Saturday May 12

WRITING FOR CHILDREN WORKSHOPS AND PANEL DISCUSSION AT WFNS: 1113 Marginal Road, Halifax (next to Garrison's, near Pier 21)

Cost: $35 for single workshop, $50 for two (pick one morning and one afternoon workshop)
The Panel discussion is free -- no sign-up necessary

To register: contact WFNS with your workshop choices at 423-8116 or by email: talk@writers.ns.ca

9:30 - 11:00

Workshop - In the Mind of a Child: First Person Narrative in Children’s Fiction with Pamela Porter *details*

Workshop - Telling a Canadian Story: Writing Picture Books, Biography and YA Fiction with Maxine Trottier *details*

11:15 - 12:15

Panel Discussion - Our Culture’s Compass: Publishing for Children in Canada with Valerie Burke-Harland, Peter Carver, Hadley Dyer and Kathleen Martin *details*

12:30 - 2:00

Workshop - From Bird’s Eye to Worm’s Eye: The Art of Visual Narrative with Bill Slavin *details*

Workshop - Crossovers: Making the Leap from Documentaries to Non-fiction for Adults and Children with Elizabeth Etue *details*

Workshop - Both Sides of the Computer: An Author/Editor’s Tips for Writing Children’s Non-fiction with Elizabeth MacLeod *details*

THE WORKSHOPS:

In the Mind of the Child: First person Narrative in Children’s Fiction - Pamela Porter
To write first person narratives for children, we must be "in the mind of the child”. The chief problem with this is that most of us shed our child minds as we grew up. In this workshop, participants will do an exercise to take them back into their child minds. The advantages and limitations of a child narrator for a story will be discussed. If you are working on a piece of fiction in first person, bring it to the workshop and if time allows your work will be included in the discussion. Come equipped with paper and pen.

Pamela Porter is an award-winning poet and juvenile fiction author. Stones Call Out is her first poetry book publication. Her free-verse children's book, The Crazy Man, received the 2005 Governor General's Award for Children's Literature. Born in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Pamela Porter has also lived in Texas, Louisiana, Washington, and Montana. Her husband's family has also operated a family farm near Weyburn, Saskatchewan for generations. She obtained her undergraduate English degree from Southern Methodist University in Dallas, and received her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Montana. She currently lives in Sidney, British Columbia.

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Telling a Canadian Story: Writing Picture Books, Biography and YA Fiction - Maxine Trottier
Explore the planning and writing of our own stories as picture books, biographies and young adult novels, as well as discovering practical ways of dealing and working with publishers. There are sensible ways to do these things and still have fun and enjoy the wide world of children’s books.

Maxine Trottier is a prolific writer of books for young people. Born in Grosse Pointe Farms, Michigan on May 3, 1950, she moved to Windsor, Ontario in Canada with her family ten years later. In 1974 she became a Canadian citizen. She is a graduate of the University of Western Ontario. Maxine spent 31 years working as an educator in elementary classrooms, guiding children toward literacy. The students in her class, who of course thought of her only as their teacher, saw each step in the creation of a new work. They heard the unillustrated story, saw the roughs, and were the first to view the finished book. Maxine divides her year between Port Stanley, Ontario on Lake Erie, and Newman's Cove, Newfoundland, overlooking the Atlantic Ocean. Both small fishing towns are wonderful places to write.

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From Bird’s Eye to Worm’s Eye: The Art of Visual Narrative - Bill Slavin
When Bill reads the author’s words, visual images immediately come to mind that are often very close to the images that the reader will eventually see in the book. He does very little editing or reworking, trusting the integrity of those initial responses. He works largely from imagination, but of course when specific information is needed, researches items in his own extensive collection of resource material, at the library, or, more rarely —— as it can be immensely frustrating —— the Internet.

Bill Slavin has illustrated more than seventy books for children, including The Big Book of Canada, Bleeps and Blips to Rocket Ships and Shooting Hoops and Skating Loops. His work has received numerous awards, including the 2004 Blue Spruce Award and the 2004 CLA Amelia Frances Howard-Gibbon Illustrator's medal, both for his work on Stanley's Party. He shares his studio in Millbrook, Ontario with his wife, Esperança Melo.

