8:30 Registration opens
9:00 Welcome
9:15 Tina Dubois Wexler - "All
About Agents.”
10:00 Linda Pratt - “Hopscotch: Making it Through the Course
as a Children’s Book Author One Square at a Time.”
10:45 Break
11:00 Jennifer DeChiara
- To be announced.
11:45 Follow-up questions
12:00 Lunch
1:00 “First pages” critique session
2:15 “Building an Identity” panel discussion
3:00 Meet-n-greet
4:00 Agents
Day ends. Thank you for joining us!
Tina Dubois Wexler, from International Creative Management, will speak on “All
About Agents.” In today’s marketplace, it has become increasingly difficult to find publishing
houses that accept unsolicited material; most editors will ask that you secure representation first and then submit through
your agent. But is an agent right for you? And how do you get one? Or, now that you have one, what happens next?
Linda Pratt, from the Sheldon Fogelman Agency, will teach the basics of “Hopscotch:
Making it Through the Course as a Children’s Book Author One Square at a Time.” You’ve
landed on the first square by deciding to write for children. How do you keep your balance, avoid the lines,
and keep moving forward to the next squares in your writing career? This session will address key questions
that one agent asks in helping her authors create a career plan. It will touch upon writing in various genres,
industry conditions, assessing one’s own goals and needs, among other things.
Jennifer DeChiara of the Jennifer DeChiara Literary Agency,
speaks regularly to writers about writing query letters, book proposals, and picture books, and will be on hand to share her
expertise.
The afternoon features two sessions: In the panel discussion “Building an Identity,”
agents will discuss how writers can create a professional identity and use it as a marketing tool. And, back by popular demand,
our “First Page” critique session will let attendees have the first page of a manuscript read aloud and critiqued
by the panel of agents.
