Whether we like it or not, stories in the form of books and broadcast programmes are commercial products. This crossover between art and commerce is perhaps most evident in children’s stories and their subsequent product ’spin-offs’. As writers we need to be aware of what those spin-offs may be and whether or not we are comfortable being used to flog them to children. The Crafty Writer asked Dr Dan Acuff, a marketing consultant for companies such as Nickelodeon, Disney, Hallmark, Warner Bros., Scholastic and Lucas-Speilberg, what a writer needs to consider.
Continue reading ‘Commercial exploitation of children’s books’
Archive for the 'Writing for Children' Category
There’s a new writer in the world of children’s fiction and her name is Kelsey Drake. Kelsey’s first published book is Scordril, a novel for the 9 – 12 age group. It’s the story of a lair of dragons who are under attack from the sinister ‘night dragons’, wielding an ancient and dangerous magic. But what the readers of ‘Scordril’ may not realise is that Kelsey Drake is actually two people: Eleanor Patrick and Sue Brownless. The Crafty Writer asked Eleanor and Sue about their experience of co-authoring and self-publishing their first novel.
Eleanor Patrick
Sue Brownless
One of The Crafty Writer readers asked me recently to give her some advice on writing a covering letter for a picture book she’d written. Well I’ve already dealt with non-fiction covering letters for books and articles previously, but I haven’t looked at fiction. Note, this can be applied to adult and children’s books alike. So here goes. Continue reading ‘The dreaded covering letter’
Fantasy is probably the most popular of all children’s genres; however much of it is still read and enjoyed by adult readers. One only has to look at the highly successful Harry Potter series to see how much influence this type of writing has. But as a writer you need to be aware of a few facts and conventions of the genre before trying your hand at writing fantasy.
Image courtesy of ginieland Continue reading ‘Writing Fantasy Fiction’
I’ve just had a short story published 18 months after submitting to Aquila children’s magazine. It’s the first of a two-parter. I submitted it as a three-parter (as per their contributors’ guidelines) but then the editor asked me to cut it by 1000 words and make it a two-parter. Yes ma’am! I said. What does this tell you about magazines? Continue reading ‘Magazine ‘lead times’’
In my writing for children classes I often catch myself reciting the mantra: publishers aren’t interested in talking animals anymore. It’s what you hear at every writing conference and read on most publishers’ websites. And yet, I have published my own ‘talking animals’ book, Donovon’s Rainbow and many of the books I read to my three-year-old daughter feature talking animals too. One of her favourites is Bringing Down the Moon by Jonathan Emmett and, to my delight, the Winnie The Pooh stories by A.A. Milne. Continue reading ‘Talking Animal Stories – Wind in the Willows MK II?’
On National Poetry Day I was delighted to receive an invitation to judge a poetry competition at my daughter’s nursery, Westerhope Village Nursery School. Megan is only two-and-a-half, so it was the ‘big’ children who entered the My First Poem competition run by Forward Press. With over a dozen budding poets completing a ‘fill-in-the-gap’ sheet, it was desperately hard to pick three winners. These were the ones that caught my eye … Continue reading ‘My First Poem competition’
This is the third installment in our free online creative writing course. In this session we will look at how choosing a point of view can affect your writing. Whose story is it? When did it happen? What relationship do you want the reader to have with your main character? Athough point of view (POV) is most often discussed in connection with prose, we will also be looking at poetry.
Continue reading ‘Creative Writing Course: Writing from a point of view’
Children’s books are often the battle ground of religious zealots with many Christians boycotting the likes of JK Rowling and Philip Pulman. In this article, on veitchsmith.com, I contend that spiritual themes can be found in the most unlikely of places.
The BBC are looking for five writers to work in residence with young people in various British cities. If you think you fit the bill, log onto http://www.bbc.co.uk/writersroom/opportunity/nch.shtml
Welcome to The Crafty Writer, published by Fiona Veitch Smith, a freelance journalist, editor, author, playwright, screenwriter and writing teacher. This site is full of information and resources to help you to become a better writer. 
