Snacks:
Tell us how you juggle your duties as SCBWI CA North/Central Co-RA,
writing, school visits, eating, sleeping…whew!
Dealey:
Writing is my first priority—besides family and eating and sleeping. I would love to say I write every morning, but
my dog whines for a walk. I would love to say I write every day, but life has a habit of intervening. The best advice I can
give anyone about writing time is: Don’t wait until you have hours upon hours of uninterrupted kid-free time. There
is no “perfect time” to write. Even if you only have 5 minutes in the car (PARKED. Do not write and drive!) while
your child is at the orthodontist, do it.
As for SCBWI duties, I share them with my writing pal and fabulous Co-RA, Patricia M. Newman, who is as organized and
obsessive as I am so we work incredibly well together. I average about 30+ school visits per year and as a teacher and actor,
school assemblies are second nature to me. Give me a microphone and MPRm full of kids and I’m in heaven. : ) February
and March are usually jam-packed with school visits because of I Love to Read, Read Across America, and Dr. Seuss’ Birthday,
but the rest of the year, I try to average 2-3 per month so I don’t burn out—and I have time to write.
Snacks:
Does rhyming come naturally for you? Who are your rhyming mentors and favorites?
Dealey:
I never specifically try to write a book in rhyme. Rhymes just pop into my head. Even when I’m working
on a novel, I’ll get a phrase that won’t go away until I take a break to see if it’s a picture book. When
I was a kid, I always wrote down the lyrics to my favorite songs (to learn them so I could sing along, of course!) and maybe
that was my training. As an actor, I performed at schools as part of a children’s touring group called Theater-To-Go,
and we did a lot of rhymed material—from Seuss and Prelutsky to Silverstein and Shakespeare. The same thing goes for
my work as a director and theater teacher. I love words.
Snacks: What was your submission process like for your Goldie Locks Has
Chicken Pox and Little Bo Peep Can’t Get to Sleep?
Dealey: Mine is a slush-pile success story. I queried two publishers about Goldie Locks Has Chicken Pox, my first picture book, and received a rejection slip right away from one of them. The other one asked
me to send the manuscript, which I did. I totally forgot about it when summer started because I was busy with Sugarloaf (the
Fine Arts Camp where I run the Theater Dept.). And, in Sept., six months after sending the query letter, I got a call from
a Senior Editor at Atheneum/Simon & Schuster.
After Goldie, I asked her
how to submit other projects and she said to send to them along. I submitted several options of Little Bo Peep Can’t Get to Sleep before we settled on the final version. Of course I’ve sent her numerous
other projects which weren’t right for Atheneum, so please don’t think I have a sure path to publication these
days. But I do have an agent now. And it only takes one YES.
Snacks: What is your writing process?
Dealey: The YA I just finished—not gonna jinx it by giving away many details—came to me mid-rehearsal
of a high school production of Macbeth that I was helping to direct. But
my family had scheduled a vacation after the play ended—and I couldn’t take my laptop—so I had no choice
but to map out the story in my journal. That really helped when I got back home and started writing. With picture books, the
title usually pops into my head first, dialog comes next, and then I play with the story. To me, writing is a bit like eavesdropping—probably
because of all my years in theater. After I know who the characters are, I “hear” them talking and write it down.
Snacks: The
YouTube video of your Writer’s Rap has been widely successful on the internet. Please
tell us how that hilarious video came about. (And thanks for helping us writers with our swag!)
Dealey: lol! Who knew we would go viral? Kids at school visits always ask what my
first published work was. It was a skit published in Plays Magazine—and
recently reprinted in their Dec. 2009 issue--called “The Christmas Wrap Rap” that I wrote for my high school students
to perform at a winter assembly. (You know--the school wants a winter assembly but you can’t mention Christmas…)
During my assemblies I sometimes have a few kids who can beat-box help me perform the first stanza (to prove that I can rap—haha).
And this lead to the idea of writing a Writer’s Rap.
I showed it to my writer’s group
and besides confirming that I am officially crazy, they didn’t quite know what I should do with it. Or how to present
it at school visits. So then at the SCBWI Conference in Los Angeles last summer, I thought I might have writer friends of
mine record different parts and make a video. You can imagine their deer-in-the-headlights expressions when I asked them to
rap with me. My drama kids at camp were game but we never had time. Only my buddy, Andrew Heringer (an unofficial member of
the fam) —who teaches with me in the summer and is a musical genius—{Shameless plug: check out his music at http://www.andrewheringer.com ) agreed to help. I remember him saying something supportive like, “It’s so ridiculous it will be fun!”
And it was. We did the voice-over on Andrew’s Mac and then duct-taped the video camera to his tripod
and filmed in the corner of my office.My dog Max needed more takes than
the rest of us. (***Look for Max in an upcoming video of his own!) Suddenly
we have over 41,000 views on Teachertube and over 4,000 on youtube. How cool is that?
Snacks:
What do you do to combat those daily, pesky obstacles to writing?
Dealey: I give
in to some of them. I love Twitter (Follow me at @ErinDealey !). It’s a wonderful way to connect with writers, editors,
agents, teachers and librarians! And walking the dog is a healthy break. But most of the time, I’m so into a project,
all I need to do is sit down and start where I left off. Suddenly everyone’s home and wondering what’s for dinner…
Snacks: What are
your favorite writing snacks?
Dealey: Dark chocolate, trail mix (with M & M’s),
maybe a chocolate chip cookie….I’m noticing a theme here…: )
interviews
Snacks: 
