Cardiff Children’s Literature Festival: Writing for Children & Getting Published
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Zoey and I recently attended Cardiff Children’s Literature Festival: Writing for Children & Getting Published at City Hall. We had a really enlightening experience, so I thought it would be a good idea to share it with you!
Cardiff Children’s Literature Festival: Writing for Children & Getting Published
Writing for Children & Getting Published involved two key speakers, Rachel Leyshon from The Chicken House and Joanna Nadin, author of over 70 books, including Penny Dreadful and Joe All Alone, and the event was chaired by Claire Fayers, author of Stom Hounds.
We attended this event with the intent of focusing on our joint projects, but ultimately the talks left me with a huge sense of shaking up my own novel, The Moss Garden.
The conversations that occurred were very insightful, and I thought I’d share some of the tips that stood out ot me on the night…
Writing for Children & Getting Published : Top Tips
#1 : Include food in your writing. This one really stood out to me because I LOVE reading about food and people eating. It really makes sense to talk about food and eating, because it’s something people do everyday! It also offers another sense to the writing, so you could also think about sight, sound, smell too…
#2 : Dialogue. Listen to people when you’re out and about, how they talk, interact, boy language. It all adds to the vibe of your scene.
#3 : Enter competitions. There’s loads online, you just need to google ‘writing competitions’ or ‘free writing competitions’ and you’ll find what you’re looking for. They can be a nice way to get noticed and potentially published!
#4 : Take a few risks. Cut the book down or even take out the first two chapters to get right into the heart of the story. If it doesn’t work, you can always pop them back in, but it’s worth a try, right?
#5 : Don’t give up your day job. Booo, I’m not keen on this one, but books (especially first time novels) don’t pay as much as we’d like unless they take off like Harry Potter or The Hunger Games. So, keep plugging away, but always have another source of income to keep you afloat. But, don’t stop dreaming, you never know… đ
So, they’re the top 5 tips from the event, but to find out more you’ll need to book a ticket for yourself for next year’s masterclass!
We really enjoyed the various talks and stories, it was really insightful and inspiring. I think it would have been great to have had a self publishing expert on the panel too, just for a different point of view… But there’s always next year!
Did you go to the Cardiff Children’s Literature Festival: Writing for Children & Getting Published event? Tell me your thoughts in the comments below….
