AFCC Day Six

I arrived late on day six because I had to take care of a few things to take care of before heading out. I was sorely disappointed that I missed Candy Gourlay's keynote talk.  I did, however, make it on time for The Nuts and Bolts of Self Publishing: The Good, the Bad and the Fabulous, a panel discussion by Sarah Mounsey, Emma Nicholson, and Hidayah Amin.  Award-winning author, Emily Lim, moderated the session.

The multiple award-winning, Emily Lim, moderates the panel.

All three ladies have self published their books to great acclaim. Emma's already been signed to an agent, Sarah won the Bronze medal in the MoonBeam Awards and and Hidayah scored a double whammy when she won this year's Hedwig Anuar Children's Book Award and the Grand Prize for the Samsung Kidstime Awards. Congratulations to all three ladies who shared their invaluable insights into the adventurous and sometime treacherous world of self-publishing.

The Bronze Medal Moonbeam Award winner, gets ready for her talk.

Sarah addresses the audience.

Two-time winner, Hidayah Amin, takes to the podium

Author of the popular  Princess Petunia's Dragon,  Emma,  takes her turn.

Later in that afternoon, I attended the most anticipated event for aspiring authors, The First Pages Critique with Sarah Odedina, Shirin Yim Bridges, Ying Chang Compestine and Edmund Wee and moderated by Kathleen Ahrens, who always does a brilliant job of reading the manuscripts. First Pages is always a nerve wracking experience for any author. During the session, the first 100 words of the author's manuscript are read aloud and then critiqued by the panel.

The Panel: 

Edmund Wee, Sarah Odedina,Ying Chang Compestine & Shirin Yim Bridges

To the uninitiated writer, it may feel like you've been sentenced to death by literary firing squad. The wait to hear your manuscript being critiqued is unbearably indescribable and when they finally do get to yours, beads of perspiration embroider your brow, your heart practically hurtles right through your rib cage and you can almost feel the unmistakable trickle of pee running down your leg. Relax, it's all part and parcel of the course. You're not a real writer until you've peed on yourself.

Ying Chang Compestine and Shirin Yim Bridges

Most of the time it's not as bad as you think it will be. But sometimes it can seem like an editorial blood bath!  Am I joking? I'll leave that for you to decide. But it's an experience that every writer should go through. It's good for you.

Authors: Sarah, Simon, Helle and Linda  anxiously await literary execution or salvation.

The surviving members of the critique session made their way down to the festival bookstore, Closetful of Books, for a spot of shopping before taking a group photo with the SCBWI members.

I managed to grab a few minutes with friend and best-selling genius of an author, Candy Gourlay, whom I missed at last year's London Book Fair. Candy was off to London a few hours later, so our meet-up was all too brief, but we did manage to take a photo. Candy says I never smile, but I beg to differ - see the photo below.

Candy  says I never smile! See I do!

Singapore's best-selling award winning author, Emily Lim took time to catch up with her American counterpart, Ying Chang Compestine before the group left  for  Boat Quay for the SCBWI AFCC Family dinner organised by Catherine Carvell.  After a full day of sessions most of us wanted to unwind, relax and fill our tummies. I, on the other hand, opted to go for the literature lecture, which was conducted in Chinese with live English translation.

Emily and Ying

Stanley, the nickname I've given my stomach, began to growl and so  I skipped out on the Q & A session and shared a cab to the  SCBWI Dinner with Best-Selling author Chris Cheng. 

And we all spent the night, eating, drinking, catching up with old friends and making new ones. All in all, it was another pretty awesome SCBWI/AFCC dinner. 

Emily and Helle

Catherine and Kathleen

L to R: Chris, Avery, Kathleen and Catherine.

Simon and Dave Liew

Linda, Helle and Simon

Adan and Felicia

SCBWI, NBDCS, AFCC, and Children's Publishing in Singapore.

Dinner with Linda Sue Park in 2011

SCBWI Singapore is  relatively small in terms of how big most SCBWI regions are, but in three years it's grown from a core group of six members, including RA Kenneth Quek and coordinator Catherine Carvell, into a group of about 40 members with an average of 17-18 members attending the monthly critique meetings.

In a span of three years, our authors have won awards, published books and have been signed to literary agencies. Even the most jaded publishing type will have to admit that this has been quite a feat for a country where children's publishing is still in its relative infancy.

