Teen Author Boot Camp and BEYONDERS book launch


This year at the Teen Author Boot Camp, we (Writers Cubed) felt very fortunate to have eight wonderful authors come and teach some great classes and workshops for our teen writers. We had over 250 kids this year. Our keynote speaker, Brandon Mull was a huge hit.  All of the authors had fantastic, fun and educational classes for the kids, with some great advice and tools for writing a book. (Wish we'd known some of this when we started out!)
And at the end of the day, Agent Amy Jameson presented the prizes and trophies for our First Chapter Contest winners. There are some seriously talented kids involved! After that, the authors hung out with the kids, signing books and chatting. It was a great day. Here is a slide show of just some of the pics taken that day.


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Most of all we had fun! (top row: Jennifer Jenkins, Tahsha Ford, Lois Brown, Margie Jordan, Jo Schaffer, Kirsten Chandler. below: Tyler Whitesides, Frank Cole, Jeff Scott Savage, Brandon Mull, Elana Johnson, Bethany Wiggins and Elizabeth Mueller.


A few days after the TABC we attended Brandon Mull's book launch party for the second BEYONDERS book. It was so much fun! He had skits and glow sticks! Haha! He raised the roof!

Shannon Hale and Brandon on stage being funny.

 D.C .Comedy-- rocked the house. It was like SNL.

 The glow sticks looked awesome when the lights went out between skits.
This particular skit made me laugh so hard. It was group therapy for writers. Authors Anonymous: (Dean Hale, Shannon Hale, Brandon Mull, Tyler Whitesides, Eric Patten and Matthew Kirby)

Shannon is not only talented and funny-- she's also a super sweetheart.

Anyway, there are YouTube videos from the launch party if you want to see some of the fun.

Hope you're all getting some writing done! It has been busy but I'm working hard to get stuff sent off to my agent--including the dreaded synopsis. UGH!!! Wish me luck.





Comments

Lisa Shafer said…
So, an 8th grader at the school where I teach -- a boy I'd taught last year for both English and creative writing, and for whom this year I'd worked to help him self-publish his novel -- was wearing one of your tee shirts yesterday.
I stopped him to see what he'd thought about his experience.
Me: Hey, you went to the boot camp! I read about that on a blog I follow. How was it?
Kid: Cool.
Me: What authors did you see? What did you do? Did you have workshops? Book signings? What?
Kid: We did lots of stuff.
Me: Like what? With what authors?
Kid (thinks for a minute): There was that one guy. You know, the Fablehaven guy.
Me: Brandon Mull? Did he speak?
Kid: Yeah. It was cool.
Me: What did he talk about?
Kid: I don't know, but it was cool.
Me: What other authors were there?
Kid: A bunch. I don't remember. But it was cool.
Me: Did you get any ideas for your writing?
Kid: No. But it was cool.

There you have it: your entire boot camp summed up by an 8th grader. :)
March 14, 2012 at 7:16 PM
Jo Schaffer Layton said…
Hahah! Maybe that one was forced to go by his mom. (=
March 14, 2012 at 7:56 PM
Lisa Shafer said…
Oh no. He was totally proud that he'd gone and eager to tell me everything -- everything he could remember, anyway. (And he's actually an honors student.)

(This is why we teachers repeat ourselves so much. Even when a kid is interested and eager to learn, what they retain isn't always what we want them to.)

In his mind, it was all a great success. :)
(But I had to come here to find out what went on.)
March 14, 2012 at 8:06 PM
Jo Schaffer Layton said…
Ah, yes. The mind of the male adolescent. (= It retains endless amazing facts about Pokemon cards and video game levels. But cannot readily recall much else-- at least to put into words. Haha!

Thanks for visiting, Lisa. (=
March 14, 2012 at 8:10 PM
Charmaine Clancy said…
Sounds like such a worthwhile and incredibly motivating event.
Wagging Tales
March 14, 2012 at 9:01 PM
Nelson said…
Hello Jo! My first visit, will visit you again. Seriously, I thoroughly enjoyed your posts. Congrats for your work. If you wish to follow back that would be great I'm at http://nelsonsouzza.blogspot.com
Thanks for sharing!
March 17, 2012 at 6:01 PM
Talli Roland said…
Oh, that looks so fantastic, Jo! I'm very jealous.
March 18, 2012 at 7:05 AM
Nelson said…
Hello, I am a new follower(378). Thank you for stopping by! I hope your day is a good one and that you will come back again soon. Greetings from Rio de Janeiro/Brasil!
March 19, 2012 at 8:20 PM
Anonymous said…
That does look fun. How exciting!
March 21, 2012 at 7:43 AM
Susan Fields said…
Good luck to you! And the Boot Camp looks like a fantastic success!
March 27, 2012 at 5:47 AM
J.L. Campbell said…
Sounds like a wonderfully worthwhile project. Well done to you and your team.
April 2, 2012 at 5:38 PM
Mark Koopmans said…
Hey Jo,

Wow, what a super idea - and what a turn out... GOOD ON YOU GUYS!!!

LOVE, love LOVE the one pic of the kid with the Mohican and the quote (along the lines of) "all types of kids like to write."

Oh, how I wish someone could have nudged me toward writing when I was a teen... but at least I'm doing it now :) Whoot!
April 11, 2012 at 2:07 AM
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