First SCBWI Meeting of the Year

Last night we had a huge turn out at the first SCBWI meeting of the year -17 members were in attendance - and it marked award-winning author, Emily Lim's first session with us. Kristina, Sarah, Simon, Malavika and Rani handed in manuscripts for critiquing and the ever diplomatic Catherine Carvell, fresh off the plane from her month-long camping tour of New Zealand, moderated the session.

Emily and Catherine

Anu and Vidhya

Simon wowed us again with his amazing rhyming skills with his story Astronaut Jack.  Sarah shared the third story in her much-loved Purple Paw Print series and, like the first two, looks set to be a hit and will have you laughing until you 'itch'. Malavika did a brilliant job with her original fable Lela and the Rabbit in the Moon. Rani, the only author/illustrator in the group, shared her amazing illustrations for her book Summer Holidays Around the World. And Kristina surprised us with her deft use of rhyme in her story Once Upon a Tide.

Simon and Grant

Sarah and Kristina

Rani and friend

Now, lots has been going on with our members since we last met in November. Emma published her brilliant book Princess Petunia's Dragon  in December and is now currently available in all good book stores around Singapore. Buy it before it sells out because it's destined to be a best-seller! Catherine's book Darcy Moon and the Deep Fried Frogs will be released in March and she recently conducted her first interview; Evelyn just won her second bilingual picture book award for her story The Naughty Mynah Bird. Congratulations to all three ladies, well done!

Emma and Petunia

Linda, Evelyn and Kenneth

In other news, Kristina is launching the second book in her Shabu Shabu series and she's also in the midst of working on another picture book. Grant is working on his mega-successful Monkey Magic series. Simon has meetings lined up with potential agents. Kenneth and Evelyn will be off to the New Delhi International Book Fair next month. I was invited to go along, but I won't be able to make this trip as Emma and I will be conducting a series of talks and workshops at some schools here and I'm really looking forward to them. Sebbie's First Day of School will be out next week and the NLB has already ordered 70 copies for the libraries here and my illustrator Soefara is already working on the next book A Day with the Duchess.

So that's it for our first meeting of the year. Hopefully we'll have lots more good news next month!