Highlights from #NY20SCBWI

Lin welcomes attendees to the 2020 SCBWI Winter Conference

I've found I can always afford fifteen minutes of idea chasing." -Kate Messner

"I have no speical talents. I am only passionately curious." - Albert Einstein, shared by Kate Messner

Jerry Pinkney's illustration (pun intended) of how the illustrator is the "interpreter of text," working out things the illustrator wants to work out.

On evaluating a work that's been submitted, agent Patrice Caldwell asking, "What's going to make them put down their phone and read a book?"

Agent Marietta Zacker, on her evaluation process: "1) Do I love it? 2) Can I think of specific editors who would love it, too?" 3) What does it need to get it ready? "I look for things that people can't not do."

Editor Connie Hsu on her own evaluation process, that after voice, "I wonder what reason is for the book to be."

"You have to decide what kind of legacy you want to leave. I want my books to say something." –Derrick Barnes.

Read more about the conference at the Official SCBWI Conference Blog here.