Tag Archives: authors

Five Great Writing Resources for New Voices Contestants

Submissions for our twenty-third annual New Voices Award are now open! Do you or someone you know write for young readers? Are you a writer of color or Indigenous/Native writer hoping to break into the publishing industry for the first time? Then these resources are for you as you refine and finalize your manuscript. Read on for five tools from editors and writers!

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Remembering Francisco Alarcón

Beloved poet and educator Francisco X. Francisco X Alarcon Alarcón passed away on January 15, 2016. Francisco was a prolific writer of poetry for children and adults. Born in California and raised in Mexico, Francisco’s poems explore his Chicano identity and celebrate the double joy of being a poet in two languages. His awards include multiple Pura Belpré Honors as well the Chicano Literary Prize and the PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Award. His passing is a great loss to the world of Latino literature.

We asked some of the authors and artists who knew Francisco to share their memories of him: Continue reading

New Voices Award Winners on Revising Your Story

New Voices Award sealThis year marks our sixteenth annual New Voices Award, Lee & Low’s writing contest for unpublished writers of color.

In this blog series, past New Voices winners gather to give advice for new writers. This month, we’re talking about one of the most important steps in writing a story: revision.

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Marketing 101: The Best Social Media Platforms For Authors

This post is part of an ongoing series at The Open Book answering MARKETING 101: The Best Social Media for Authorsquestions about book marketing and publicity.

One of the questions I get most often from authors—both new and
experienced—is, “Which social media platforms do I have to be on?” There are a lot of ways to answer this question but I want to start by addressing the question itself, which is often phrased in exactly this way. The answer is: you don’t have to be on any social media platforms that you don’t want to be on. Social media can help you connect with new readers, raise your discoverability, and sell books, but it can also be a drain on your time, attention, and ideas. Social media is not for everybody, and not every platform is for every writer. So the first thing to do is let go of the guilt and pressure you feel to be on every social media platform that exists, posting content in real time. Almost no authors can pull this off and it’s not worth losing your sanity to attempt it. Continue reading

New Voices Award Winners: “How I Started Writing”

New Voices Award sealThis year marks our 14th annual New Voices Award writing contest. Every year, LEE & LOW BOOKS gives the New Voices Award to a debut author of color Guest Bloggerfor a picture book manuscript.

Did you know that last year, children’s books written by authors of color made up less than seven percent of the total number of books published? As a multicultural publisher, we’re dedicated to increasing those numbers. The New Voices Award is one way we can help new authors of color break into publishing.

In this new blog series, we thought it’d be fun to bring together some past New Voices Award winners on the blog to see how they got their start as authors, what inspires them, and where they are now.

Q: How did you start writing picture books?

Author Linda BoydenLinda Boyden, The Blue Roses

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