Yesterday, I attended Books by the Banks in Cincinnati! This
was not only my first visit to Books by the Banks, but my first book festival
overall. Cue the milestone marker! It was a great festival to have as my first,
as it’s intimate, accessible and free.
Of course, I went for the YA authors. There were 17 of them!
By far the largest number of YA awesomeness that I’ve been in the presence of.
After perusing their tables and chatting up some, I attended a few panels, the
last of which was YA Fiction in a Flash. The YA authors in attendance gave us
the down low on their fabulous books, which was followed by a Q&A
session.
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| From left: Emma Carlson Berne, Jody Casella, Cinda Williams Chima, Liz Coley, Lorie Langdon, Carey Corp, Lisa Klein, Maureen Lipinski, Rebekah Crane, Mindy McGinnis, Jennifer McGowan, Tim Mettey |
Here’s some wisdom I gleaned from that session:
On Being a Plotter or
a Pantser
I know the first line and the last line, but the rest is a
mystery. –Mindy McGinnis
I only write scenes I want to read. –Jennifer McGowan
I don’t outline the ending, because if I know how it ends,
I might get bored with the story. –Maureen Lipinski
I start each novel with an outline, but as I get more
confident with the story, I become more of a pantser. –Lisa Klein
I like the process of discovery. –Cinda Williams Chima
On the YA genre
Nobody knows what
the next big thing is until it happens. –Cinda Williams Chima
YA is read by all ages because teenagers are interesting.
–Mindy McGinnis
You feel your teenage years so wholeheartedly, which may be
why adults read YA. –Rebekah Crane
Being a teen isn’t easy, and if you think it is, then you
have no business writing for teens. –Cinda Williams Chima
On Revision
Revision is a completely different skill set than writing.
–Carey Corp
Step away for six months,
if you can. When you finish a draft, you’re too emotionally invested to edit,
which is what needs to be done. –Mindy McGinnis
Never let anyone tell you there’s only one right way to go
about this. Writing is hard enough without trying to shoehorn yourself into
someone else’s method. –Cinda Williams Chima
Wade through the first draft crap to get to the gems.
–Rebekah Crane
On Reading
Becoming a writer changes your relationship with books. –Liz Coley
My mentor is any author whose books I’ve read, as I learned
to write through reading. –Mindy McGinnis
On Being a Writer
Up until the third grade, I used to get in trouble for
daydreaming, but now I get paid for it. –Cinda Williams Chima
We are told not to read reviews, but most of us do anyway.
–Mindy McGinnis
Listen to your own voice. –Liz Coley
Write the book that you were meant to write. That gives you
the biggest chance at being successful. –Cinda Williams Chima
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| Author Pavilion |
This is an annual event, so you can bet that I’ll be back
next year! Thanks to all the authors (not just the YA ones) that participated
and thanks, Cincinnati, for being awesome!
DISCLAIMER:
This post in an unofficial account of the YA Fiction in a Flash panel at the Books by the Banks event with the
aforementioned authors on October 12, 2013 in
Cincinnati, OH. The views that I present in this article are my interpretations
of the event and are not direct quotations of the author’s comments. These
paraphrases do not necessarily represent the opinions of these authors or their
publishers.
