Mette Ivie Harrison's Blog, page 120

Candace Fleming

Last week Candace was one of the presenters and I got to sit in one of her sessions about writing non-fiction. She told us a simple story from the life of Mary Todd (Lincoln) and then asked us how we would tell it to make it good reading. The problem was that we were not allowed to add anything that was not historically accurate. At all. And that was when I realized why I do not write historical fiction. At all. I write demented historical-based fiction sometimes that no one but me coul...

good news!

So, I said a few weeks ago I had some good news and now I can announce it officially. I have a new two-book contract with Egmont, working with Ruth Katcher, who originally edited and then championed THE PRINCESS AND THE HOUND and THE PRINCESS AND THE BEAR at Harper. I am very excited to be working with her again. The first book is:

TRIS AND IZZIE, a contemporary romance/fantasy that reworks the traditional German legend of Tristan and Isolde with a light touch. Isolde, whose boyfriend is M...

the secret

I asked an editor and a couple of other author/illustrator friends at dinner last night what question they hated most to answer. In fact, everyone had a different specific question, but they were all shades of the same thing:

What's the secret to being published?

There is no secret. Why would there be? There's no secret about becoming a doctor—go to med school. You want to play the piano? Practice. Get a teacher. Listen to CD's. Will you sell a million books if you spend years working ...

conference

I will be at the UVU Forum for Children's Literature Conference Monday and Tuesday this week and will be staying down in Provo, so I probably won't be posting. Hope to see some familiar faces.

need some DVD recs

I watched Defiance and Up in the Air this morning on my epic ride/run and need some more DVD recs for the future. I loved watching Lost Season 5 a few weeks ago, all the episodes in a 6 hour ride. It helped me focus on something else. So what do you have?

marketplace and writerly play

The question beginning writers always seem to ask is, where do you get your ideas? There's not really a good answer for this, because most writers have lots of ideas. The real problem is, how do you figure out which idea is the best one to write right now. Which one are you suited to write? Which one is marketable at the moment? Which one do you have the skills to write? When you've done it a lot, you get a sense of it, but that doesn't mean that you don't still make mistakes.

I think th...

ADOS

ADOS is the term we use at our house to refer to "Attention Deficit--Oooh, Shiny." 14 invented this term essentially to describe herself. I doubt that many people would think of her as ADD these days, but in childhood, she was extremely difficult. Some of my memories of her:

At age 6 months, I tried to feed her cereal or other foods on a spoon. She turned her mouth to the side and refused to open up whenever food approached. Eventually, I gave in and allowed her to use her fingers to feed...

the business of writing

I am frustrated sometimes by trying to explain a writing career to neighbors and friends who do not want to hear an hour-long lecture about Harry Potter and the change in the publishing world children's books and adult genre books, etc. Including various sidenote lectures such as advances, royalties, paperback vs. hardback, shelf life, agents, editors, and why this is a real career and I'm not just lucky and no, I can't give your cousin's manuscript to my editor to get it published.

No one re...

baby lettuce heads

My sister was explaining to me recently why she could not have a vegetable garden. It was because, whenever she went out with a knife to get some lettuce, she stared down at the baby lettuce heads and knew that she would be killing them, KILLING BABY LETTUCE HEADS, just so that she could have some in her salad, and it was too, too cruel to think of.

I asked her if she had the same problem going to the store to buy lettuce. No, she said. Because that lettuce is already dead.

This explained a ...

skills a writer needs

Here is a list of some writerly skills that I do well at, in order of importance:

1. good grammar and spelling, typing quickly (basic, foundational skills from school)
2. listening to feedback (hard-earned)
3. revising (without completely changing)
4. compromising (because I do not have to be right)
5. meeting deadlines/time management/organization (OCD)
6. handling money (frugality from a poor childhood)
7. plot
8. understanding readers (because I am still 14 in my head)
9. cool ideas (What if . . .?...