Picture Book Workshop Right Around the Corner!

The picture book market is highly competitive, with thousands of writers attempting these deceptively difficult works of art. Southern Breeze PAL members Randi Sonenshine and Dori Kleber will teach you two ways to make your picture book one that editors and publishers will want.

First, Randi will present strategies to ramp up the value of your picture book for today’s busy teachers. She’ll share insights into how and why teachers use picture books, as well as which content, structures, and features matter most in today’s classrooms. You’ll also learn which literacy skills and standards span multiple content areas and grade levels and how to seamlessly incorporate these into your picture books, giving them a life far beyond Circle Time.

Then, Dori will show you how to craft a satisfying narrative picture book using the classic “Hero’s Journey” story arc, first imagined by Joseph Campbell. Although many associate the Hero’s Journey with epic stories like “Star Wars,” you’ll see that its framework is equally useful for taking a character through a story that’s only 32 pages long. You’ll learn to recognize the Hero’s Journey in mentor picture book texts and apply it to your own manuscript to strengthen your story arc.

Dori and Randi will devote the final part of the workshop to providing feedback on the opening pages of picture book manuscripts submitted by attendees. Please bring a manuscript in progress if you want to participate in this “First Pages Critique.”

Picture Book Workshop
Saturday, Sept. 16, 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.
Marietta, Ga.

 Registration: SCBWI Southern Breeze

#SpringMingle - Come Make Your Illustrations Soar w/ Loraine Joyner - #SBreeze17

Come Make Your Illustrations Soar with Loraine Joyner

Southern Breeze is pleased to announce that Loraine Joyner, former Art Director for Peachtree Publishers, will be the judge for the Liz Conrad Scholarship for Springmingle and Illustrators Day '17, and will participate in the Quickfire Portfolio review on Illustrators' Day. She will also be available for private portfolio reviews.

An added bonus for this year's Liz Conrad Scholarship includes a mentorship with Loraine for the winning illustrator. The winner of the scholarship will work with Loraine to complete the following in accordance with specified formatting and deadlines:

● a picturebook storyboard, including main character sketches and selection

● roughs for a selected scene

● final drawing of a scene

● final finish of a scene

● 3 character finishes of the main protagonist showing 3 distinctly different emotions, each from a different angle or point of view, but with no settings or secondary characters

The Mentorship will include meetings in person, skype, email or phone and will reflect what it would be like to work with an AD on a picture book project complete with required format specifications and deadlines to meet.

What an amazing opportunity for a lucky illustrator!

REGISTRATION IS NOW OPEN! Click  :::HERE::: to log in and register.

~See you in March~

Announcing 8 on Eight!

Announcing 8 on Eight!

As writers, we all know how important it is to polish our opening lines. But that’s sometimes easier said than done. How do we know we’ve hooked the reader? How can we be sure an editor is going to fall in love with our material? (At Spring Mingle, Senior Editor Stacey Barney said she knows on the first page if she’s going to offer on a manuscript––the very first page!).

Don’t panic!  8 on Eight is here to help. Designed by members of The Winged Pen, this monthly contest is designed to give one lucky kidlit (PB, MG, or YA) writer feedback on his or her opening 8 lines from at least eight experienced writers.

To enter this month’s contest, simply leave a comment on their blog, after 8 pm est tonight. But hurry! Entries will be drawn from the Triwizard cup at 8 pm on May 1^st.

:::Leave a Comment:::

Let us know what you think of this contest.

What other contest do you know of that you would like to see featured?

Leave us your thoughts!

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The Southern Breeze Mentorship Program Wants YOU!

You’ve been writing for years. You’ve learned so much from the conferences and workshops you’ve attended. Your critique group says you are right on the cusp of getting published. You just need something . . .

The new Southern Breeze Mentor program might be just the thing to help you get over the hump!

Of course, a mentorship can’t guarantee that your manuscript will land in the right hands at the right time. That would take a magic wand. But months of mentoring by a well-published author can help you polish your words and see your work more clearly.

We have mentors waiting in the wings in most every juvenile genre PLUS grant writing! I would imagine this program would be especially helpful for novelists. It’s difficult for a critique group to provide in- depth feedback on an entire novel, generally hearing only 1-2 chapters per meeting. And the other alternative – hiring a freelance editor for a novel is cost prohibitive.

Our talented pool of mentors includes:

Heather Montgomery, NF and Grant Writing
Vicky Alvear Shecter, Novels and Nonfiction
Susan Nees, Chapter Books
Jodi Wheeler-Toppen, Nonfiction and Magazine
Karen Kurtz, Nonfiction and Grant Writing
Nancy Raines Day, Picture Books
Kami Kinard, MG Novels
Irene Latham, Poetry
Jo S. Kittinger, Picture Books, Fiction or NF

Beyond the fact that these authors are successful in their fields, they also each have a teacher’s heart. They want to invest in the next wave of writers coming up the ranks. That attitude is what makes SCBWI such an amazing organization. We all want children to have the best books possible, whether or not it is you or I that writes it.

Learn more about the Southern Breeze Mentor Program on the website. It’s not too late to apply!!

~Jo S. Kittinger
Mentorship Coordinator