Step Three - Day One

I made it to the BEA. Unfortunately, the exhibits weren’t open on day one. So it was dedicated to lectures and forums. They call them the “Big Ideas at BEA”

The first of the big ideas is titled “Bringing your authors to the Social Media Party… and Getting them to Stay”. A lot of this was about what one company did to integrate both their employees and their authors to social media. There was a vast difference in experience with social media present in the room. I have always known that there was a technological gap between generations, but in my personal life, I saw little of it. Today brought it home in a big way. The largest concern for many of the publishers and authors in the room was to know if social media sites really had an impact on sales. I got the general feeling that the majority of them saw social media as a pick one and go with it rather than being a part of every site out there.

I’ll be the first to admit that being a part of every social media site can be tedious, but if you are trying to build yourself as a brand (which is now known as being a “brandividual” apparently) you must do so everywhere. One woman complained about all the people commenting on the newsfeed that she didn’t know; information overload is what the speaker called it, I call it marketing. If you have finally reached the point where you have more people you don’t know than do, when trying to sell a book through a social media like facebook, I say you’ve done your job. Everything starts with personal networks. When it branches out, that’s the beginning of a market.

The second big idea was very similar to the first. This one was titled “Building Online Reader Communities with an eye on ROI”. It was a forum that, basically, reinforced everything from this first panel using people who are involved in social media. For example, an author there spoke about her experiences with social media. This one didn’t seem to focus on the mainstream social media though. This one focused on publishing social media that I didn’t know existed. The most interesting thing done here however, was the use of a twitter feed during the panel. So if you commented or asked a question... it showed up on the big screen next to the panel. Nifty to be sure.

Then I had lunch. Yum.

At 12:30 I went to my last big idea “I’ll never pay over $9.99 for E-Books! And similar Lies”. This one was the most… eh. The speaker, Michael Norris, Senior Analyst for Simba Information, made some very pretty graphs and spoke of several extensive surveys that I simply don’t all together trust. First off, his graphs and figures never considered free e-books. Granted, he was surveying the amount of people who “bought" e-books (9% in 2009; 8% in 2008) but that didn’t count in the number of people who invested in some sort of e-Reader be it Kindle, Nook, or iPad. In fact, according to him the “device won’t stay around long enough to make an impact”. With the exception of the iPad, he might be right about that. The iPad offers so much more than a simple e-Reader that it really isn’t worth buying a Kindle or Nook for this one functionality when you can put the money towards other devices that do so much more.

But to say that people would be willing to pay more than $9.99 a book…

I don’t know… I’d have to use some MBA tools of analysis for that one. But off the top of my head, I would think that with the threat of substitutes so high, why would someone choose to pay more for an e-book than what they can get it for on the shelf? Also, wouldn't you want to continue to increase the use of e-books rather than discourage it?

All in all though, that was the first day. There was a key note interview with Barbara Streisand that was insightful towards her character, but in the grand scheme of things, it wasn’t truly important towards my purposes here.

There were more big ideas throughout the length of the conference, but this day was the only one in which people attended them. Once the exhibitor rooms opened, no one left there. You would've missed too much.

Picture Books

I made a trip to Barnes and Nobles. The kids section in particular. I wanted to have a look at some of the picture books, to get a better feel for them. When I read children’s books, I usually stick with the ones that have more words and fewer pictures. Currently I’ll be looking into getting the entire series of the Guardians of Ga’hoole. It’ll be released as a movie soon; I’d like to have it read before then. Of course, money may be an issue, we’ll see.

Anyway, back to picture books. Three stood out to me for various reasons though I read many. Let me tell you about why I found them special.

The first was “Sugar Cookies: Sweet Little Lessons on Love” by Amy Krouse Rosenthal. What I particularly liked about this book was that it used cookies as a way of teaching about love concepts such as adoration, respect, protection, etc. For example, "Edearment means, come here, my sugar, my cookie, my sweet" (Amazon.com 'Look Inside' function provided this example). However, I will say that I thought some of the concepts were a little advanced for a toddler to understand. But then they are supposed to absorb things like this better than adults do. Another aspect of the book that I liked was that it also encouraged interaction with parents through a sugar cookie recipe at the end.

One of the other things I liked about it is that it didn’t rhyme. I understand that children learn better through repetition of similar sounds and patterns. But to be honest, I almost feel like it’s simply been done and over done. So none of the books I’m describing has anything to do with rhyme.

The next book was “Not a Box” by Antoinette Portis. This is my favorite. I will own this one. The book depicts a young rabbit sitting in a box on the first page. The text simply states “why are you in a box?”. Turning the page, you read “It’s not a box” and the young rabbit is now sitting in the box surrounded by red lines that reveal a racecar. The entire story goes back and forth, about whether or not the box is a box. This story absolutely touched my heart. It’s a celebration of the imagination of children. Additionally, the cover of the book was made out of cardboard, so I must give props to the creative team on this one. I loved it.

