For our eighth Writers on the Rise interview, please welcome Kim Baccellia! You can visit her website here and her blog here. I have one more interview lined up after this; if you are a writer still seeking an editor and/or agent, and are interested in being interviewed, please let me know and I will see what I can do.
Hello, Kim! Can you tell us a little about yourself?
I’m a former first grade teacher that decided to finally write that novel I’d been talking about! I volunteer at my son’s school and library. I also review books and plan on doing more for Midwest Book Reviews. But first I need to concentrate on finishing my third story!
I’ve also been a Cybils-Children and YA book literary awards-panelist for the past three years. This year I helped judge over 126 nominated MG fiction books! Coming up with the finalists was fun.
After reading so many books, how do you apply your experience as an awards panelist to your own writing? What do you think makes a book a winner?
Wow, this is a great question! If anything my experience as a Cybils panelist has opened my eyes to how subjective this business really is. A book that I love might not be something others really care for.
The winning formula for a book is the million dollar question! But the books that seem to stand out are books that speak to the audience. For example Alvin Ho was a great example of a boy that relates to seven-year-old boys in the same way Junie B. Jones does for girls. We need more book like that!
Also, Twilight is another example of how some critics trash the book but teen girls love it. I remember one day asking a thirteen-year-old why she loved these books. “Edward. Duh, what else?”
What are you currently writing?
Tentative title is Step Stone Away. It’s a MG fantasy/mystery. I’m having fun writing it as it has a little of everything including an Egyptian love goddess. My sister, who’s studying to be an Egyptologist and did volunteer work at the British Museum, has been helping with the research to make sure I get that right.
Here’s the blurb: Thirteen-year-old Jordan Lake longs for the kind of romance her legendary Aunt Alice always experienced. When Jordan comes across an ancient bracelet that used to belong to Aunt Alice she figures that wearing it will help her have the romance of her dreams. More like a nightmare. Wearing it unleashes the curse of the love goddess Hathor who decides it’s fun to mess with the middle school social scene. Now Jordan has to figure out a way to vanquish Hathor and still get a date to the dance all while unraveling the mystery of where Aunt Alice has been for the last fifty years.
Having an Egyptologist-in-training for a sister sounds handy (and fun). Can you tell us more about the kind of research you have been doing for Step Stone Away? What tips do you have for writers of fiction with historical elements?
My sister has been going through her own research to help make sure I get the facts right with Step Stone Away. She steers me clear from the whole ‘Hollywood’ version of ancient Egypt. She’s also sent me incense from Egypt and right now I’m waiting for Hathor’s sistrum.
I think writers who do stories with historical elements need to do their research to make sure the facts are right. For example, in Step Stone Away, I have the father of my main character mention how the priests robbed the tombs. My sister caught me on that one! Also she corrected me on a stone I had in this one bracelet.
The Internet is great source to find material too. No longer does a writer have to go to a library to do research. I’ve found lots of info this way. I also went to the Bowers museum exhibit on ancient Egypt, which was fascinating.
What else have you written?
Earrings of Ixtumea and Crossed Out. Crossed Out will be coming out later this year. Here’s the blurb: Stephanie Stewart didn’t ask for the gift of guiding the deceased to the Other Side, but she’s stuck with it. Why can’t dead people just follow that bright light and leave her alone?When Mr. Undead wants to use her for his own evil purposes, her special ability becomes a major liability. Suddenly Stephanie finds herself faced with a choice–trust others with her ability or the world as she knows it will go to hell. Literally.
How did you go about getting your first two books published? Any words of wisdom to share about your experience?
I think it’s better to wait a little longer on accepting one of the first offers that comes your way. Do your research too. I also learned that writing the book is the easy part. It’s all the promotion that comes once your book is out that’s tough. Also make sure you know who your publisher’s distributor is. This info is important as most bookstores order from certain ones.
A big thing I’ve learned is to get out there and not be afraid to ask.
Where are you at on your path to publication?
I’ve been taking small steps that hopefully will lead to getting representation from an agent. A couple years ago I attended my regional SCBWI Agent’s Day conference and got to hear Laura Rennert of the Andrea Brown Literary Agency speak. I remember thinking, that’s what I want in an agent. Someone who not only knows the market but is passionate about each of her clients.
What advice do you have for writers?
