KidLit411

If you are  writing a children's book  Kidlit 411 is the, go to, blog for  all of your favorite information sources in one place.

The People of 411 

 KIDLIT411 founder, Elaine Kiely Kearns is currently chasing the dream as a published author. Armed with a master's degree in Education and working from her home office, she spends her time perusing the internet for golden nuggets of information about children's writing and creating her own picture book and middle grade stories.


Sylvia Liu is the other half of KIDLIT411, keeping the site running, adding links, and overseeing the illustrations and Illustrator Spotlight. She is a writer and illustrator. She is the winner of the 2013 Lee and Low New Voices Award and her winning manuscript, A MORNING WITH GONG GONG, will be published as a picture book. 

KIDLIT411 links are also contributed by their critique group buddies, Alayne Kay Christian, Renee LaTulippe, Yvonne Mes, Teresa Robeson and VICTORIA RICHARDSON WARNECK.

http://www.kidlit411.com/

Goals of 411

Their goal is to organise relevant information about writing and illustrating for children in one handy spot, right here. The site includes:

• Topical Pages - links to articles and resources organized by topics. 

• Author & Illustrator Spotlights - each week, they feature an author and an illustrator (or an author-illustrator), who share their experience with you.

• The Weekly 411 - each week, they compile the new links that were added during the week in an update post. You can receive this by email by subscribing to email updates (in the left hand sidebar).

So spend some time, browse, click, connect as they welcome you to the world of kid lit writers and illustrators!

Going colour

I made an avatar for Geoff for his game, a mermaid to try out the manga style and try my hand for an upcoming anthology and dear Olaf with whom my daughter and I have fallen in love. He is from the disney/pixar movie Frozen. I do like the colour.

I just paid my subscription to 12 x 12 and I am so excited.

I am going to widget it in a minute then do some actual writing. wriggle dance wriggle dance
I have a huge goal in mind for picture books. I currently have 40 ideas in a folder with graphic organisers to flesh them out from their initial one sentence or poem snippet and in February I am joining another picture book idea marathon so I should have another 26-28more ideas and by the end of the year I want 12 complete manuscripts ready to submit and 12 brilliant pitches and illustrations and a really good bio and I believe I can do it.

I have one YA paranormal novel almost ready to submit. A few tweaks and it is ready to fly.
I have one Australian Romance with historical aspects about 20k of submission but I am very happy with it.
I have one horror outline and a couple of short shorts not going anywhere yet.
I have one sci/fi fantasy at 70k still and siting on a shelf for a little while longer.
I have the beginnings of two steam punk novels that need time and effort.

Right now I am concentrating on kid lit ie Children's literature. Picture books. I love picture books.

I have done my second 'Start the year off write' prompt and was very pleased with the results. Cutting excess words and reworking with more active language is an excellent practice.