Picture Book Marathon 2012
Picture Book Marathon 2012 logo design by Will Strong
Today begins the 2012 Picture Book Marathon. I’m participating in the spirit of the event this year, but time constraints prevent me from participating fully. It’s a rigorous schedule to create one picture book manuscript per day. Think it’s easy to write a picture book? Think again! Every word counts in a picture book, and there aren’t many of them to go around. And then to think about a manuscript that might actually be publishable…well, that’s one of the points of this event. You hope to create at least one that might eventually be workable into publishable material. You also practice your writing (and/or illustrating) and idea generating skills not to mention being part of a group. If you want to learn more about creating picture books, I recommend Ann Whitford Paul’s book Writing Picture Books.
This go around I’ll be doing a lot of idea generating and adapting longer nonfiction manuscripts into picturebook format; however, I do expect several fiction ideas to pop up as well. They always do! I really enjoy the camaraderie of this event. Check out their site at http://www.picturebookmarathon.org. Good luck if you’re participating! Good luck with your writing even if you’re not!
