Clare Vanderpool: Writers Stew: Ingredients: Memory, Research, Imagination

There are many things, within the writing process, that come together to create a story.

Clare's recipe for this talk has altered, the ingredients have changed a bit.

Along with memory, research, and imagination, Clare adds: openness, curiosity and living life. It all goes into the writing process.

Clare was asked if having children delayed her writing process and publication, but she believes that if she would have had one to two years straight to write the book, it wouldn't have been the same. The story needed to simmer, and she needed all that happened during that time to write the book.

Clare came across this quote from Moby Dick:

"It is not down in any map; True places never are."

It was the launch of inspiration for MOON OVER MANIFEST. Then began the research.

Some inspiration and research came from her own family photos, some of which she shares with the those of us here.

When commenting on imagination, Clare says, "Sometimes you have those moments when something comes to you and it's like they came from somewhere else."

Serendipity and synergy are a couple more ingredients to throw into the writers stew.When you start working on something, suddenly information and things start to come your way.

There are two sides of the story pot. There are all the ingredients that we bring to the pot as the writer, and the reader brings their own ingredients to the pot.

SCBWI Success Stories

Each panelist has found SCBWI to a part of their success along the way: getting them started, keeping them going as they traveled their path to publication, as well as being important once the contract came.

A piece of advice from each of the panelists:

Chris Rylander: The only thing that can stop you from being published is stopping.

Chris Rylander's debut novel THE FOURTH STALL is this year's Sid Fleischman Award for humor. 

Lissa Price: Remember that last year I was the one sitting out in those seats. Next year you could be sitting up here.

Lissa Price is debut novel is STARTERS. The follow-up in the series ENDERS will be out in December.

 Ruta Sepetys: Don’t be afraid of change. Be open.

Ruta Sepetys is the author of the NYT bestselling BETWEEN SHADES OF GRAY. 

Clare Vanderpool: Hold on to the moments that excite you.

Clare Vanderpool's debut novel MOON OVER MANIFEST was awarded the 2011 Newbery Medal. Her second novel NAVIGATING EARLY comes out in 2013.

Keynote: Clare Vanderpool - Writing in the Crossroads: Where Craft and Creativity Meet

Clare Vanderpool won a Newbery Award for her first novel, MOON OVER MANIFEST, which is based on a real southeastern Kansas town where her maternal grandparents lived. The book was the first debut novel in more than 30 years to win a Newbery--sort of an amazing thing.

"The book coming out in the first place was the culmination of many years of trial and error for me," Clare said. "For me, that was the be-all and end-all."

She started writing in 1994, when her first child (of four!) was born. She was staying home with them. "Back then I had no gray hair or wrinkles and I could still fit into my pre-pregnancy jeans if I'd had a bad case of stomach flu, really held in my breath and didn't button the top button."

She was perpetually exhausted from parenting. Her best writing times happened a long stoplights and while stirring pots of macaroni and cheese, or even back-to-back episodes of "Sesame Street."

"If you're not scratching out writing time minute by minute, I don't think it should count."

Back then, she had a finished manuscript and a pile of rejection letters. Now, though, her kids are noisy teenagers, and she showed us a video of what her writing life is like--not exactly a picture of serenity, even if it's one of charm. And she has a published book, another on the way, and a Newbery on the shelf.

What has changed in the interim? She'll be forever associated with books she's loved. But what hasn't changed--the hubbub of family life.

Her kids and her characters both clamor for attention, and she finds herself in "the crossroads between life and art."

"I've learned there are these things called laurels and you can't rest on them."

Winning a Newbery "is a bit like having a baby ... if you didn't know you were pregnant."

She wrote for sixteen years before she was published, and she practiced voice, plot, character, conflict, pace, tempo, rhythm, layering, foreshadow, language.

"You really do have to put in the miles with blood, sweat, and tears," she said. "You're really not going to learn it until you try it."

Feedback was an important step, too. "Sometimes you think something's wonderful, and it's not. Sometimes you think something's horrible, and it's not."

Reading advice from other writers has been a factor. Flannery O'Connor's MYSTERY AND MANNERS is her favorite guide.

Eventually, she felt confident enough with craft to venture down the road of creativity. "For me, the closest thing I can compare it to is seeing something for the first time that happens in my story that I didn't have a part of."

"The sweet spot is the crossroads where craft and creativity meet," she says. "Those roads of craft and creativity can take us on great adventures, but we can also get a little lost if we don't know what we're about."