The third and final picture book I took notice of was “Pink me Up” by Charise Mericle Harper. This one also depicted a young rabbit, but in this case, it was a girl from a large family of boys who was meant to go on a “pink-nic” with her mother but ends up having to go with her dad. First, the title sounded so much like “Pick me up” that when I saw this book on the shelf I chuckled and said “ok”. However, what I like most about this book are the pictures. Without the pictures, the text wouldn’t be as much fun. For example, the author doesn’t tell you that she’s the only girl in the family, she shows you with a family portrait. I laughed aloud with this one. It was adorable. The only criticism is that it’s specifically geared towards girls.

Now I know boys are harder to write for because they don’t like reading, but I like picture books that celebrate childhood rather than putting genders in a box. Am I doing just that saying that a boy won’t enjoy this book? Maybe.

Okay, probably.

But the main character is a girl, she thinks only girls can wear pink, and while she comes to understand that boys sometimes like pink too, I can’t see how it would appeal to them since the only male in the story is the dad. I don’t know, maybe I’m reading too much into this but it certainly seems like they wrote this one for the girls.

Is that a bad thing, no. I just wonder where the boy books are. I know I said it’s difficult. I did acknowledge that. I just wonder what it is about reading that boys don’t like? A curious case that has yet to be solved by the greatest minds in literature. I doubt I’ll have too much luck with it.

Why Children/Young Adult Books

I am very interested in the publishing business. I’m looking to get my foot in the door somewhere where my skills and talents can be translated into a career. However, I would very much like to work with children and young adult books. When I told someone this, I was asked why.

My automatic response to that question is that young adult literature is what I write. My books, while complex and convoluted are essentially about a young girl who ends a war in another magical world. At the end of the series, she’s 25 years old, but she begins her journey at 16. She struggles to find herself, to find love, to deal with pain and loss, and to simply live. It’s a high fantasy epic which I hope can be purchased in every bookstore out there one day. Of course, it needs to be finished then published first, but that’s a minor detail.

The truth is. I like children and young adult books. I like reading them, they’re quick and easy, and they remind me of where I came from. I wasn’t always a fast reader, or a good one. But I developed that. Every chance I got, I bought books and bookmarks (because that’s what kids do. They buy the fancy, holographic, find-the-picture bookmarks) from the Scholastic book fairs. I still have some of those – both the books and the bookmarks. I still haven’t read some those – the books only this time. I bought too many for me to read every year, I kept my favorite books and the ones I still intend to read. But those book fairs helped to shape me into an avid reader. I rarely go anywhere now without a book in my hand.

But that’s not the only reason why I want to work with the books that the kids of today will be reading.

So here’s the list of why:

1. You’ve heard it. I like them.

2. My parents, specifically my dad. When I was young, every night before I went to bed, my parents read to me. I don’t know how many times I fell asleep to the sound of my dad’s voice, but I do remember that sound. Even now, the memory of his voice rumbles through my chest as he reads the words and acts out the voices for each character of some unknown tale. How many children received what I had? How many children do so now?

3. My sister, who is mentally handicapped and will never develop mentally beyond that of a five year old. She can’t read. She probably never will. But if you put a picture book in front of her, she’ll tell you a story. She’ll “read” it to you. I love that childhood imagination. And it reminds me to keep it alive in myself. I want to help bring that out in others. I want to be a part of someone’s adventure, even if they don’t know I was involved.

4. Me. I’m a big kid. There are certain areas of my life in which I have always felt above my years in responsibility and maturity. I attribute these aspects of my personality to having a sister who is mentally retarded. In many respects, I had to grow up a little faster than everyone else because I had to protect her from bullies, babysit for my parents, and care for her when my parents weren’t able to (which admittedly wasn’t often). I don’t mind though, this helps me immensely in the business world because I have a strong sense of my responsibilities and I’ve always taken them seriously. One of my last bosses wrote the following recommendation, taken from my LinkedIn page: “I am very pleased to recommend Lisa Wicks, as her work has been exemplary, on time, often delivered prior to tight deadlines, and with the maturity and quality of a professional many years ahead of Lisa's position.” But my weakness is cartoons. I love to watch the Disney Channel, Cartoon Network, and Nickelodeon. They make me laugh. Phineas and Ferb is pretty ingenious; example below. So I feel like I have a connection with kids.

I may be 25 years old, but when my nieces and nephew come by, guess whom they’re playing with. I’m usually up for a game on the Wii, or my PS2, or even a game like Uno, Parcheesi, or Apples to Apples. Last time my niece Samantha came over to spend the night we spent a couple hours reading "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets". We only got through maybe half a chapter, but we were reading aloud and had to check the definition of several words (for her benefit, not mine obviously). But I did this because I liked that book and quite frankly, reading was always an adventure for me and I want so much for her to feel that way about reading as well. I would love for all kids to feel that way about reading.

But how does one say all of this when answering that question on the street? “Well, there are many parts to this, here let me read you off a list.”