doodling at the cwig conference

On Saturday I was the tea lady and ran around buying biscuits for the one-day conference of CWIG, the children’s book division of the Society of Authors. I’m sure lots of the writers will give amazing descriptions of the talks, which were excellent, but I got a bit obsessed with the capitals on the columns down the nave at the venue, a church called St James the Less. I also rather like the name, it’s kind of funny to think about a lesser James walking around, slightly shame-faced. This capital was different than all the rest and had a leaf design that also looked a bit like crouching panthers.

I also did some doodles of the speakers. Here are The Two Steves, Steves Barlow and Skidmore, who have been running around the country for years doing events and had lots of helpful tips, such as how not to get on the bad side of the school dinner ladies.


Tony Bradman, Steve Barlow, Steve Skidmore

Here’s a quick poster I made for the front door:


Photo nicked off Karen Ball’s blog

We had an inspiring and very funny talk by Frank Cottrell Boyce:

Here’s Eleanor Updale, who chaired the first panel:


Eleanor Updale, Helena Pielichaty

Here’s Helena Pielichaty and me, she’s also a newbie on the CWIG committee.

I forgot to take a photo of the noticeboard I drew, but I just nicked it off Karen Ball’s blog entry about the day. (Do read it if you’d like a more writerly impression of the day.)

Karen Ball stood up to say that if you’re interested in writing for children and want to join the Society of Children’s Book Writers & Illustrators, you can submit work to the third Undiscovered Voices anthology>. I remember that several people in the first two had some good success following their inclusion, including getting good agents and book deals. Details here.

There was some good SCBWI representation, including Sue Eves, Miriam Halahmy and Anne-Marie Perks.

Sue Eves & Miriam Halahmy


Jo Cotterill (aka Joanna Kenrick), Shana Nieberg-Suschitzky


Gillian Cross gave the welcome


one of the Scattered Authors Society coordinators Penny Dolan, Anne Cassidy and Wendy Meddour


More CWIG committee newbies! Nicola Davies and Bali Rai

I didn’t get photos of them, but it was also lovely to see Ros Asquith, Jane Ray and loads of other people. You can see more of them on my Facebook album here. Thanks so much to all the people who made the day happen, including Enid Stephenson and Jo McCrum.

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