Part of a series introducing the Mentors for the 2019-2020 SCBWI-WWA Mentorship Program. This post introduces our Non-Fiction Mentors Curtis Manley and Mary Boone. To apply for the mentorship program visit here: https://wwa.scbwi.org/2019-mentorship-program/. Application Deadline: July 30, 2019.
Mentor: Curtis Manley
Curtis Manley grew up in Pennsylvania, where he read science fiction about aliens and long trips to other star systems. Later, he wrote poems, studied volcanoes, and learned about the geology of our solar system’s planets and moons. In the high desert of Idaho, he mapped huge lava flows similar to ones on Venus. His background in both science and poetry helps him include nonfiction elements in both fiction and nonfiction stories that entertain while making the universe a little more understandable. Curtis now lives near Seattle with his wife, their daughter, and a cat. Check out Curtis at www.curtismanley.com
Q: Why do you like to mentor aspiring writers?
I enjoy passing along what I’ve learned about writing and publishing. I want that knowledge to help others avoid the missteps I’ve made — and help them reach their writing and publishing goals more easily.
Q: What does being a successful published professional look like to you?
Success means different things at different stages of one’s career. Starting out, success means you are pleased with how your first published book turned out, and you have good reasons to expect success with one or more additional manuscripts that are in progress or out on submission.
Q: What can a mentee expect from your mentorship?
I hope to be able to offer honest opinions about my mentee’s project and concrete advice about how to make that project true to the mentee’s vision while also being attractive to publishers — and compelling to readers.
Q: What are you reading?
In addition to adult science books for background for my own projects, I’m enjoying Hedy Lamarr’s Double Life: Hollywood Legend and Brilliant Inventor by Laurie Wallmark, The Lost Forest by Phyllis Root, Birds of a Feather: Bowerbirds and Me by Susan L. Roth, and Fossil by Fossil: Comparing Dinosaur Bones by Sara Levine.
Q: What are you working on these days?
I’m finishing up a ms that is an off-shoot from my recently published nonfiction picture book, Just Right: Searching for the Goldilocks Planet. I hope my editor for Just Right likes it. I have a longer nonfiction ms that also needs to be a picture book, so I’m exploring what type of structure will help make it work.
Mentor: Mary Boone
Mary Boone has ridden an elephant in a circus parade, jumped out of an airplane, baked dozens of cricket flour cookies, and hung out backstage with a boy band – all in the interest of researching her nonfiction books and articles. Mary has written more than 50 books for young readers, many of them biographies and how-to books. She strives to create the kinds of books that are so compelling kids can’t wait to run home and tell their families: “You’re not going to believe what I learned today.” Her author site is: www.boonewrites.com, her Twitter account is: @boonewrites or visit her on Instagram: @bugscribe.
Q: Why do you like to mentor aspiring writers ?
So many people have helped me along the way, mentoring is a terrific way to give back some of that writing wisdom. If I can play a tiny part in helping someone else achieve their kid lit dreams, sign me up!
Q: What does being a successful published professional look like to you?
My definition of success has changed each and every time I’ve published a book – which is good, because it forces me to raise the bar for the next project. My one constant: I want to create books that are both informative and surprising. I want kids to be so awed by what they read in my books that they can’t wait to share that new knowledge with their friends and family. When that happens – Ah, success!
Q: What can a mentee expect from your mentorship?
I really want to help my mentee focus on what they want. What is their end goal? What does success look like for them? Their answer to those questions will help guide our path. Along the way, I can promise I’ll be supportive, but I’ll also provide a kick in the pants if I think that’s what they need.
Q: What are you reading?
I just finished Code Girls by Liza Mundy. What are the best books I’ve read in the past year? I loved Celeste Ng’s Little Fires Everywhere and I recommend Tara Westover’s Educated to everyone who will listen
Q: What are you working on these days?
I’m up to my eyeballs in proposal revisions for a new middle grade nonfiction project about entomophagy. I’m also researching unbelievable – but absolutely true – sports stories.