Saturday, October 24, 2009

Doing Lunch with Jessica Day George

Some of the Inkers (actually, all with the exception of Kirk, who was headed out of town) got together yesterday for lunch with the always delightful, witty, and clever Jessica Day George, authoress of the wonderful Dragon Slippers trilogy, Princess of the Midnight Ball, and Sun and Moon, Ice and Snow.

Joining us for the fun were FOD's (Friends of Donna's) Lizz and Tawyna and honorary Inker Graham Chops.

JDG very generously answered all of our questions about what it is like to be a successful author and the whole writing and editing process, whilst we enjoyed BBQ.

She said the best advice she could give is to attend writing conferences, good conferences where you can get some face time with editors and pitch your project to them. She tried for nine years to get published by mailing things out and endured over 180 rejections (which she used to keep in a nice scrapbook, until it fell apart). Then, within about three months of pitching to editors at BYU's Writing and Illustrating for Young Readers Workshop, she had signed a deal.

We also talked about balancing writing time and family time and came to the conclusion there is no magic formula for this, you just have to write when you can. Another subject was the value of being part of a critique group that is supportive, but also able to give constructive feedback.

We'd like to thank Jessica for spending time with us. It is always inspiring to get advice from known authors.

Jessica is currently editing the sequel to Princess of the Midnight Ball, titled Princess of Glass, due out in May of 2010. She also enjoys knitting, a skill passed down from her grandfather.

For more information on Jessica Day George, you may visit http://www.jessicadaygeorge.blogspot.com/.

5 comments:

  1. It was a BLAST! Thanks for setting it up, Linda.

    Jessica was delightful, fun, and genuine, a true pleasure to lunch with.

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  2. She's legit. It's cool meeting an author who's a normal person even after the publication point.

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  3. Totally cool! We should all be so lucky!

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  4. Most excellent company and food. Thanks everyone for the fun lunch. The FOD's had a great time too. LOL.
    Jessica is my hero. No really I mean it. She's my hero. Love the red hair too. So jealous making.

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  5. I was just looking at the pics and wishing that Kirk could've been there. There wasn't enough testosterone at that lunch. Although, I'm sure Graham would disagree.

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