First off, don’t submit anything unless it’s ready to go. Don’t get inpatient to get published. I found out the hard way that this doesn’t help with your writing career. Be careful on what you blog, especially any negative stuff. Yes, agents and editors do read that. And finally, join a critique group. Mine are awesome and helped so much.
I know what you mean about being impatient to submit. This usually happens to me when I know I should probably go fort at least one more draft, but I can’t wait to see what others will think. How do you deal with your impatience?
I think my experience with Earrings of Ixtumea has taught me that being impatient to submit only ruins any chances you might have with an agent and editors from more traditional houses. What I mean is if you submit something that isn’t totally done or is only a first draft, well, agents know that. And that blows any chance you might have had with them.
One of my words for this year is being disciplined. I really have to stop myself when I have that overwhelming urge to just submit. I’m really trying!
What are your inspirations?
A rejection from a publisher had me wondering if I should turn that recent lemon -rejection-into lemonade. So I spent a few days brainstorming a premise which involved romance, thirteen year olds, a bracelet, and of course, an Egyptian goddess who looks a lot like Angelina Jolie. Then I queried that same publisher with the premise and a couple chapters. They wanted more.
For Crossed Out, the idea that maybe someone had the job to make all those crosses you see on the sides of the highway came to me. A few years before that, my own sister had been murdered and an experience I had made me wonder if maybe not all the dead knew they were in fact dead. Add an undead hot guy who tries to change the rules.
What has been the best part of writing?
To be able to map out a story and see it come to life. Getting email fan letters has been cool too.
And what has been the worst part?
Comparing myself to other writers who have agents and get those big auction deals. I admit it makes me feel like I’m maybe not ‘good’ enough. But my online writing groups get me back on track!
Rejections are tough too. Especially when you read that others get agent interest after only a few. I try to look at rejections as a mini lesson. I also make sure to thank all editors and agents who took the time to read my work.
I know online writing groups help many writers stay on track and keep their spirits up, as well as providing invaluable feedback on their writing. How did you find your groups online, and what advice do you have for those looking?
I found my one on-line group through my association with Kelly Herold who’s the cofounder of the Cybils. I did some YA reviews for The Edge of the Forest, her on-line literary review site and when she had an opening in her group, she emailed me and asked if I was interested. Yes! This group has been wonderful!
My other on-line group I heard about from a writer friend. This same friend directed me to the fab Joyce Sweeney, who mentors YA writers in Florida.
If someone is looking for an on-line critique my advice is to check your local and regional SCBWI. Usually they post names of others who either are in a group or are looking to join one. Also check Verla Kay’s board. Some writers post opening there.
Where do you hope do be in a year?
Hmmm. In a year I hope to have interest in Step Stone Away. I would love to have an agent by then but I know that might not be a realistic goal.
I’m also hoping I don’t get too discouraged and to not give up. My biggest challenge is to be persistent even if it seems like it’s almost impossible to get that agent or traditional book deal.
And here’s a teaser from Kim’s Step Stone Away:
I stopped listening to Maddy. In our teacher’s hands was the most amazing bouquet of red roses. I could smell the sweet scent. Senorita Garza’s hair wasn’t pinned up but cascaded down her slim shoulders. Wow, she looked really pretty without her hair pulled back into an old lady hair style. Her eyes twinkled just like Audrey Hepburn’s in Roman Holiday. I couldn’t help but sense that love might be involved.
I glanced at Maddy, who had a dreamy expression on her face. Boy, if anyone saw her, they’d think she had something to do with our teacher’s sudden happiness and not a piece of metal that happened to be…
“Ouch!” I jumped up. A shock shot up my arm.
“Are you okay, Jordan?” Concern lined Senorita Garza’s otherwise smooth face. She put the roses on her desk and marched toward my seat.
“Ewwww!” One of Jessica’s friends screamed. “Ohmigod. Bugs!”
Screams filled the air. Chairs slammed against the walls. Girls and even a couple boys, jumped up on top of the tables.
I glanced over and saw beetle-like things climb out of the roses and scamper across the tile floor.
Oh, great. Not bugs again! Couldn’t Hathor be at least a little more original?
“Dude, check it out.” Nathan, one of the skateboarders Andrew hung with, pointed at a huge black and shiny bug. The beetle like bug must have been at least a couple inches long. Its shell reflected the florescent light.
