Yeah, not quite the same as Kate in Titanic, I know, but I’m high, aren’t I?!

But seriously, I have been helping with the renovations, I promise. I’ve even got some serious splinters and bruises to prove it.

Anyway, today I’ve hidden from my husband to whip up this newsletter and give you a few Stu-updates.

The first thing is a new release date! Stu and the Sinister Second Serum will now be released on September 10, a week earlier than originally planned.

This change of date is not only to give our amazing librarians a little extra “time” to order Stu and the Sinister Second Serum in for their patrons’ spooky season reading, but is also because I’ve had several wonderful readers asking when “Stu 2” would be out—plus, Stu couldn’t wait to share the continuation of his story and wouldn’t shut up until I conceded a week.

So release date is now less than six weeks away! Squeee!!!

In other news, I’ve received my author copy of Stu and the Sinister Second Serum in both hardcover and paperback for any last-minute proofreading. I couldn’t wait to compare these books to their counterparts for Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops, Book One in The Sketcher Series. You can check out the colorful front covers, back covers, and spines of both books in this short video:

Or if you’d like a closer look at and/or reminder of Stu and the Sinister Second Serum’s front and back cover, click on my previous newsletter here.

Doesn’t the front, back, and spine beautifully match Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops? My cover illustrator and designer, Lily Uivel, has done an absolutely amazing job!

And last but not least of my updates, I’ve started finalizing September and October events. Below are two confirmed dates:

Sunday September 27th, 10am to 3pm - Books and Beyond at Ourimbah

Saturday October 3rd, 11am to 2pm - BookFace, Erina Fair

More details on events are coming soon! Second squeee—uh-oh, my husband is calling. Speaking of spines, my back has suddenly started to hurt…

Talk again soon.

Rebecca J. Chaney is the author of middle grade stories full of science, mystery, and laugh-out-loud moments. Her debut novel, Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops, was the first children’s book shortlisted for the Newcastle Writers Festival Fresh Ink Emerging Writers Prize. Rebecca was also awarded Runner Up for the Writing NSW Fellowship, and Honorable Mentions in the global Kids’ Choice Kidlit Writing Contest and the Just Write for Kids’ Pitch it! competition for this novel.

Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops is the first book in The Sketcher Series and is available on Amazon as well as at Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org, Waterstones, Book Face, and most bookstores worldwide. Or ask your library to order it in for you!

You can also find links to major bookstores and most of the digital platforms where Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops can be found here.

Stu and the Sinister Second Serum, the second book in The Sketcher Series, will be out September 10. You can pre-order the ebook here.

If you’d like to learn more about The Sketcher Series and read the first pages of Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops and Stu and the Sinister Second Serum for free, or book Rebecca for a school or library visit, please visit Rebecca’s website here.

STU AND THE SINISTER SECOND SERUM will now be released on September 10! A week earlier than communicated below! Squeee!!!

Yep, here it is!!!

I’m absolutely thrilled to reveal the cover of my middle grade science fantasy adventure, STU AND THE SINISTER SECOND SERUM, coming September 17! Coming September 17, in “time” for the spooky season! (As the cover hints, Halloween features in this instalment of Stu’s madcap story.)

That’s your cue to click on the video below for your first peek - don’t worry, it’s safe!

Drumroll, please…

Huge thanks to super talented Lily Uivel for once again capturing Stu in phenomenal quirky Stu-style. Find out more about Lily and her amazing illustrations here.

STU AND THE SINISTER SECOND SERUM is Book 2 in The Sketcher Series, and I can’t wait to share the continuation of Stu’s story of mystery and mayhem with you all!

Here’s the blurb:

Science should never be sinister.

Stu is finally enjoying life in Las Vegas, but life is never ordinary for someone who can
stop time. Especially when Stu meets a strange girl who seems to share his powers.

But when his scientist mother is kidnapped, Stu discovers that someone is trying to recreate the unique purple serum that gave him his abilities. And use this liquid to turn people into a formidable time-stopping army.

Can Stu and his friends come up with a plan to save his mother and defeat a sketchy villain?

Only time will tell.

Do you like it?

Here’s the front cover again, if you weren’t brave enough to click on the video above or if technology failed:

I ADORE it so much! And like STU AND THE SKETCHY TIME STOPS, it’s a wraparound cover. Here’s a sneaky sketchy peek at the back cover:

And for anyone interested, you can pre-order the eBook here.

