Young Authors Conference

I have been meaning to blog about this event since it happened on May 3, because it was one of the best things that has happened to our family recently..or EVER!!!

Every year Missouri Southern University in Joplin hosts the Young Authors Conference. Here in Mount Vernon, only 4th graders go to it, but the conference includes kids in grades 1-6. This year, my 4th grader, Sabra, had her book picked as an entry into the conference, so she got to go to it...and since she got to go, so did the rest of us.

The guest speakers at this conference were authors Roland and Marie Smith. AJ was a little jealous because Roland Smith is one of her favorite authors, but it didn't take her long to be really excited that shew as going to meet him, however it happened. The day before the conference, I read one of Roland Smith's books, Sasquatch. It was great! Roland Smith's website is here. Since the conference, I've also read Zack's Lie, Jack's Run, and Cryptid Hunters.

Roland and his wife, Marie Smith, also write books together for younger children. I'm sure you've seen these books at the bookstore, they are part of the series that features every letter of the alphabet. Roland and Marie wrote B is for Beaver, E is for Evergreen, N is for Our Nation's Capital, and Z is for Zookeeper. They're also on Roland's book page.

The conference featured talks by each of the two authors to groups of kids. They were each very different, but both were great. They talked about how they got started in writing, the things they liked to write about, and the mistakes they've made as writers. They really took the kids seriously as writers, which impressed me so deeply. AJ moved up and sat with the kids and asked questions of both authors, and all three of the kids brought notebooks and pens. The girls took scrupulous notes on both of them, while David mostly drew pictures.

At the end, each child got a book for free that was autographed by the authors, and afterward, the authors stayed around and offered to sign any other books anyone wanted. Our girls showed them their notebooks full of notes on their talks, and Roland played as though he was going to tear AJ's notes out of her notebook. He said, "You're just going to use this information to become a famous writer!" It was pretty funny. They signed their notebooks, too, and let us take pictures of them with the girls. They were so very gracious and open and funny; I was so impressed.

Finally we left, with several signed copies of the Smiths' books, at least one for each child. It was the greatest day! We spent the day as a family at a writers conference! Matt and I also realized that it would be really easy to sneak back in there next year...we'd sit in the parents' section like we did this year...nobody would ever know...

Sabra's book was called 11:27, and is about three kids who discover a dragon named Narcissa Pendragon, but Narcissa is only visible to humans between 11:26 and 11:28 every day. It was really cute. Also, there was another girl there, a 6th grader, named Sabra! That was pretty amazing in itself.

Kathy