by Sylvia McNicoll | Nov 15, 2015 | Sylvia McNicoll
Ten Hot Tips I learned at Packaging Your Imagination.
Okay maybe I didn’t learn these ten tips all brand new, maybe some were things I knew deep down inside and just had confirmed. After some twenty years of attending these day long seminars where I volunteered to do everything from placing and driving out of town speakers, selling books and raffle tickets, introducing speakers, fixing and adjusting audio equipment, I put my feet up and just listened. Here’s a few of my takeaways:
1) My agent David Bennett, at TLA, is the best. He’s the guy in the blue on the right.
2) I can’t wait to work with Carrie Gleason, the Dundurn editor (to the extreme left) Â Together we produced Crush. Candy. Corpse when she worked at Lorimer, a very lucky book for me. This time around we’ll be working on The Great Mistake Mystery series.
3) You’re supposed to tell publishers when you’re multiple submitting and they won’t penalize you for it. Â They may even read your work faster. The whole panel confirmed this even though some writers in the audience remained skeptical.
4) Response and publication is a waiting game. You wait and wait and wait. Nothing personal. Just busy. Just thinking. (I thought that treatment was only for me.)
5) Promotion is a team effort. Publisher and author.
6) I should try writing my picture book from the dog’s point of view, a tip from the sidelines, Rebecca Bender.
7) I should also email writing workshop promo material directly to the school librarians–not through the school board. This was a tip from Lana Button, again off side.
8) To teach rhythm in poetry workshops, I should try a drum. This was in a Q & A with Loris Lesynski.
9) There are many wonderful, creative, and fun people who attend Packaging Your Imagination, any one of them would make a great character in a book. (and I’m not just talking about the speakers). I learned this on the drive in and at lunch and breaks.
10) I look like Diane Keaton. Seriously. I’d just had my hair done. A fellow attendant commented how I looked like a celebrity. I joked that I was a celebrity–I was a famous Canadian children’s writer–why didn’t she recognize me? Then she snapped her fingers, and said I looked just like Diane Keaton. Â I explained that in a couple days when I had to do my own hair, I would look like a Canadian children’s writer again.
by Sylvia McNicoll | Nov 15, 2015 | Sylvia McNicoll
The CNIB helped me with the research for A Different Kind of Beauty. While my Bringing Up Beauty series was immensely successful both in Canada and in Norway, Sweden, Finland and Germany–immensely successful did not translate into wealth. More like a bit of living–the kind a full time retail person might earn. So a small donation to Lions Foundation Dog Guides, with  no big donation for CNIB’s help and efforts.
Years later, I get a delightful request for my help to judge the Braille Writing conference from Karen Brophy. It was filled with praise for a later title crush. candy. corpse
Would I also perhaps appear to hand out the prizes. It was a wonderful opportunity for a bit of a payback to an organization that does so much.
Fifty entries translated from Braille arrived. Â It took me two chapters’ worth of writing time to read them and write comments for each and finally to judge. This was during August when writing time was at a premium. The rest of the world was at the beach.
Then October 30th, a Friday morning, early, early, Â I made my way downtown for the 8 a.m. meeting at the Mariott and found the four winning writers who were invited to the conference, told each how wonderful I thought their work was.
Once the official introductions and a presentation on playing visually impaired hockey were over, it was our turn.  I spoke on the judging process and told the conference attendants a bit about the winners. The writers read their poems and stories. They were such an enthusiastic bunch, great dramatic readers. Sadie was a jumper and a hugger.  I hugged them all and handed them their certificates and cheques
What a privilege to be celebrity enough to make them feel special for a day.
by Sylvia McNicoll | Oct 1, 2015 | Sylvia McNicoll
On September 30, 2015, I raise my glass to a publishing team I’ve never personally met, Eli Toresen and Anne Ramberg! On this day, after some thirty-two years of producing wonderful reads for girls in many countries, they retire.