More info on where else to buy STU AND THE SINISTER SECOND SERUM is coming soon!

Enjoy the rest of your week!

Rebecca J. Chaney is the author of middle grade stories full of science, mystery, and laugh-out-loud moments. Her debut novel, Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops, was the first children’s book shortlisted for the Newcastle Writers Festival Fresh Ink Emerging Writers Prize. Rebecca was also awarded Runner Up for the Writing NSW Fellowship, and Honorable Mentions in the global Kids’ Choice Kidlit Writing Contest and the Just Write for Kids’ Pitch it! competition for this novel.

Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops is the first book in The Sketcher Series and is available on Amazon as well as at Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org, Waterstones, Book Face, and most bookstores worldwide. Or ask your library to order it in for you!

Stu and the Sinister Second Serum, the second book in The Sketcher Series, will be out September 17.

You can also find links to major bookstores and most of the digital platforms where Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops can be found here.

If you’d like to learn more about The Sketcher Series and read the first chapter of Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops for free, or book Rebecca for a school or library visit, please visit Rebecca’s website here.

But the excitement around the second book coming out doesn’t mean I’m forgetting about the first book in the series, Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops. No, sirree!

If you’d like to see me get a little animated while reading from Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops, here it is! Once take, no edit. 😂

Click here to watch it. Right here on Substack for A Storied World.

I hope you (and your kids) enjoy!

Thank you to Mary and A Storied World for featuring Stu in its summer reading program for kids! Check out all the readings here.

Rebecca J. Chaney is the author of middle grade stories full of science, mystery, and mayhem. Her debut novel, Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops, was the first children’s book shortlisted for the Newcastle Writers Festival Fresh Ink Emerging Writers Prize. Rebecca was also awarded Runner Up for the Writing NSW Fellowship, and Honorable Mentions in the global Kids’ Choice Kidlit Writing Contest and the Just Write for Kids’ Pitch it! competition for this novel.

Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops is the first book in The Sketcher Series and is available on Amazon as well as at Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org, Waterstones, Book Face, and most bookstores worldwide. Or ask your library to order it in for you! Stu and the Sinister Second Serum, the second book in The Sketcher Series, will be out the end of September 2026.

You can also find links to major bookstores and most of the digital platforms where Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops can be found here.

If you’d like to learn more about Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops and read the first chapter for free, or book Rebecca for a school or library visit, please visit Rebecca’s website here.

Her: “Is this your book?”

Her nose wrinkles like my book smells of mothballs. Or decay. Or maybe her nose is simply itchy? Her nose is itchy but she’s too polite to attack it in front of me?

Me: “Yes, it is! It’s a tale about—”

Her: “Is it FUNNY?”

Me: “I hope readers find it funny and reviews suggest that they do.”

Her nostrils flare and she makes a weird noise in her throat like she’s choking, before she snorts—no, scoffs. She drops my book like it has Ebola and scurries away, hunched over like she’s worried someone saw her standing at my book event table…

Okay, this is a slight exaggeration of an actual incident that occurred at an event.

It’s also a slight exaggeration of many actual incidents that occurred in my years as a bookseller.

Incidents that remind me of the subtle—and not-so-subtle—snobbery around funny children’s books. The ill-informed opinion of some that funny children’s books don’t measure up compared to children’s books that are more serious in story and tone, so therefore should not be encouraged.

But the thing is, we need funny children’s books more than ever. Our school kids are in the middle of a literary learning crisis and reading apathy among children is increasing. Yet the answer may be simple.

Give kids funny books.

It’s what they want, and the evidence is in the sales. Like the fact that seven of the UK’s top ten bestselling kidlit authors write funny books. This list of creators sold more than five and a half million copies in 2025, worth more than 38 million British pounds. For context, that’s more than 71 million Aussie dollars for those of us Down Under, and more than 50 million US dollars for our friends in the USA.

Sales figures not to be scoffed at.

Yet some do scoff, like my nose-wrinkling table visitor, because funny children’s books are still not held in the same esteem as children’s books that are…not funny? And they’re definitely not viewed in the same regard as adult fiction. Yet writing funny books is just as hard as writing any other type of book. Those who haven’t, should try it some time. 😉

The viewpoint that a certain section of children’s books are inferior is especially unfortunate when declining readership is not a kidlit problem alone. Plus, child readers become young adult readers who become adult readers, and if we don’t keep kids reading—that is, if we don’t give them what they want to read—we will one day lose adult readers as well.