SCBWI members at AFCC 2012

Speaking with Shamini Flint and Emily Lim at AFCC 2012

On the SWF panel with David Almond, Emily Lim, and John Dougherty

Our  group has been lucky enough to have dined with Linda Sue Park, Wendy Orr, Jacqueline Harvey, and Lisa Yee to name a few. 

Dinner with Ian and Jacqueline, and Lisa Yee

Dinner with Tom and Wendy @ AFCC 2013

Dinner with Jacqueline Harvey

Some of us have been to the Bologna Children's Book Fair and The London Book Fair. We've been asked to speak at festivals and we've attended them too. 

At the Bologna Children's Book Fair

Kenneth dining with Leonard Marcus @ Rules in London

I credit the growth of our group down to two key members: RA Kenneth and  group coordinator, Catherine, our leaders. They are extremely passionate about children's books. Kenneth is also the Deputy Director of the National Book Development Council of Singapore and one of the festivals under his portfolio is the Asian Festival of Children's Content.

Catherine, Sarah, Emma and Kenneth @ AFCC 2012

Mr Rama

Evelyn Sue Wong, Ruhksana Khan and Trevor Kew

Conceived by Mr Rama, Director of the NBDCS, the festival has grown exponentially in recent years. The glitterati of children's literati  that have graced the event include: Wendy Orr, Candy Gourlay, Susanne Gervay, Naomi Kojima, Kathleen Ahrens, Dianne Wolfer, Vivian Kirkfield, Ruhksana Khan, Sarah Odedina,  Helen McAleer, Andrea Pasion-Flores, Helen Mangham, Jayapriya Vasudevan, Cynthea Liu, Alvina Ling, Mio Debnam, Linda Lingard,  Holly Thompson, Leonard Marcus, Steve Mooser,  Norman Jorgensen, Chris, Cheng, Edmund Wee, Yusof Gajah, James Foley, Trevor Kew and many, many more.  It's a great place to meet publishing professionals-- from authors and editors to agents and publishers - and learn more about the industry.

Susanne Gervay @ AFCC 2013

Book signing for Emma's Elephant.

Emma and Wendy Orr

Naomi, Mio and Kenneth @ AFCC 2013

Tuting Hernandez, Myra Garces Bascal, Susanna Goho-Quek, Chris Cheng
and Mr Rama at the joint book launches of ' Water' and 'Beyond Legends, Folktales and Myths'.

The AFCC/Book Council team 2013

CLICK THIS LINK TO REGISTER FOR AFCC

Now this year's AFCC is going to be bigger than ever before and will span five whole days including a media summit, seminars for parents and teachers, talks, workshops, manuscript and illustration critiques, book launches and much, much more.

Now a few friendly words of advice for any first time authors and illustrators out there who will be attending this MUST-GO-TO event.

1. Don't approach editors, publishers and agents with your manuscripts. This is neither the time nor the place to do so. Instead you can submit your manuscripts or artwork for the First Look and First Pages critiques or the pitch session.


2.  Watch, listen and learn. Watch, listen and learn. Watch, listen and learn.

3.   As the sessions run concurrently, pick and choose your sessions wisely. 

4. Enjoy the festival.

On to Bologna, Baby!

17th March 2011

Chris Cheng

After checking in, Kenneth kindly bought us breakfast while we waited for our connecting flight. After some initial confusion we found our gate only to find it packed. A verifiable who's who of publishing was on the plane, including Chris Cheng and his wife Binnie whom we had met at the immigration line at Heathrow. Thanks to Kenneth, they had changed their flight to the same one that we were on. Kenneth had checked us in online and we were seated at the back of the plane. 


I overhead to ladies talking about wanting to change seats. "Oh no, we can't change seats. That's the only way they'll identify us is by which seat we were sitting in if the plane goes down!" Ok, this really calmed my nerves. Sarah Odedina, editor of the Graveyard Book and Harry Potter was seated about two rows in front of us. 

Sarah Odedina

In  First Class was Chris Cheng and Arthur A. Levine, who I was to meet later on the bus to the Terminal at Bologna airport.

Arthur Levine

After a 1:45 minute flight over the Alps we touched down. Chris Cheng introduced Arthur to Kenneth who in turn introduced Arthur to me. What a nice, personable man, I thought. 

The Alps

The taxi line at the airport was horrendous. All the flights seemed to have arrived at once. While inline I chatted to Chris about the state of publishing in Singapore and the struggles that the writers here face. Soon enough it was our turn to hop into a taxi and head to our hotel, Il Convento dei Fiore di Seta.