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Crossovers: Making the Leap from Documentaries to Non-fiction for Adults and Children - Elizabeth Etue
As with a non-fiction book, the best documentaries take shape first on paper. Whether that means writing copy for a narrator or "writing" the entire film (without writing a word) by selecting and arranging the interview soundbites and natural sound, the documentary writer is the first person to see the film in his or her head as she lays it out on the page. Often, the writer is also the producer and director, and sometimes the photographer and editor, but it is in the writing stage that your precious stack of field tapes becomes a film. The leap to/from the book is a natural one, that you, too, may explore.

Elizabeth Etue is a radio and print journalist, the president of Virago Entertainment and the writer and associate producer of the documentary Chasing the Dream - Women's International Hockey. She has enjoyed a twenty-two year career in book publishing and co-wrote an engrossing and highly-praised history of women's hockey, On the Edge. Her latest book, Born to Play, vividly recounts Olympic gold-medallist Hayley Wickenhaiser’s rise to international fame with previously unpublished stories, photographs and quotes. The inspirational story, which appeals not just to girls and athletes but to anyone with big dreams, has won praise from such famous hockey players as Curtis Joseph and Jarome Iginla.

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Both Sides of the Computer: An Author/Editor’s Tips for Writing Children’s Non-fiction - Elizabeth MacLeod
Get an insider’s view on what children’s publishers are looking for in non-fiction books and what makes good children’s non-fiction today. You’ll also discover what editors expect of authors and what authors should expect of their editors. Gain new insights into this challenging and rewarding field of writing for children.

Getting a degree in sciences may not be an obvious first step to becoming a children's writer, but that was how Elizabeth MacLeod's career began. She survived the Banff Publishing Workshop a few years later and began work as an editor at OWL Magazine. Liz took a break from children's publishing to write for a software company, then became an editor at Kids Can Press where she still is an author and freelance editor. Liz's books range from non-fiction to picture books to craft books. The Kids Book of Great Canadian Women and George Washington Carver are her most recent books and Liz has edited books on topics ranging from hockey and Canada’s prime ministers to soap and sea monsters.

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THE PANEL:

Peter Carver has worked in the Canadian publishing industry for 30 years as editor, publisher, writer, and commentator, principally in the field of books for young readers. His publishing career began with Peter Martin Books in 1976, where he was the editor of a series of anthologies for reluctant readers entitled the Elements series. Since then he has edited picture books, fiction, and non-fiction projects for a number of Canadian publishers. For several years in the 1990s he was co-owner of a small publishing company, Boardwalk Books. Peter is a three-time recipient of the Vicky Metcalf editor’’s award, in 1993, 2000, and 2001. Since 1996, he has been editor of children’’s and young adult books for Red Deer Press.

Valerie Burke-Harland is a journalist, storyteller and businesswoman who started her career as a freelancer for CBC and with radio stations in Ottawa, Montreal and Toronto. After a stretch running her own marketing company, she took on Marketing and Promotions Director with Red Deer Press in Calgary where you can find her planning and executing innovative launches for Red Deer’s Spring and Fall titles.

Writer and editor Hadley Dyer grew up in the Annapolis Valley, Nova Scotia, and now lives in Toronto, where she is the children's book editor at James Lorimer & Co. She also writes non-fiction children's books, is a regular contributor to magazines, such as Canadian Family, Toronto Life and OWL, and teaches children's publishing at Ryerson University. She has been an active member of the book industry for many years as children's bookseller, publicist, book reviewer, library coordinator of the Canadian Children's Book Centre, and past president of the Canadian National Section of the International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY Canada). Set in the North End of Halifax, Johnny Kellock Died Today is her first novel.

Kathleen Martin is the author of six non-fiction books for children: Sturdy Turtles, Building Beavers, Floating Jellyfish, Gentle Manatees, Soaring Bald Eagles and Swimming Salmon (Lerner Publishing Group). She is the Nova Scotia representative for the Canadian Children's Book Centre, has edited children's fiction books for Front Street/Cricket Books in Chicago, and was an acquisitions editor for the Cricket Magazine Group. She also writes for adults. She is the Atlantic correspondent for Marketing Magazine. She edits fiction, poetry and non-fiction books for publishers in Canada and the United States, and has written for a variety of magazines and newspapers. She previously taught communications at Acadia University. She is Atlantic Liaison for the Canadian Children’s Book Centre.

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