UVU Children's Lit Forum Day 2

I actually got up early this morning, which was good considering two people were counting on me on getting them to the conference on time. As for the conference, this morning focused more on picture books than I would have liked (and the one speaker who had presentations on YA lit this morning had to cancel for some reason). And even though the afternoon held better presentations for me, I still enjoyed my morning.

I especially loved hearing Shannon Hale speak again. This time on writing and mothering, but really more of how to write around your schedule of a full-time job, or in my case, being a student. I found the whole thing really fascinating. Plus, Carol introduced me to the editor at the conference and mentioned the good quality of my manuscript. Yay!

I have to say that Shannon provided quite a few good snippets over the last couple of days. So below are some of my favorite quotes from her from the conference:

• "[Being a writer] is a form of mental illness."
• "Don't google your name or book's name - it leads to unhappiness and misery."
• "Writer's block is the fear of not writing eloquently."
• "As writers we're crows - ooooo, something's sparkly!"
• "I'm such a story-whore."
• "There should be a session for a cage match"

And to quote Carol and her metaphor about what she does, "Goddess."