Saturday, January 21, 2012
Creative Exchange and Shinnenkai Dinner

Time:  Saturday, January 21, 2012
Exchange 6:00-7:30 p.m.
Dinner from 8:00 p.m.

Place:
Exchange:
Tokyo Women’s Plaza, Conference Room 1
5-53-67 Jingumae, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo
(by the Children’s Castle and United Nations University)
map
Dinner:
Daylesford Organic Restaurant
La Porte Aoyama, 2F
5-51-8 Jingumae, Shibuya, Tokyo
map

Fee:     Exchange:
500 yen SCBWI members
800 yen nonmembers
Dinner:
charged individually according to dishes ordered

This Creative Exchange will be in English and Japanese.

Reservations:
Contact SCBWI Tokyo
by Friday, January 20
(please specify exchange, dinner or both)

Join us for the first SCBWI Tokyo Creative Exchange of 2012! Bring your work in progress and your new ideas to share with the group for constructive feedback. Open to published and pre-published writers, illustrators and translators of children’s and young adult books. Also, bring along your questions about writing, illustrating and the marketing process.

After the exchange, join us for a shinnenkai (New Year’s party) dinner to share our creative goals and hopes for the new year.

What to bring for the Creative Exchange:
For MG and YA Fiction Bring 10 copies of a story or chapter up to 2,000 words.
For Picture Books Bring 10 copies of a dummy or story board or manuscript up to 600 words.
For Translations (Japanese to English) Bring 10 copies of a story or chapter up to 2,000 words.
Participants without manuscripts are welcome to participate. 

Saturday, February 18, 2012
Writers’ Night featuring
Claire Dawn-Marie Gittens with Brick by Brick—Building your Blog
and
Trevor Kew with Less Talk, More Action—Achieving Balance between Action, Dialogue, and Description in Your Children’s Book

Time:  Saturday, February 18, 2012
6:00–8:30 p.m.

Place:  Tokyo Women’s Plaza, Conference Room 1
5-53-67 Jingumae, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo
(by the Children’s Castle and United Nations University)
map

Fee:     1,500 yen SCBWI members;
2,000 yen nonmembers

This Event will be in English.

Reservations:
Contact SCBWI Tokyo
by Friday, February 17

Brick By Brick: Building Your Blog
Today’s writer needs an online presence. Blogging is one of many ways to create such a presence. Claire Dawn-Marie Gittens will give an overview on blogging specifically for writers. For those who are new to blogging, we’ll look at reasons to blog, how to set up a blog, and what to put on your blog. For those who are already actively blogging, we’ll look at how to build a following. Finally, we’ll take a moment to look at other social media for writers. Is blogging the best route for you? How can you combine your blog with other social media? Q&A and discussion will follow the presentation.

Less Talk, More Action—Achieving Balance between Action, Dialogue, and Description in Your Children’s Book
Have you ever heard kids complain that a book contains too much action? Probably not. Too much dialogue, maybe. Too much description, definitely. All three elements are important to the success of any novel, but how do we achieve the right balance for our audience? How do we paint a picture without boring readers with excessive details? How do we ensure that dialogue doesn’t overwhelm the story? And how do we create action that seems meaningful and authentic? Trevor Kew will speak briefly on his experiences in writing action-packed scenes for children, using examples from both drafts and finished pieces. This will be followed by an interactive session, where participants will get the opportunity to make choices about their own use of action within their writing. Q&A and discussion will follow the presentation.

Claire Dawn-Marie Gittens is a 30-year-old Barbadian living in Iwate. She writes for young adults, and her story “Ichinichi on the Yamanote” will be released in the forthcoming Tomo anthology. Her blog, Points of Claire-ification.

Trevor Kew is the author of three novels for children– Trading Goals, Sidelined and Breakaway that all revolve around sports. His story “The Bridge to Lillooet” will appear in the forthcoming Tomo anthology. He teaches English Literature at Yokohama International School and originally hails from Rossland, British Columbia, Canada. Visit his website, Trevor Kew's Books.