Monday, September 30, 2019

Switching my Writing Gears

It is no secret that I changed genre's from my first book to my second. My first book (The Last Great Adventure of the PB&J Society) is a middle grade novel, geared towards 8-13 year-olds. My upcoming book (Help Wanted, Must Love Books) is a picture book geared towards 4-7 year-olds.



Because of that change, I am often asked if I still write older books, how easy it is to switch back and forth between writing picture books and middle grade books, and how different is it writing in those two genres. So today I'm going to talk about that.

First, yes! I definitely still write middle grade books. I love the long story form, and being able to tell more. I love reading those books, too, and I still have a lot of stories in me. In fact, I'm working on one now, that I'm not going to tell you anything about (aren't I mean??!), but I'm on the second draft, so that is a good sign. Hopefully, in the future, you will see more published middle grade books from me.

Here is the thing, when I sent the draft of Help Wanted, Must Love Books to my agent, we had a little chat. She loved it, but she wanted me to understand that if I decided to go that direction, I needed to spend some time working on picture books. Focusing on writing more picture books, and spending some time (years probably) building up my author cred as a picture book author.

So that is what I have been doing these past couple of years (only recently have I begun working on middle grade again). I feel incredibly fortunate that my book sold. It is not the first picture book I've ever written, but it IS the first one I've gone on submission with (for all you non-authors, going on submission means that my agent sent it to editors in hopes they would want to publish it). The trick is to repeat that, now!

As for the question about difficulty. Switching back and forth is do-able, but difficult. The two formats are extremely different. In middle grade, I have space to say all the things. And while I want my writing to be crisp, and only say things it needs, it feels incredibly freeing to have SO MANY WORDS with which to write my story.

Picture books are mind-numbing projects where every word on the page has been scrutinized many, many times. Every word must be essential if I want to keep it. Every word must being working hard and expressing as much as possible. And even then, I need to make sure that the word really needs to be said. Because if pictures already express that idea, then it is the chopping block for those words.

With my middle grade, once I signed with my agent, I had a couple of back and forths to fix things, before going on submission, and then a couple more back and forths to fix things with my editor (not to minimize the changes, some of those changes were BIG!), still, once I sent in the final copy, it was final.

With my picture book, we were making changes every step of the way.

  • Changes before sending the text to the illustrator. 
  • Changes after seeing the sketches. 
  • Changes after receiving final art. 
  • Changes because the art director had a thought. 
  • Changes because marketing needs a different focus. 
  • Changes because I had a brilliant idea last second (yes, of course it was brilliant, why do you ask?).   

We made changes right up until they sent it to print and we could no longer make changes.

It has been fascinating to watch and participate in the process. And despite the whole mind-numbing thing, I love, love, love writing picture books. It is an incredible thing to be able to say so much with so few words, and I feel like my writing is stronger for having learned and studied the craft of picture book writing (and please note, I am still learning, and probably will be forever). I will definitely be in this genre for a long time to come because I love it so much.

So for you authors, do you find it difficult to switch genres in your writing? And for you non-authors, what do you think when an author that you love in one genre switches to write in another? Do you read those books, too?

Tuesday, September 3, 2019

2019 Summer Bucket List

The day after Labor Day. Whether school started earlier or not, this is pretty much the official day of the end of summer. Pools close. Weather starts to change (we hope!). Free weekends are a thing of the past.


But happily, memories live on, so it is time to report on our 2019 Johnson Family Summer Bucket List. To be honest, things have gotten a little out of hand. We used to make a list with the intention of finishing every last thing. Now we make a super long list with the idea that we can find something to do when we're bored.

Personally, considering how long our list was, I'm impressed we got through so much! And because I like numbers, here you are.

Number of items on our bucket list: 70
Number of items checked off: 42
Percentage of the list complete: 60%

Even better than numbers are pictures, so here are a few highlights:

Monster Pizza!! This was our kick-off activity. So. Much. Pizza. We definitely want to do this again . . . when we can drag along a few more people!



Here's a two-fer: Go to Oregon. Play on the beach. And really, this beach was the site of many bucket list fulfillments. Go for a walk. Go on a picnic. Roast marshmallows/make s'mores. Visit cousins. Seriously, the beach is my favorite.



We went to Lagoon.



We went to Canada.



We ran a family 5K (even if I only have a picture of two of us). And actually we ran TWO family 5Ks, so kudos to us!



But alas, we had a few items on the list I lament not getting to:
  • Learn to make macaroons.
  • Learn to make a curry dish.
  • Fix the trampoline.
  • Silent day!!! Okay, maybe the kids were glad about this one, but we're even because they also missed . . .
  • Hatchet throwing. (It could have been fun, I just have visions of a bad ending to that. o_o)
My favorite bucket list item was going to the beach (and we did that a lot). Girlie says her favorite was going to Canada (so shout out to Aunt Becca for making that happen!).

Anyway, the point is, we had an awesome summer, and I love that our kids love doing the bucket list. And who knows? Maybe we'll keep pecking away at this list over the  fall. That WOULD break the rules, but us Johnsons are known rule-breakers,* so it wouldn't really be a shock, would it?

Tell me about your summer! What was your favorite thing you did this summer?

*hahaha! This is a lie, we are ridiculous rule-followers, and when I DO break a rule or two, my kids are horrified. HORRIFIED.