And if we don’t give children the types of books they want to read now, we will lose them. Now.

So give kids what they want.

Encourage schools and libraries and the media to fully embrace funny children’s books. Speaking of the media, ever noticed how kidlit reviewers seldom get the media space that reviewers of adult fiction do? It’s often left to wonderful social media ambassadors or the amazing Substack kidlit community to share the awesome array of funny children’s books on offer.

But it shouldn’t be this way.

At least there is hope that maybe, just maybe, things are starting to change. Here’s one example that gives me hope.

Andy Griffiths, author of the extremely popular and absurdly funny Treehouse, Bum, and Just! series has been named as the next Australian Children’s Laureate. His two-year appointment to the role of Australian Children’s Laureate will see him travel around Australia in a mission to engage young people to keep reading. Yay, yay, and more YAY!

And get this. More than 20 million copies of his funny children’s books have been sold worldwide. Yep, 20 million copies! That’s a lot of readers enjoying his funny children’s books (you can check them out here) and sales of 20 million copies is nothing to scoff at. Funny children’s books sell.

The time to stop the snobbery around funny children’s books is well overdue.

Funny children’s books may just be the thing that keeps kids reading.

And we should all be encouraging that.

In other news, I’ve been furiously working on finalizing Stu and the Sinister Second Serum, the second book in The Sketcher Series, for its release at the end of September. Final manuscript proofreads are nearing completion and the book cover is looking AMAZING (I really do have the best cover artist and designer). I can’t wait to share the cover with you soon, along with snippets from the book! Hint: there’s a definite spooky vibe to this next instalment of Stu’s madcap adventures. 👀

Rebecca J. Chaney is the author of middle grade stories full of science, mystery, and mayhem. Her debut novel, Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops, was the first children’s book shortlisted for the Newcastle Writers Festival Fresh Ink Emerging Writers Prize. Rebecca was also awarded Runner Up for the Writing NSW Fellowship, and Honorable Mentions in the global Kids’ Choice Kidlit Writing Contest and the Just Write for Kids’ Pitch it! competition for this novel.

Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops is the first book in The Sketcher Series and is available on Amazon as well as at Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org, Waterstones, Book Face, and most bookstores worldwide. Or ask your library to order it in for you! Stu and the Sinister Second Serum, the second book in The Sketcher Series, will be out the end of September 2026.

You can also find links to major bookstores and most of the digital platforms where Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops can be found here.

If you’d like to learn more about Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops and read the first chapter for free, or book Rebecca for a school or library visit, please visit Rebecca’s website here.

I had a super-fun day at the very first Books and Beyond event last Sunday, and part of the reason was…snakes.

Yep, snakes.

Lemme explain.

Books and Beyond is an Australian book market put together by talented author friends, Selina Fenech and Vivienne Lee Fraser, for local indie authors to meet readers, discuss their writing, and hopefully sell some books!

So did I want to be part of this? You betcha!

And did I think I was going to make many sales with only one book, Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops, out so far? Not likely.

I knew I needed something else for my one-middle-grade-book stall to stand out among the plethora of prolific YA and adult fantasy and romance writers that is the usual fare of voracious indie readers.

First, I asked a middle grade author friend, Fiona Lloyd, if she would like to share my stall. Fiona also has only one book out at present, but she is a member of one of my writing groups and we know each other well—an important consideration if you are planning on sharing a stall with someone for five hours. Two titles on a stall is better than one and I knew we would have fun on the day. And we did. I think if there was a prize for the chattiest stall, we would have won it! Also, having another author on board also split the already very reasonable cost of the stall, so neither of us had to sell many books to make a profit.

The second thing I did before the event was think about what else besides my book and the usual giveaways of coloring in pages and the like would entice middle grade readers to approach my stall.

And that’s how I came to snakes.

Those who have read Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops will know that my chatterbox protagonist, Stu, has a pet corn snake called Riccardo—or Ric, for short. After moving to a new country and being hurt by his former best friend, Stu is too afraid to open up to anyone other than Ric. This snake is Stu’s only friend until Stu finds the courage to take a chance on human friendships again. So a snake features heavily in Stu’s life.

With this in mind, I procured a big bundle of 3D-printed snake toys in an assortment of two-tone colors and priced them at a price point that would hopefully entice children (and their parents and guardians) who wanted to buy something at Books and Beyond but had limited budget to do so. Here’s one of the colorful critters here:

And did they sell?

