Austin SCBWI Digital Symposium II: The Nuts and Bolts of Success

Blogs, tweets, facebook, oh my! What a tangled web the world of social media weaves! Every day, it seems more and more ebooks are sold. People twitter. Articles are written on websites and blogs. The digital universe is blossoming as people look to social media and the digital highway to reach their audiences and the children's kidlit industry is no different.

So join me at the Austin SCBWI Digital Symposium II on October 6th, 2012 and engage with us. Not registered yet? Click Here! As one of the faculty members, I'll be presenting the topic "Blogging 101: If you Build it, They Will Come!" Trust me, you can do this. And even if you don't want to maintain your own blog, there are ways to connect with readers through blogs and we'll discuss those options, too.

Tricia and I at her launch for The Navel of the World (The Forgotten Worlds)

In 2011, PJ showed attendees how easy it was to build a book trailer and we had an overwhelming response to have her return for part II of our digital symposium. If you missed her the first time, don't make the same mistake twice. Click here to see author PJ Hoover's blog post about her upcoming presentation "Book Trailers: Bringing Your Story to Life." And click HERE to hear about how she sold two books! Yay, Tricia!! So happy for you!

Kirsten Cappy, owner of Curious City

Do you have a website? You can't afford to hire somebody? Do it yourself. No, really. Marketing guru and owner of Curious City, Kirsten Cappy and author Samantha Clark will present "Website Liberation with WordPress." They'll show you how easy it is to build a professional website using this template driven tool. For more details, click HERE. 

Attending the digital symposium is a must whether you're pre-published or published and our Austin SCBWI chapter has assembled many presentations designed to give you the nuts and bolts you need for success! I've just highlighted a few in this post. Register today and embrace the world of technology. It's time!

Austin SCBWI Meeting and News

There's a lot going on in our Austin SCBWI community and this week is no exception.

Author/illustrator Salima Alikhan will address how to take criticism and turn it around so it motivates you as opposed to letting it depress you. Her talk "Writerly Despair: How to be Inspired Rather Than Crippled by Criticism" takes place at 10am at BookPeople on Saturday, May 12, 2012.

I'm really looking forward to hearing what she has to say. I think it's easy for us to stay in our caves especially after we've received a healthy dose of criticism and weeding through the tough love can be difficult so tomorrow's chapter meeting will no doubt be jam-packed. And I love spending time with peeps, too!

This week also brought along some sad news as we said good-bye to a literary giant in the world of children's literature, award-winning author/illustrator Maurice Sendak. Cynthia Leitich Smith put together a lovely post in his honor. Click HERE if you missed it. Also literary magazine Hunger Mountain has a submission call out, they're putting together a special edition to celebrate Sendak's life and work. Click HERE to get all the details.

As a contributor to ReaderKidz, I'm excited today for the post on author Cynthia Levinson's magnificent book We've Got A Job: The 1963 Birmingham Children's March. Click HERE to see the post. A truly inspiring story about the difference a group of children made during the Civil Rights Movement. There's also a plethora of educational materials to accompany the book on Cynthia Levinson's website. If you haven't read the book yet you owe it to yourself to read it, you won't be disappointed.