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Lilla here. In just a few weeks, on Monday, October 24th, I’ll be teaching my children’s picture book writing course, My Kid Book Pitch. I absolutely love teaching this course because I love helping creative people like you to thrive, and I love helping you to reach into your magical imagination and pull out all the stories I know you have whirling around in there.

I know what you’re thinking: “But Lilla, I’m not a writer!”. I think you are, but you just don’t know it yet. That’s why I do writing retreats with my artists and artist/authors. I believe in artists’ minds and their ability to make books. (They do so well that they get book deals and I’m going to share with you what I teach them!)

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If you’re an artist, you may think that you can’t write a story like a ‘real’ author. You might think you have to know all these weird secrets about writing, but I want you to know that you totally can write! You speak, you write emails, you text, right? You’re already writing, so check off step one. You just need to learn a bit about the craft, which I find really fun, like a game. It’s about how to perfect each sentence using some guidelines.

Artists are innovative, creative and have very special ways of thinking, which make them perfect for telling stories. All they need to do is learn the craft of writing, just enough so that their children’s book pitch is strong enough to be picked up by a publishing house. The editor will clean up your work, as long as your writing isn’t pulled down by some big missteps.

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A Year of Weeks written and illustrated by Erica Root, a Make Art That Sells student who is also represented by my agency after I fell in love with her art in class.

Still don’t believe me? I’ve written a three part #MATSprep warm up exercise for you ahead of My Kid Book Pitch to show you how it works, and I’m going to teach you some of my top tips. You’re going to be an editor for a week. I hope you’ll join in, because I think you’ll be surprised at how easy and fun it can be.

Ready for Part 1? You’ll get Part 2 next Thursday, and Part 3 the week after that. Keep an eye on the Make Art That Sells social media channels and on our newsletter and blog so you don’t miss out! Here we go …

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Here are the practice sentences that we’re going to fix this week. I’ve made them really bad on purpose (which was fun). Write it on a piece of paper or on your computer and let’s dive in and make it better.

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1. Remove the Visual Descriptions

First, I’m going to cross out everything that could be illustrated. Visuals are things like ‘a bright red hat’, ‘a tall, old man with a long, fluffy pink beard’. If you’re both the writer and the illustrator of your story, you can make a note of these things to illustrate, but don’t put them in the text. I know: illustrators love to write descriptive text, because you’re visual. Save it for your art. This is not to say that should never use visual words; not at all. Just be sure it’s not something you could illustrate.

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2. Revisit ‘Feeling’ Words

Let’s take a look at the ‘feelings’ words in this sentence.

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Circle all the words that tell emotion. There are two: ‘hoped’ and ‘like’. The problem with labeling the feeling is that I’m telling the reader what the character is feeling. That’s less interesting, and neither paints a picture for the reader, nor gets us to feel the feeling ourselves. It’s a missed opportunity to show the feeling, which will amp up your writing.

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Art for My Kid Book Pitch by Make Art That Sells student Raquel Russo. We’ll work through your 100+ page downloadable worksheet together to help you come up with a winning character like this.

So let’s go deeper. What is she actually feeling? She hoped that she’d really like the new cat. She’s worrying that she might not like the new cat. She’s fearful. She’s afraid. We’re not really sure why. Maybe she doesn’t like cats. Why? Maybe once a cat scratched her. Maybe she is afraid to get close to the new pet because she just lost her dog that she’d had her whole life. You can make anything up.

I’m going to go with the idea that once a cat scratched her, maybe as a baby, and she has been afraid of cats ever since. So I’ve changed it to this:

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I’ve turned it into dialogue, because I often find it an easy way to show emotion.

It speaks to her fear rather than being told she hoped she’ll like the cat. We get that she’s afraid. We’re not told. We are shown. This is called show, don’t tell, and that’s the most valuable tip in the writing biz.

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In My Kid Book Pitch, you’ll get a 100+ page downloadable workbook packed full of tips, advice, worksheets and my Make a Story Recipe to help you nail your story idea.
We’ll work through it together in class.

Let’s take this sentence:

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I’ve crossed out the visual words and removed the flashback. (We’ll look at flashbacks later.) That leaves this:

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What’s the emotion here? First, we know two things about her. One, she likes to draw. Two, she like to draw anteaters. I wonder why that is. Maybe she likes that they look funny and weird. Maybe she also feels funny and weird and feels a connection to them. Maybe she wonders how they could possibly like eating ants. It’s disgusting. So you see what I did? I riffed on the sentence. You’ll do that with your sentences to change them into better sentences.

So I might write:

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Now we’ve got something. We’re intrigued. We know a bit more about Cami. We might even begin to feel the feels. To empathize. We might even be interested to know why she feels weird.

Compare it to the original sentence, where I personally felt nothing (I can say that because I wrote it):

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How about you try rewriting the sentence. Maybe Cami likes to draw all the time because she’s bored. Why is she bored? What’s she doing that’s so boring? Make up something! (Yes, you get paid to lie.) Maybe she draws so much because her father died and she’s trying to deal with it by distracting herself. Maybe she draws because she learned about a famous woman artist and she wants to be one when she grows up. Try to make it personal; make it about what you might feel if you were her, or call upon a personal experience, in the way that actors do. The more you make up stuff about your character — backstory — even if you don’t write any of it, the more easily writing the actual text will be. You’ll see what I mean as we go on.

Now, write down some backstory. Write down why you think she likes to draw freakin’ anteaters so much. (You’re not writing the actual text yet.) Make up stuff. Write down a few ideas and pick your favorite. I’ll wait.

Now we can revisit this sentence armed with backstory. Rewrite the sentence. Make us feel a little something.

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Try writing a few versions and pick your favorite. You could even illustrate it! Post on social media with the hashtag #MATSprep and tag @makeartthatsells so I can see.

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Character by Make Art That Sells student Paloma O’Toole. I now represent Paloma after seeing her art in class – in common with all my live courses, My Kid Book Pitch is a great way to get your art in front of me!

See how fun this is? You’re getting good at this writing thing.

Guess what’s going to happen to your writing? Over time, you’re going to find that you have a voice on paper that reflects who you are. Your writing might be funny, quirky, serious, thoughtful. Or a few of those things. See how your work evolves as you do the three part #MATSPrep.

Next week in Part 2, we’ll work on flashbacks, chronology, and changing tense. Then, in Part 3, we’ll take a look at adverbs and why they are evil. Just kidding. Don’t miss it!

Don’t forget, I only teach this course once a year! Don’t miss out – sign up here.

Lots of love

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The Childrens Book Bundle Banner 2 Make Art That Sells Get your FREE assignment: Writing tips from an agent and author

P.S. You could get 25% off My Kid Book Pitch when you buy it together with Illustrating Children’s Books Plus and Lilla’s Art Recipes: Drawing Faces in The Children’s Book Bundle – down from £527/approx. $612 to just £395/approx. $459! Get it here.

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