YES! They sold like hot cakes, or is that hot snakes? And as many adults as kids bought them. So much so that one customer came to my stall and said, “So you’re the one selling all the snakes.”

One or two adults thought they were bookworms, and a couple of kids thought the black variety were Toothless, the lovable dragon from How to Train Your Dragon, even though my snakes didn’t have wings!

Here’s my half of the stall while I still had some of the critters:

Not only did I sell out of these small slithering specimens halfway through the five-hour market, but they also provided another opening into discussions about Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops, which resulted in book sales! Plus some of these chats were with librarians, which also opened up more libraries to acquiring my book as well as invites for me to conduct more library events. (You can read about my library workshops here.)

The sale of these snakes also reminded me that middle grade readers LOVE anything to do with animals. Just look at all the successful books where animals feature, like the Warriors series with its cats, and standalone books like Runt (featuring a dog) and The One and Only Ivan (with its gorilla, among other animals).

I guess what I’m trying to say is that I think it’s good to broaden your idea of what might sell beyond your primary products, your books. As an indie-published middle grade author, it’s not easy to sell high volumes of books at venues outside of school and library events, but if you open yourself up to also offering other products that align with your book and its targeted readership, you never know what might happen. Offering something inexpensive that ties in with your story may lead to another source of revenue.

And for me, it all came down to snakes.

Author friends, what items other than your books do you sell at events?

And readers, what interesting items (other than books) have you seen authors sell at book-selling events?

And for both, which books featuring animals have you really enjoyed, and did the animal/s in question have anything to do with your enjoyment of that book?

You can find out more about Books and Beyond book markets here, and more about its founding authors, Selina Fenech, here and Vivienne Fraser, here. And you can find out more about my stall buddy author, Fiona Lloyd, here.

Rebecca J. Chaney is the author of middle grade stories full of science, mystery, and mayhem. Her debut novel, Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops, was the first children’s book shortlisted for the Newcastle Writers Festival Fresh Ink Emerging Writers Prize. Rebecca was also awarded Runner Up for the Writing NSW Fellowship, and Honorable Mentions in the global Kids’ Choice Kidlit Writing Contest and the Just Write for Kids’ Pitch it! competition for this novel.

Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops is the first book in The Sketcher Series and is available on Amazon as well as at Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org, Waterstones, Book Face, and most bookstores worldwide. Or ask your library to order it in for you! Book Two in The Sketcher Series will be out in 2026.

You can find links to major bookstores and most of the digital platforms where Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops can be found here.

If you’d like to learn more about Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops and read the first chapter for free, or book Rebecca for a school or library visit, please visit Rebecca’s website here.

Now on to the third and final part. We start with a session that, in my opinion, covers genres that don’t get enough “airplay” at literary festivals. Graphic Novels, Verse Novels, and Poetry (and Comics) with Pip Harry, Joel McKerrow, and Christof Bogacs.

Pip Harry is an author and editor of books from picture books to young adult. Find out more about her here. Joel McKerrow is a children’s graphic novelist and a performance poet, and you can learn more about Joel here. Christof Bogacs is a comic book and video game writer. Find out more about Christof here.

Pip said:

• Verse novels are accessible to a range of reader levels and their abundance of white space allows kids to breathe. They call for the condensation of words to their bare essence and are finally starting to surge in popularity in Australia.

• When it comes to kids on screens, a way around it to let them use Yoto, a screen-free audio platform that features audio cards in a player. It’s like a kid-friendly boombox that also plays stories.

Joel said:

• When it comes to poetry, don’t read the poem, let the poem read you. (I LOVE this!) Let the poem evoke an emotion in you.

• When writing, Joel likes to focus on the quick punches that jokes achieve, and also loves squishing genres together, for example, bring comedy into an action book with science fiction or fantasy elements. (*cough* I try to do the same in my middle grade novel, Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops. Learn more about this book here.)

Christof said:

• Australia lacks the technical capacity to produce many comic books, for example, it lacks the required number of digital colourists for a thriving comic book industry. In comparison, U.S. culture leans far more into comic book consumption than Australia, and has a much higher abundance of comic bookstores per capita.

• The more human our stories are in the response they invoke, the more they are likely to cut through on social media as well as to combat A.I. Marketing campaigners are turning to A.I. for their words, which is leading to bland campaigns.

