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A Writers' Conference

Jessica Burkhart. She's a tween author. That is she writes FOR tweens. She's not a tween herself. Although that's just about when she began her writing career. I attended one of her sessions at the Missouri Writers' Guild Conference this past weekend, and I walked away feeling like I had somehow missed my own wedding twenty five years ago. She's twenty-two (yes, 22) - my son's age. She's had hundreds of articles published and is in the middle of an eight-book deal. Wow. Check out her blog. After I got over my own sluggish debut into the writing world, I realized that she's been able to get this far because she actually sends out queries ALL the time. She doesn't sit back and hope for an answer from the one editor she sent one query to. She has mulitple queries out - according to her, 30 - at any one time. You can't get published if you don't get yourself into an editor's hands!
I know. Brilliant.
My favorite part of the conference was the two opportunities I had to make a pitch. The first one was to the editor of Listen Magazine. Although I didn't have an article idea that fit with their very specific mission (to offer teens healthy alternatives to drugs and alcohol), she was kind enough to give me a couple of ideas for magazines that might be interested in the ideas I had. The second opportunity to make a pitch? That was the highlight. Kate Angelella of Aladin Books (the children's imprint of Simon & Schuster) likes the premise of Antipodia. She wants me to send it to her when I've finished writing it. A real editor of a real publishing house. Wow. Yeah. I'm excited.

By the way, Antipodia is the middle grade novel I began as part of my writing course last year. The details? Well, I'll save that for another blog.

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