've missed and I'll add them in!

Scribble City Central

Critically Yours

Who Ate My Brain

Liz De Jager

Thoughts by Monkeys With Typewriters

Almost True

Crime Central

A Blogging Writer!

Julie Day

Follow UV on Facebook!

And Twitter, too.

Incompetence - The Series. Episode Four - Me Competent? Really? WOW! Yay! Maybe.

by Maureen Lynas
NE Regional Advisor SCBWI

Previously on Incompetence - The Series:

Episode One- Unconscious Incompetence

Our very excited Lesser-spotted Red-faced Authors have hatched from their egg of unconscious incompetence and discovered a world in which -

they don't know what they don't know.

Please Note : If you've just read the first episode and found no reference to the Lesser-spotted Red-faced Author blame my incompetence and lack of imagination at the time.

Episode Two - Conscious Incompetence

The fledgling authors discover just how enormous their incompetence is and

they know what it is that they don't know.

Such a lot to learn!

Such small heads!

Episode Three - Happy New Conscious Competence!

They know what they know and don’t they know it! Yippee!

And now for the final episode-

Episode Four - Unconscious Competence. Me? Competent? Am I? Wow! Really?

Meet Flapper. She’s been published!

She’s flown to the land of the Greater-spotted Authors with her book in her beak, and now she wants to know -

Is she a Greater-spotted Author yet and – drum roll for big question – have the flock of Greater-spotted Authors actually achieved Stage four – unconscious competence. Do they instinctively use and apply their knowledge? Because she’s not certain she’s there yet, even though the book is out and the reviews are egg-crackingly excellent.

Does she get an answer? She does. Yes. Then she gets another and another and another until she’s reeling with the confusion of it all.

Then Clever Cluck comes forward to help with some questions of her own.

‘Can an author ever be unconsciously competent when every book is different? What type of author stands the biggest chance of being unconsciously competent? Do you have to be unconsciously competent in everything to write a good book? Was Margaret Mitchell at stage four when she wrote Gone With the Wind?’

One quick tweet and Flapper had an answer, Yahoo!

'According to Contemporary Authors, Mitchell worked steadily on Gone with the Wind from 1926 to 1934, with brief periods of "discouragement" in 1927 and 1934. In April of 1935 she gave the manuscript to Macmillan editor, Harold Latham to read and he sent her a telegram saying that her novel had great potential. It was published in 1936.'

Ten years, thinks Flapper. That doesn’t sound very unconsciously competent at all. I think she was wide awake and full of consciousness. In fact, I suspect much crossing out and redrafting.

‘Then of course there’s Harper Lee?’ says Clever Cluck.

More tweeters join in and Wikipedia’s first to answer.

'Having written several long stories, Harper Lee located an agent in November 1956. The following month at the East 50th townhouse of her friends Michael Brown and Joy Williams Brown, she received a gift of a year's wages from them with a note: "You have one year off from your job to write whatever you please. Merry Christmas." She quit her job and devoted herself to her craft. Within a year, she had a first draft. Working with J. B. Lippincott & Co. editor Tay Hohoff, she completed To Kill a Mockingbird in the summer of 1959. Published July 11, 1960.'

‘So, only four years,’ says Flapper. ‘Maybe there was a bit more competence, or maybe it was a shorter book?’

‘Have you considered some slightly more prolific authors,’ asks Clever Cluck. ‘How about Austin?’

More mad tweeting and Wikipedia is first again with his answer.

‘Jane Austin’s artistic apprenticeship lasted from her teenage years until she was about 35 years old. During this period, she experimented with various literary forms, including the epistolary novel which she tried then abandoned, and wrote and extensively revised three major novels and began a fourth. From 1811 until 1816, with the release of Sense and Sensibility (1811), Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mansfield Park (1814) and Emma (1816), she achieved success as a published writer. She wrote two additional novels, Northanger Abbey and Persuasion, both published posthumously in 1818, and began a third, which was eventually titled Sanditon.'

