Alumni Voices with Quinette Cook: Growing Your Circle of Friends

To paraphrase Marsha Qualey, “the good thing about the Hamline MFAC program is the variety of places called home by the students and faculty and the resulting mix of people. The crummy thing is the post-residency (and after graduation) far-flungedness of friends.”

The last time I sat down to work on my novel, writing was still (for the most part) a solitary act. The good news is that your circle of friends and supportive community may be a lot larger than you know.

You’re probably already doing all the right things right. Right? You’re taking classes, writing with consistency (butt in chair) and you’re a member of the Society of Children’s Book Writers & Illustrators (SCBWI). You’re NOT a member! Why not?

Did you know SCBWI is the only professional organization specifically for writers and illustrators of children’s books? SCBWI can connect you to editors, publishers, agents, librarians, educators, booksellers and others involved with literature for young people, from Board Books to Young Adult novels.

From my very first conference (where I was greeted by Marsha Qualey!) to my current role as Minnesota’s Regional Advisor, I have grown personally and professionally. Thanks to the Hamline faculty, and in particular Ron Koertge, I was prepared to submit my verse novel, GILT, which subsequently won the 2012 Work of Outstanding Promise Honor Award and the attention of my agent. (I won’t lie; I’m still on cloud nine.) Of course it’s great to find an agent or an editor, but there’s so much more!

Your membership to SCBWI gives you access to great events scheduled around the world or in your backyard. In addition, you have access to all kinds of information on the website including a resource library, an illustrator gallery, a member bookstore and a section for awards and grants. But the best thing you will find is other like-minded people. SCBWI is a great way to continue to learn, network and have fun!

Take it from me. Even when you’re sitting in front of your computer working on the final revision to your final-final-final draft, you can bet someone else is too–someone you met in your growing circle of friends.

For more information go to, www.scbwi.org

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Quinette Cook is a January 2012 graduate of the MFAC program. She lives and writes near Minneapolis, Minnesota.

The right place, the right time: following the breadcrumbs

Sometimes things work out just right. And last weekend was one of them--when I happened to be in Minneapolis and able to go to the lovely Birchbark Books and hear our wonderful Anne Ursu read from Breadcrumbs. All the chairs were full and we were enthralled to hear Anne read from her book.

We've heard parts of the story before and know of Hazel and her friend Jack , made of "baseball and castles and super-heroes and Jack-ness." And we may remember that Jack gets a shard from an evil mirror in his heart, gets entranced by the white witch, and forgets his friend Hazel. I bought a copy of Breadcrumbs at Anne's signing and am now to the place where Jack has just left with the white witch. There is so much I want to underline in this book, so much I want to share. I won't share all that I'd like but I have to pull this piece out--the description of the evil character who makes the mirror that explodes and sends one shard into Jack's heart:

"We'll call him Mal, though that is not his real name. His real name has forty-seven syllables, and we have things to do. Mal looks like nothing you know or can imagine, neither goblin nor troll nor imp nor demon. ...Mal is not any one of these things but all of them. Mal is a goblin. He has green-brown skin, a froglike mouth and sharp little teeth. Mal is a troll. He is seven feet tall and warty, has terrible breath, and a penchant for hanging out under bridges. Mal is an imp. He has a small bat wings, a high-pitched screech of a laugh, and pointy little ears. Mal is a demon. And that means he is up to no good."

I will not be able to think of personified evil again without thinking that its name must have forty-seven syllables.

This little section of the book made me wonder what I would write in describing "Mal," what ears or teeth or feet or voice. Perhaps evil uses e-mail, or Western Union, or a too-wide smile. Some morning, when faced with the blank page, I'm going to write a cousin for Anne's Mal.

In the meantime, it was wonderful to be at the reading with Phyllis Root, to hear Anne, to chat and laugh with Megan Atwood, and get a catch-up on the semester from Quinette Cook.