• Christof’s process is to make the books first, tell friends about them, then hopefully make money. Make the books, make friends, make money. Here’s an interesting anecdote: Jeff Kinney, author of the massively successful children’s series, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, said during his recent Sydney Writers Festival appearance that he starts all his books by first coming up with its joke, and then forming the story out of and around it.

Pip, Joel, and Christof all agreed that upper middle grade books need to be given more love in Australia from publishers. (I wholeheartedly agree too!)

Next came my final session for the day, How to create and maintain a thriving career in an industry that is everchanging with Deborah Abela, Kate Temple, and Nat Amoore.

Deborah Abela is the author of countless children’s books (I kept losing count so I gave up trying to figure out how many. If you want to try, her website is here.) Kate Temple is one of those rare creatures who harmoniously co-writes with her husband, and you can find out more about them both here. And last but not least, Nat Amoore is one of the most energetic and hilarious children’s authors to ever grace a stage. Learn more about Nat here.

Deborah said:

• The biggest influence on her career is when she meets with librarians, teachers, and booksellers in person.

• You may not like social media, but you have to put yourself on it. “Don’t orphan your book.” (Deborah credits Australian children’s author, Louise Park, with this quote).

• School visits are more than simply a promotion of your book, but doing them does leverage book sales. Present yourself at events in a way that shows what you’re comfortable doing and what you’re good at, whether that be comedy, talking about writing craft, or whatever. Look at what the kids react to and find your groove. You may be talking to the kids, but you are talking to the teachers too – don’t waste their money. Hopefully, the kids have a good time, learn something, and leave the session wanting to read. Be of value. Trust in what you have to offer, and offer it.

• At any book launch, READ AN EXCERPT FROM YOUR BOOK. It’s surprising how many authors don’t do this. Book launches also help promote your book on social media after the event is over.

Kate said:

• The biggest impact on her sales has been cultivating a range of books.

• Librarians are very active online, and content that authors upload about their books may get shared to students before an author visit.

• Presentations are part of the work of writing and selling books. Feedback and ideas from kids at these presentations often goes into future work.

• Do you follow your heart or the market? Hopefully the two are close, but with how slow the publishing process is, you’ll never be intentionally on trend. You want to know your target audience, but you should also be excited about your project. You also have a lot more celebrity authors in the market to compete with now.

Nat said:

• The number one impact on her book sales are school visits. They make her Public Lending Right (PLR) and Educational Lending Right (ELR) payments soar. (This is a lending rights scheme that not all countries have, where creators and publishers are compensated in recognition of income lost through free multiple use of their books in public and educational lending libraries. You can find out more about Australia’s payment scheme here.)

• After the pandemic ended, publishers didn’t return to marketing their books in the same way as prior to Covid-19. For example, there are much fewer organised in-person book tours now.

• When pitching an author visit to a school, send a PDF with clickable links and include your book’s blurb, your author bio, fees, and any session requirements such as technology and materials.

Whew, that’s it! My key notes from a BIG day in Sydney at the Writing NSW Kids and YA Festival. It ended with my favorite part of any writers’ event: mingling with friends.

Kidlit writers are the best, aren’t they?!

Now it’s back to editing the second book in The Sketcher Series. More on that soon.

Happy writing, and bye for now.

Rebecca J. Chaney is the author of middle grade stories full of science, mystery, and mayhem. Her debut novel, Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops, was the first children's book shortlisted for the Newcastle Writers Festival Fresh Ink Emerging Writers Prize. Rebecca was also awarded Runner Up for the Writing NSW Fellowship, and Honorable Mentions in the global Kids' Choice Kidlit Writing Contest and the Just Write for Kids' Pitch it! competition for this novel.

Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops is the first book in The Sketcher Series and is available on Amazon as well as at Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org, Waterstones, Book Face, and most bookstores worldwide. Book Two in the series will be out in 2026.

You can find links to major bookstores and most of the digital platforms where Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops can be found here.

If you’d like to learn more about Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops and read the first chapter for free, or book Rebecca for a school or library visit, please visit Rebecca’s website here.

Today’s newsletter, Part Two, covers chats on why series fiction is still a winner with kids, why Australian teens need Australia stories, and how two writers are creating communities of authors, illustrators, and readers.

Enjoy!

The first session I attended after the Keynote Address was Why Series Fiction is Still a Winner with Kids and Publishers with R. A. Spratt, Belinda Murrell, and Nathan Luff.

