WriteOnCon Awesomeness Coming in 3...2...1...

We hope you’re ready for WriteOnCon 2011 (we have dates--watch the main site for an epic announcement), and a full year of live events–-because we’ve been VERY busy behind the scenes, planning some New Awesome. We thought we’d start the year off with a bang and announce our amazingly fabulous January Live Event.

Are you ready for this? Got your shiny, new calenders out? Here are the details!

We’re SO excited to announce that we’re bringing in the amazing ladies at Pippin Properties, Inc for a special live chat/panel discussion!

Holly McGhee, Elena Mechlin, and Joan Slattery of Pippin Properties, Inc. will be joining WriteOnCon to discuss query writing do’s and dont’s and what they’re looking for!

When: Monday, January 24th, 2011 at 5:00 PM EST
Where: http://writeoncon.com/

In case you didn’t notice, the event is scheduled a little earlier than you might be used to, so make sure you make a note of the time and don’t miss out.

The chat will go up about 15 minutes early on the WriteOnCon homepage, and can also be found under the “live events / chat” tab.

Make sure you come armed with plenty of your most pressing questions about query writing and what Pippin is looking for. We’ll be spending 30 minutes on each. And to help you better figure out what to ask, here’s a little more info about these lovely ladies:

About Holly:

Holly McGhee founded Pippin Properties in 1998, after seven years as an Executive Editor and Associate Publisher at HarperCollins, and four years in adult trade marketing. She still can hardly believe that she gets to work with books every day, and she firmly believes that you can learn just about everything you need to know in life from children’s books. She is honored to have spent more than a decade representing talented authors and artists such as Kate DiCamillo, William Steig, Harry Bliss, David Small, Doreen Cronin, Kathi Appelt, and her very own sister, Alison McGhee, as well as many other amazing people. In her personal life, Holly writes under the pen name Hallie Durand and she likes spending time with her three kids and husband, going bowling, grocery shopping, and taking care of her nineteen year old dinner-plate aurelia tree, the best plant on Earth!

About Elena:

After a few years of bopping around the publishing industry, Elena finally found the perfect position from which to pursue her love of all things children’s literature at Pippin Properties. At Pippin, she loves reading queries and loves the treasure hunt that ensues! A uniquely collaborative agency, Pippin represents publishing greats such as Kate DiCamillo, David Small, Peter H. Reynolds, Kathi Appelt, and Doreen Cronin, among many others. Elena loves funny picture books, is typically averse to rhyming texts, likes goofy middle grade, and is on the hunt for some hot YA! She spends much of her free time enjoying New York City on foot.

About Joan:

Joan Slattery joined Pippin Properties, Inc., as a literary agent in November 2010. Prior to that, she spent nearly twenty years editing fiction and picture books for Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers (Random House). As an editor, she had the pleasure of working with Philip Pullman, Jerry Spinelli, Jane Smiley, Cynthia Voigt, Adele Griffin, Shelley Pearsall, Jen Bryant, Laura McNeal, and Tom McNeal, among many others. She also holds great admiration for librarians (and their sway over the children’s book industry) and received her own Masters in Library Science while working as an editor. Joan lives with her husband and twin five-year-olds in a suburb of New York City.

You can learn more about Pippin and their fabulous clients at www.pippinproperties.com.

We’d like to kick 2011 off with pizzazz so please spread the word! We’ll see you Monday, January 24th!

And I'm not gonna promise anything, but who would you like to see in a WOC Live Event? At the annual conference?