Writing inspiration and the book world

May 2017
Wow, it's been a whirlwind of a Spring!  And what a great few months for writing inspiration!  After I completed The Children's Book Academy picture book writing class, I dove right in and applied for their Andrea Pinkney Scholarship for the Middle Grade Mastery class.  This scholarship aimed to give opportunities for diverse authors to get their stories out there, and guess what?  I won a half-scholarship to the Middle Grade writing class!!  Woooo!  What a great start to a writing class that would change my writing journey.  I went through 4 weeks of learning how to write intriguing characters and a story that would grab the reader from the first page.  It's been an incredible journey learning from Dr. Mira Reisberg and Hillary Homzie, published middle grade author of several books including The Queen of Likes.

April was the month for amazing book events and author signings.  I stumbled upon Jon Klassen's author appearance at my local gift shop in Atwater Village.  It was such a wonder to watch him read to a group of rambunctious toddlers and give a little illustration demo.  He even graciously signed my favorite picture book of his, and gave me advice to publishing picture books.  

I finally attended the Los Angeles Times Festival of books, where I was enthralled by the Middle Grade book talk featuring authors Danielle Davis, Steven B. Frank, Erin Estrada Kelly, and A.S. King.  What an incredible panel of inspiring authors!  I bought three of the middle grade novels, collected more author autographs, and snuck in a few insider questions when meeting the authors.

And to round out my collection of author autographs for the season, I stopped by Leanna Lin's Wonderlands' author event with Genevieve Santos!!  What a sweet and down to earth soul.  I talked illustration and writing with her, got a fun sketch and author signature in her newly published chapter book and bought a wonderful, custom drawing of my husband and I for our upcoming Paper wedding anniversary! 

Whew!  I've really hit the ground running with this writing thing, and I can't wait to see what wonderful, and inspiring experiences summer will bring!