“Clase!” Senorita Garza’s flushed face grew even redder while she tried to get order back in the classroom.
“Kill it, dude.” Another guy shouted.
Right at that moment, a sensation similar to needles shot through my wrist. I shook my arm to make the feeling stop, avoiding the bugs coming our way. I hopped on top of a chair.
Half-human, half-angel, Meridian Sozu has a dark responsibility.
Sixteen-year-old Meridian has been surrounded by death ever since she can remember. As a child, insects, mice, and salamanders would burrow into her bedclothes and die. At her elementary school, she was blamed for a classmate’s tragic accident. And on her sixteenth birthday, a car crashes in front of her family home—and Meridian’s body explodes in pain.
Before she can fully recover, Meridian is told that she’s a danger to her family and hustled off to her great-aunt’s house in Revelation, Colorado. It’s there that she learns that she is a Fenestra—the half-angel, half-human link between the living and the dead. But Meridian and her sworn protector and love, Tens, face great danger from the Aternocti, a band of dark forces who capture vulnerable souls on the brink of death and cause chaos.
I had the good fortune to win an ARC of Meridian from Robin Prehn, who snagged it at the ALA Midwinter Conference. I read the book in nibbles and gulps, both wanting to savor it and make it last. Meridian is the kind of book that my mind kept drifting to when I was trying to concentrate, or even when I was just shopping at the grocery store.
The best parts, for me: The character of Meridian, who manages to be both strong and vulnerable, mature and believably sixteen. Kizer pulls this off with Meridian’s voice, I think, which reminded me a little of myself at that age. I really like how she explores her powers and the idea of death; Kizer handles these scenes with subtle, nuanced emotion, where a lesser author might stray into the melodramatic. Meridian’s protector and love (as described in the blurb), Tens, came across refreshingly charming and flawed in the face of a slew of drop-dead gorgeous, brooding, and otherwise cardboard males in other young adult fantasy. Yes, he’s mysterious, but not annoyingly so.
The weakest parts: At times I felt like the antagonist was just stuck in there to provide tension and didn’t really have a good reason to show up so often. Even though the antagonist has a motive, it wasn’t one I felt at a gut level. The ending, consequently, seemed somewhat flat, and also felt like a set up for a sequel. Also, the pacing felt a little uneven in the last half of the book; I wondered if these scenes were written more hastily than the earlier ones.
Overall, I found Meridian to be deliciously different, not even bothering to tread into the realm of cliches, with great characters I could sympathize with and imagine outside of the book. I suspect Meridian will be quite popular when it comes out in August 2009. Highly recommended.
For the seventh Writers on the Rise interview, please welcome Kirstin Daley! You can visit her blog here.
Hello, Kirstin! Can you tell us a little about yourself?
I’d love to! Well I’ve been writing since as long as I can remember. I remember writing short stories in grade two, and loving it then. I’ve wanted to get published since I saw a kid do it on TV. I looked at the kid and thought “I’m going to be kid author.” Well that never did happen but I wanted to be a writer still so I just changed my dream to being an author period. I write pretty much everything from poetry to short stories, but novels are my love. I just love creating plots, and characters. I could see me doing this for the rest of my life.
I also wanted be a teenage prodigy novelist way back when, so I started hacking away at novels around the age of thirteen. Needless to say, I missed that deadline by several years. What advice do you have for novelists who start young?
I would saw to write and a lot, because I noticed that when I wrote more I got better as a writer. I began to evolve and that’s the only way you are going to get any better. And of course the most important bit of advice I can ever give anyone who wants to be a writer is to love it and have as much fun as you can. Being published would be awesome but loving what you do is what makes it truly amazing.
What are you currently writing?
Currently I am re-writing my novel Dawn of Destiny: A New Beginning. It’s the first of my Dawn of Destiny trilogy. It’s about a young vampire who is trying to come to grips with being a vampire, but along the way is thrown into something a lot bigger. It was originally a short story I wrote at the age of 11, but I later started making it into a novel in university. It’s now been four years and I’m still working on it. I tried to forget about it like a year ago, but I’m too much in love with it, and my characters. I’ve realized I can’t stop writing it so I’m going to give it another try.
Vampires are quite popular in young adult fiction nowadays, particularly with the obvious example. Twilight. What do you think of the vampire books out there right now, and what sets yours apart from the pack?