To back track a little: In 2001 my agent at TLA Â David Bennett sold my novel Bringing Up Beauty to Eli Toresen of Stabenfelt. Â A real coup for which I am eternally grateful to him. This meant the novel was published in Norwegian, Swedish, Finnish and German. The advance outstripped any I’ve ever earned since, anywhere else. Â Bringing Up Beauty enjoyed great readership in Scandinavia and quickly went into our equivalent of a reprint. Eli also bought the Canadian illustrator Shariff Taribay’s cover art. The book grew into a series of three, but when the Canadian publisher Stoddart went under, Stabenfeldt published the titles first. Â Imagine, I wrote the books in English, emailed them as an attachment and within a few weeks received a positive response. Â Every writer’s dream!
And then years later, Canadian publishers would release the work.
Never meeting in person, none-the-less through email we pitched ideas back and forth. Eli and I created a series involving a wonderful wolf dog named Paris and an unhappy teen named Zanna who teamed up to rescue many a lost and injured wanderer in the Rockies. Bears, cougars, avalanches, bighorn sheep, rapids, eco terrorists, snow storms, plane crashes–what didn’t I write about. And…who knew Norwegian and Swedish girls would enjoy the icefields of Alberta as much as I did.
By the way, only one of these titles, the first, Last Chance for Paris ever published in Canada.
For Eli I also updated the first book I ever wrote. Â Blueberries and Whipped Cream became this:
Most recently I pitched the idea of the one week do over series.  In each story, a different character under totally different circumstances would die from some random reckless act, go to a individualized in-between place and score a retry of their last seven days in an attempt to improve their life and perhaps escape fate. I wrote about a girl skateboarding attached to a car who ends up in a garden and another who drowns off a pier near Hamilton.
 En Andra Chans became Dying to Go Viral in Canada only after a great success in Norway and Sweden. Fate is a Brown Dog has yet to find an English language publisher.
Here is my last work with these wonderful Norwegian editors who have published, including this one, 13 of my novels, six of which have never seen the Canadian light of day.
Stabenfeld was bought out, is moving to Sweden and looking at publishing a different way, probably not including me. Certainly not including Eli and Anne.
What a wonderful journey it’s been. Â I received much fan mail, one from girls who read the Et Vilt Liv series every summer as a ritual.
In a world that rapidly changes and sometimes does not acknowledge great achievement and hard work, I drink my glass of champagne in a salute to these publishing women. To Eli and Anne!
May the next chapter bring you even greater adventures!
And who knows, maybe we will all hike together somewhere different soon.
by Sylvia McNicoll | Sep 15, 2015 | Sylvia McNicoll
 Paul Kropp and I go way back to 1988 when I took his writing course at Sheridan College and  through it wrote my first novel Blueberries and Whipped Cream, quickly followed by Jump Start for Paul’s famed Series Canada for reluctant readers. Over the years, he would call on me for various projects. There was always a lovely lunch or party involved, part of the wooing process. At Scholastic I wrote Smoky and the Gorilla and Double Dribble for an educational series of his. When he worked at Chapters, Paul convinced me and a lot of children’s authors to write “Coles Notes” on various subjects to rival the Dummy and Idiot’s Guides. At the party at his house, many writers expressed dismay and regret and worry over accepting something they had no experience in writing, myself included. But I worked hard on A Mom and Dad’s Guide to Martial Arts, couldn’t disappoint Paul, and through it learned how to write nonfiction. I ended up working at a magazine for eight years as a result of the experience.
He always had great vision for even the wildest projects and convinced others to see it his way too. I admired his dedication and passion but mostly I enjoyed his sense of humour. Over all these books, we shared so much laughter and  became good friends.
More recently, Paul started his own publishing firm HIP and I wrote, on his invitation, Dog on Trial, a kind of reluctant reader Marly story where the dog does not die. We enjoyed some laughs over a funny book that he made funnier with his editing.