‘Now!’ Our Flapper is flapping! ‘There’s someone I can relate to! There’s someone who’s been through the stages of learning how to write.’

‘But,’ interrupts Clever Cluck, who’s warming to the theme now. ‘Did the books become more interesting, more engaging, have stronger characters, more complex plots, as she became more experienced? Or did Austen display a tendency towards prolific genre writing.’

‘Aha! Prolific genre writing!’ Flapper feels that she’s getting nearer some sort of answer and her feathers are fluffed. ‘Maybe this is where authors genuinely demonstrate their unconscious competence. What about Agatha Christie? How productive was she!’ This last bit was said as a statement rather than a question.

The whole flock of Greater-spotted Authors is tweeting madly now, Flapper’s still flapping and Clever Cluck's clucking.

And good old Wiki answers with – ‘Agatha Christie wrote 79 novels: 72 under her name, 1 under her second husband's last name and 6 under the name Mary Westmacott.’

Then Jeeves interrupts with a tweet of his own – ‘Christie has written over two billion books worldwide and has been translated into over 45 languages.’

Now that is impressive! thinks Flapper. She must have been unconscious at some point!

Wikipedia’s full of himself as he announces, ‘Barbara Cartland is Queen of the Unconscious Authors! Seven hundred and twenty three books! Her first works seem to have been very different to the books that most readers are familiar with. Cartland published her first novel, Jigsaw in 1923, a risqué society thriller that became a bestseller. She also began writing and producing somewhat racy plays, one of which, Blood Money (1926), was banned by the Lord Chamberlain's Office. But she soon settled down and started to produce novels that proved to be exactly what a lot of people wanted to read,' he added.

‘So, little Flapper,’ says Clever Cluck. ‘What is it these authors have become so adept at? What part of writing have they embedded in their subconscious so that they can write all of these books?’

At that moment (this is turning into a story!) a Masked Agent flew down and landed on a nearby, very conveniently placed, branch.

‘I have the answer,’ he said wisely. ‘These particular authors are unconsciously competent at the following -

They devise characters that can go from book to book.

Agatha Christie’s Poirot and Inspector Japp.

Ian Fleming’s James Bond and M.

Alexander McCall Smith’s Precious Ramotswe and Mma Makutsi.

Or

They use archetypes repeatedly.

Barabara Cartland’s brave and feisty heroine who never the less will require rescuing by the rugged, fearless, yet sensitive, hero.

They keep the structure the same.

Bond - the Hero’s Journey.

Poirot – a murder must be solved, there’ll be clues, red herrings, then a revelation.

Precious Ramotswe – a mystery must be solved, there’ll be clues, red herrings, then a revelation.

Cartland – Woman meets man A and doesn’t like him. Woman meets man B and likes him. Woman realises man B is bad news and man A is the one and only love of her life.

The premise is constant.

Bond – The world is under threat from a supremely nasty villain and Bond must save humanity.

Poirot – Someone (sometimes lots of someones) is murdered and Poirot will find out who did it.

Precious Ramotswe – Someone commits a crime and Precious will make sure they come to justice.

Cartland – Girl falls in love with the right boy.

The voice is consistent.

The author understands how to write, how to use the right tone, relevant motifs, and appropriate dialogue for time, setting and character.

The wise one nods wisely and falls asleep, leaving the flock to wonder – which one am I? And what’s left for my conscious mind to do?

And Flapper is still left with a question -

Am I going to be an author who strives to re-invent the wheel with every book, constantly battling away at my incompetence or am I going to take what I am currently unconsciously competent at and work with it? Where am I on the incompetence ladder?

And the even BIGGER question is - How incompetent are YOU!

Note from the author - I currently consider myself to be extremely consciously incompetent at maths, consciously competent at the aspects of writing that I know about, and I have no idea how much I am unconsciously incompetent at because I try not to think about it.

With thanks to Abraham Maslow for the Fours Stages of Learning.