I am a huge Twilight fan and to be honest I’m terrified people will think that I’m copying her, but to be honest I started writing it a long time before I ever heard about it. What sets mine apart are the characters and the fact my vampires are different. Vampirism in my novel is more a disease, so they turn out a lot more human then in any other vampire book I’ve read. My characters are very original in my opinion because they aren’t just vampires, they have these back stories and interesting quirks that I, myself, love.
What else have you written?
I’ve written a lot of stuff but not much of it has actually become anything. So far I’ve finished two novels, the one I’m re-writing now Dawn of Destiny, and my other novel Dark Mourning. I would like to eventually have Dark Mourning published as well. Dark Mourning is a paranormal romance about a orphan who falls in love with who she believes to be the ghost of her mother’s ex boyfriend.
Where are you at on your path to publication?
So far I’ve sent queries out for Dark Mourning, but nothing really came out of that, so I’ve decided to work on another story and come back to Dawn of Destiny.
What advice do you have for writers?
Hang in there. Writing really is a hard business and you will get rejections, but if you stick with it and just write because you love it then it will be a lot easier for you. Writing just to write makes it more fun then writing hoping you’ll come up with some bestseller.
Even if you love writing, sometimes it can be hard to find what you love to write. This thought occurs to me every time I’m stuck on a draft or fishing for new ideas. I have to read other books and brainstorm before I’m inspired again. How do you find what you love to write?
It’s usually when I’m writing something and always going back to it. If I’m always wondering what will happen next, or day dreaming a scene then I know I love it.
What are your inspirations?
Stephen King and J.K. Rowling are two of my major inspirations. They both have made from so little, and also never let rejections get them down. They both had so much rejection, but made it to be so famous. I would love to be famous but really I’d love to be like them as they are so down to earth and seem to just write because they love it.
I also use music a lot for my writing. I’ll be listening to music and think oh that is so a song for this character, or goes with this part of the book. From there I may come up with back stories, or other things. Lately I’ve been using Within Temptation a lot.
I know a lot of writers have playlists for their novels, and I also listen to music while I write, since it helps me get into the right mood. What kind of atmosphere do you like to be in when you write?
It all depends on what part of the novel I’m working on. If its sad then I like to go for read sad music but it depends on me as well. Sometimes I just like listening real depressing music for the heck of it, while other times I need the up beat music.
What has been the best part of writing?
Re-reading something that is really good. I love the feeling of looking at something I wrote and thinking, “Hey, this is actually really good.”
I also love getting some of my work back from friends and others and hearing that they really loved something I wrote, or that they are in love with my characters as much as I am. It makes me really happy.
And what has been the worst part?
Rejection. I don’t take it really well but I’m learning to accept it and use it to make me a better writer.
I agree that rejections, though they can sting, are also one of the best ways to improve your writing. What have you learned from them so far?
I’ve learned I need to be more patient and due a lot more work before I send them in. I’ve also come to learn to have thicker skin. Rejections are a part of writing and they aren’t trying to be mean but simply do their job.
Where do you hope do be in a year?
I’d love to have an agent in the next year, and have Dawn of Destiny finished on its way to publication.
And here’s a teaser from Kirstin’s Dawn of Destiny:
“Why?” I finally gasped, “why are you doing this?! What in the world did I ever do to you?”
Jason’s eyes flickered and I could tell something I said had finally registered. He was back in my world at last. I began to think that maybe I could reason with him, save myself. If nothing else I knew I had to try.
“Why are…”
“What did you do?” Jason interrupted, stroking my wet hair. I didn’t like the way he gazed down at me either, with a sort of longing that was far from innocent, “You didn’t do anything, that’s the thing about destiny love, you don’t have to do anything because it just happens. That’s the important thing as yours is connected with my own you see, and I really need it to come true.”
“My des…”
“Yes,” Jason interrupted. He suddenly looked rather impatient, “Your destiny. If everything goes according to plan, then well fur is going to fly.”
He started to go down toward my neck again and I screamed. I didn’t want him to finish, I didn’t want to die. I wasn’t able to scream for very long however, as within seconds his hand clamped tightly over my mouth.
“You could go on and scream. It’s not like anyone would hear you, that’s exactly why I planned it this way. You’re time has been numbered since the minute we met.”
Bonus! A book trailer for Dawn of Destiny: http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=vWWuVydDr_s.