Kropp asked me to sign the book at Reading for the Love of It, February 2014 and then took me to lunch. Over a delicious Italian pasta and a glass of wine, he convinced me to write a survival story, maybe something with a plane crash. I’ve crashed a small plane before for a publishing house in Norway called Stabenfeldt so even though I was working on a bigger project, I agreed, thinking it might be a quick easy book.
Somehow I ended up embroiled in research with pilots and a doctor and doing way too much work for such a short piece. Â Because it was for an older audience, Paul wanted some edge: “a character should die in the story.”
I hate it when characters die.
Seemed a shame for so much work to hit such a small audience so I asked if I could send it to my Norwegian publisher. Paul agreed and separated the rights in the contract. Â Eli Toresen, the wonderful Stabenfeldt publisher, liked it but found the injuries a bit too graphic for her Girl It Series. So with a few thousand more words, an added subplot, and some more medical research I was able to save my character.
I didn’t know it would be my last lunch with Paul or my last book. On August 22, he died after a short fierce battle with cancer. He’s one character that medical science could not save. I only wish I could re-write this ending.
Kraslanding, the Norwegian version of Survival printed the day after Paul’s funeral and will be in readers’ hands in November. Â The dedication will read:
For Paul who launched a thousand reading and writing ships
and this one small airplane.
He did so many wonderful things for his students and worked so hard to make reading accessible to so many, I realize it’s selfish and trite to focus on how this loss affects me.
But now I will be forced to fly a little more solo and I will miss him.
by Sylvia McNicoll | Aug 9, 2015 | Sylvia McNicoll
The point is not the crustless sandwiches or the scones or homemade shortbread, chocolate chip cookies and cupcakes  The point is not the creme brulée tea, or the Copa Cabana green tea or any of the other varieties. 
The point is the poetry.
Listening to Hamilton Youth Poets perform accompanied by the Junior Hamilton Philharmonic string quartet was amazing!
The young writers spoke out about relationships:Mother/daughter, marriage, girlfriend/boyfriend, even laptops. And racism. The poetry was biting at times, poignant and funny at others (Alzheimer’s of the heart is just one image I remember, but there were brilliant motherboard heart/hard drive metaphors too)
The violins and cellos added a beautiful icing to a sweet evening of delicious words.
Knock em dead in Saskatoon!
by Sylvia McNicoll | Jun 23, 2015 | Sylvia McNicoll
This is a photo of my students (aged 12-17) at the Mississauga Living Arts Centre on the last night of our Creative Writing Lab. Â It’s always been a dream of mine to host a teen writing club and somehow, through a lucky twist of fate, I became the teacher of this group. These are kids who prefer “real” paper books–reading them is more relaxing–but nevertheless carry stories on all their devices: phones, iPads and computers so as to never be without something to read.
After a full day of regular classes, they chose as their extra-curricular to attend mine. Sometimes they stared at me blankly as I spoke on a variety of genres and writing topics, screenplay writing, poetry, character building, setting, but whenever I asked them to write, amazingly, they bent their heads and elbows to the task. Always made me smile.
The second last week one of the young writers asked me to edit a blog/job enquiry for a science website for students. Â I was a little hesitant, not about the student so much as the website. Â Was there some kind of scam behind it?
Sensing my hesitation, she continued, “Please tell me I’m not going to be one of those starving artists/bloggers who can’t make a living writing.”
The million dollar question. My mouth dropped open. I had no ready glib positive answer. “Send me whatever you want me to look at,” I answered finally.
Access Copyright, CANSCAIP, The Writers’ Union of Canada–I Â belong to and support these organizations in the hope that there will be jobs for our future writers. I push for music, art and content to paid for and thereby validated and valued with these students in mind. No three month trial, or 10% “fair dealing” intellectual grab. Just because you love your work, doesn’t mean you should do it for free.
A week later, on our last class, I summon everything I have to answer honestly but aspirationally, “there will be writing jobs but we don’t know what they will look like yet. You are our future Margret Atwoods, you will shape the industry. I look around at you and have great faith and hope.”
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