I was honored last month to be featured inWriters’ Forum magazine’s “Where I Write” feature. Originally, my husband created my dream writing space at home. He built glass-door bookcases and wainscoted the walls and lugged in a comfy green couch to set alongside my desk. But then we had triplet sons, and that space was […]

I love the “How Writer Write” podcast. Host Brian Murphy excels at leading great discussionabout writing practice and process. We get into that in this episode, plus we dig into the question “What makes a story ‘Young Adult’?” and I get to talk about what it’s like to think like an editor. It’s a fabulous […]

I shared some predictions for children’s literature market in the January edition of SCBWI INSIGHT, a monthly enewsletter for members of the Society of Children’s Books Writers and Illustrators. INSIGHT features current children’s book hot topics, helpful hints, exclusive interviews and monthly contests. When talking about likelihoods for 2021, emerging trend-lines are intriguing to extend […]

I’m honored to have created a new class for Children’s Book Insider: “10 Things That Get Kidlit Manuscripts Rejected – and How to Avoid Them.” It will be 90 minutes of deep-digging writing tools for writers of picture books, chapter books, middle grade and young adult — fiction and nonfiction. I’ve got you all covered […]

I’m pleased to announce that I’ll be presenting the fifth workshop in the Society of Children’s Books Writers & Illustrators’s second Digital Workshops series. The series is for current SCBWI members, and is free — an offering for members during this unusual summer of lockdown and creative challenge. My workshop will be “Submissions Studio: Writing […]

My article “2019: A Year in Review” has been published in SCBWI’s Winter 2020 edition of THE BULLETIN. That’s a biannual publication provided to members of the Society of Children’s Books Writers & Illustrators. The article is a children’s publishing industry overview, examining events and trends of 2019. I’m honored that SCBWI trusted me to sum […]

I’m excited! SCBWI-Austin invited me to present a submissions webinar as we settle into the new year with resolutions and recommitment. It’s called “Writing Queries, Strategizing Submissions, and Interpreting Editorial Feedback“ The webinar will be for writers of all children’s book categories, for beginners as well as advanced writers looking to perfect their submission package and strategy. I’ll […]

I’m honored to be a Guest Blogger on the amazing Cynsations blog today, with my post “Deborah Halverson on Viewing Narrative Beats as ‘Revelatory’ Beats in MG/YA Fiction.” There so much power and potential in those moments between lines of dialogue — the beats. I explore that in the guest post. Here’s a snippet: “Perhaps we […]

  My website designer and I have been hard at work all summer on a little something fun: a fresh new look for DearEditor.com, my writers’ advice website. I unveiled the redesign today. Huzzah! It’s been a labor of love. This designer, Theresa, was the first person I told of my plans to create the […]