Program

Lesléa Newman loves to quote her favorite statistic: "One-hundred percent of all authors had, at one time in their lives, never published a book." How does one move from writer to author? With a little, and sometimes a lot of help from her friends, including teachers, librarians, editors, mentors, colleagues and other writers. In this presentation, Lesléa Newman shares the journey she has been on since she was eight years old and made the decision to become a writer. As the author of close to fifty books, she has a lot to say about where ideas come from, how to write and rewrite (and rewrite and rewrite) and how to nurture your beginning drafts into a finished manuscripts that become books. She reads excerpts from rejection letters and editorial letters (you may think once a book is accepted your job as a writer is over, but in many cases it is just beginning) and talks about book contracts, how authors get paid, book promotion and publicity, working with agents, editors and art directors, and the importance of writing groups. Plenty of visuals including handwritten drafts, art samples, book dummies, press sheets, contracts, author questionnaires and much much more.