SCBWI Online Summer Conference

This post started off as a discussion about all the different online conferences I would recommend, but boy did that get long! I had no idea I had so much to say on the subject! So I have cut it down to just look at the most recent SCBWI Summer Conference.

I will say that in a previous job, I actually worked for a conference company (in a completely different field) and so have a very in-depth knowledge of the backend of conferences, the nitty-gritty, and the blood, sweat and tears that goes into them! And I was working in conferencing when Covid hit and we had to pivot swiftly to online events. I have never felt more like a stressed-out television producer than being in the "green room" of Zoom frantically trying to phone a presenter in a different country who is supposed to be presenting live in 2 minutes while trouble-shooting the microphone issue that had inevitably come up during the current live presentation...

All that to say that I really appreciate all the time and effort (on the run-up, during and post-event) that goes into these things. They are no easy affair and so I applaud the organisers and all the presenters and people that give their time to help teach all the delegates. Thank you!

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SCBWI Summer Conference - July 31 - August 2, 2025

This was a 3 day online event that had some fantastic speakers with the focus going from picture books up to young adult. I debated whether to sign up for this, simply because I wasn't sure exactly how much I would get out of it and it wasn't a small price tag, but I was very happy I took the plunge, even though I did miss some of the main presentations. One thing I have started to do when looking at events is break down the cost. So I worked out how much per presentation the event was and it helped me decide to go.

It was my first SCBWI conference that I have "attended" (in quotation marks as I didn't manage to go to anything live!) and I would definitely go again. The presentations were available for 6 weeks after the event and unfortunately I didn't get a chance to look at all of them (completely my fault - summer is always busier than I think it will be!) but I caught up on the main ones I wanted to see. Here is a short recap of them:

Opening Keynote by Soman Chainani

This was a very inspiring talk by someone who has had a very unique experience in the children's publishing space. Soman talked about how he started off in a completely different direction and about how he has forged his own way in the industry (MG romantasy is now a genre thanks to him!). The quote that stuck with me: "follow yourself to what you can do, what you want to do, and most importantly what you need to do".

Editors & Agents Panel: The Big Picture in Children's Publishing

Tara Weikum, Patrice Caldwell, Kait Feldmann, Saho Fujii, TeMika Grooms (moderator)

It was fascinating to listen to Tara, Patrice, Kait and Saho talk about the similarities of editors and agents, what makes a good (and bad!) agent/editor and some of the trends they have been seeing. Some little snippets of advice from them:

• Saho's suggestion for illustrators - send postcards by mail (rather than email) because then she can put them up on her wall/board and see them regularly rather than filing them away in a folder on her computer and potentially forgetting them.

• Kait's suggestion to find agents - publishers weekly (with bi-weekly newsletter) shows deal announcements so you can see who is selling what and which editors are buying what.

• Patrice's advice for querying her - don't query her with a new project every 30 days (assuming it is a longer project, not PBs) as it doesn't look good and she can see in Query Manager how many times and with what you have queried her. She doesn't mind being queried by the same person, but would prefer people just query her when they are ready!

• Tara's advice on questions for potential agents - ask them how often they might send out submissions. Some newer agents might send once a week (too often!!) which is a mark of not knowing exactly where to send your books. Publishing is a small world and agents/editors talk!

Revise and Strengthen Your Picture Book Manuscript with Intention with Heidi E Y Stemple

I have had the pleasure of seeing Heidi present before during a 12x12 webinar and she is FANTASTIC! Such in-depth knowledge delivered in a very easy-to-understand way. She took us through one of her picture books beginning to end and talked about the different techniques she used to strengthen it, such as the intentionality of having quiet beats following peril, graphing out emotional plot points throughout the book, threading your chosen motif throughout using word choice and using bracketed text. It felt like a masterclass in 1 hour. I now have a huge check-list I can use to run through all my stories to really make them shine! If you ever get an opportunity to attend a class with her, I say jump on it! I believe she teaches regularly at the Highlights Foundation.

Flipping the (Manu)script: How to Experiment with Your Stories--and Career with Sue Fliess

This was fascinating and I came away with so many wonderful ideas to try and experiment with! Sue talked about trying anything and everything - don't stay in your lane (calling back to Soman's keynote) - and never let anyone put you in a box. Her mantra was say "yes" and then figure out how to do it as you go. And with over 60+ picture books since 2009, she is obviously doing something right! I loved that one of the things to try was writing a blog. In my limited experience since starting this, I have found my writing is flowing a lot more naturally since I started blogging (both for the blog, for my PBs and my CBs). So it has worked (at least for me!).

One Topic, Many Styles: A Picture Book Workshop with Lesléa Newman

This was a really interesting look at one topic (clothing) and the many, many different ways it is represented in picture books. It was a delight to listen to Lesléa read lots of picture books and talk about how each tackled its topic differently. I loved that she chose clothing, as it represents so many things to different people: culture, identity, agency, style, religion, etc. We also got a reading list of all the books she mentioned - I have doubled my TBR!

Creating Winning Picture Book Biographies with Don Tate

I really enjoyed hearing about Don's process as he has gone about researching and writing his biographies. The love of libraries and librarians came through strongly and I echo that loud and clear! I have toyed with the idea for a biography for the last year and Don gave me some great ideas about how to get started, and also to make sure that I have the passion to write about the person I chose - to really examine why I want to write about them. It will probably be another 5 years before I get started, but I really believe that it is important to learn about all different types of kidlit writing, even if it isn't something you are concentrating on at the moment. All the forms overlap in some way!

10 Misconceptions about the Creator-Agent Relationship with Jennifer Rofé

It was a pleasure listening to Jennifer talk about the misconceptions and seeing them put straight. I had some of these misconceptions when I first started writing (like getting an agent meant 100% your book would be published - spoiler, that is not the case!!) and so seeing her run through the most common ones really helped clarify things in my mind. It was also good (if a tad disheartening) to hear her say that in her 20+ years in the industry, right now is the slowest the industry has been...

Analyzing and Writing Picture Books with Kaitlyn Sanchez

I have seen Kaitlyn talk a few times on webinars and podcasts and she is always so full of energy and information! It was so much fun walking through the books that she chose and trying to identify the main features of them - fiction vs. non-fiction; literary vs. commercial; character vs. plot vs. concept driven; plus figuring out some of the literary techniques the authors used. I loved the books she chose (many from her own authors) and especially this one - Ned the Knitting Pirate. Fun fact: I have a draft in my folder about a knitting pirate and it has a lot of the same beats as this one, including the same ending! At least I know it was a good idea - back to the drawing board I go!

And the one that got away - I really wanted to watch Create Dynamic, Innovative STEAM Books that will Capture an Editor's Attention with Jennifer Swanson but ran out of time on the replays. If anyone out there saw this and wanted to share any insights, I would be greatly appreciative!

I would love to hear what others thought of the conference. Who was your favourite presenter? Was there a specific topic/presenter that made you register?

For a recap on some different presentations, have a look at the SCBWI Blog post HERE.

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And to just touch on the theme of online conferences, two that I am registered for and very much looking forward to are the Picture Book Summit (4 October 2025) and Girl Power Hour (11 October 2025). If you are not signed up for them and write picture books, I can highly recommend you have a look at their websites and see if they are for you! I went to both last year and got so much out of them!