R. A. Spratt is the author of more than thirty children’s books and the host of two podcasts on storytelling. You can learn more about her here. Belinda Murrell is the author of more than thirty-five children’s books and is a descendant of Charlotte Atkinson, the author of Australia’s first children’s book. Find out more about Belinda here. Nathan Luff is an author, playwright, and part-time primary school teacher. Learn more about Nathan here.

R. A. Spratt said:

• Children seek the comfort of predictability found in a series’ format, which makes series popular. Series can also give you considerable backlists, which are usually necessary these days to make a sustainable living. (As an aside, R. A. Spratt said that some major Australian festivals are asking authors if they’re willing to donate their time at appearances and not be paid at all (!!!) but appearance fees are also necessary to make a sustainable income.)

• Books in series are like cigarettes. Light the hook for the next one at the end of the previous.

• Comedy series now have better narrative plots than many of the popular series of our childhood, and the protagonist’s problems often change per book. Some problems might not be solved but the protagonist learns how to deal with them. (Spoiler Alert! Stu, the main character in my debut middle grade novel, Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops, is grappling with exactly this in the second book in the series which I am currently writing. He is grappling with a problem he won’t necessarily solve but must learn how to deal with it.)

Belinda said:

• Series draw kids in more than standalone novels, as kids like to collect and display them on their bookshelves. They also know that when they pick up the next one in the series, they are likely to love it. They also don’t have to do the work again of getting to know a whole new set of characters. The familiarity of the series draws them in.

• The first book in a series usually sells the most and unfortunately, deals for series are often now for a smaller number of books, as publishers are increasingly taking less risk. What would once have been a four-book deal is now only a deal for two.

Nathan said:

• Australia’s current top ten in children’s fiction are all books that are part of a series.

• Subsequent books in a series are coming out faster now than previously. It’s not unusual to now see all three books in a series come out in one year.

• A side note: Budding romances between characters is becoming popular in middle grade, as publishers try to tap into the current adult fiction romantasy trend.

The next session I attended was Why Australian Teens Need Australian Stories with Will Kostakis, Hayley Lawrence, and Tristan Bancks. This session expanded into a broader conversation on the state of the Australian YA publishing.

Will Kostakis is a young adult and children’s author, and a winner of the Prime Minister’s Literary Award for Young Adult. Learn more about Will here. Hayley Lawrence is a Young Adult author who was shortlisted for The Australian/Vogel’s Literary Prize for young writers. Read more about Hayley here. Tristan Bancks is the author of more than fifteen books for young adults and children, and is an author-advocate for literary non-profit, Room to Read. Find out more about Tristan here.

Will said:

• Only 2% of titles on Australia’s YA best-seller lists are Australian, and that’s on a good week with a new Australian release. (Yikes!)

• YA books in Australia are lucky to sell more than 2,000 copies, and #booktok does little for Australian YA books and/or authors.

• U.S. publishers aren’t usually keen on bringing out a book that’s already been published elsewhere like Australia. U.K. publishers want books published in their own country first and prefer to then send books authored by Australian writers back to Australia in a Rights sale.

Hayley said:

• Australia’s diverse settings, such as the remoteness of Australian locations and our deadly creatures, add tension to stories. Australian teens need to see books set in their own country.

Tristan said:

• Specificity helps books go international but unfortunately, blandness sells well overseas.

• Print books don’t shove algorithms in your face, with ads that say, because you liked this, you’ll love this. Algorithms skewer what you see, what you’ll read next. Algorithms and social media splinter our focus and encourage us to talk into a void.

Creating Communities of Authors, Illustrators, and Readers with A. L. Tait and Deni Vee

A. L. (Allison) Tait is a children’s author and one of the founders of the Your Kids Next Read Facebook group and podcast. Dani Vee is a children’s and adult fiction author, host of the Words and Nerds podcast, and a publisher at Larrikin House. Learn more about A. L. Tait here and Dani Vee here.

This was a shorter session than the previous two, with the main point being that creating communities is a long game with incremental steps and A LOT of unpaid work.

Well, that’s it for Part Two. I’ll be back next week with my third and final instalment of notes from my day at the Writing NSW Kids and YA Festival 2025. Stay tuned for sessions on graphic and verse novels, poetry and comic books, as well as a lively discussion on how to create and maintain a thriving career in an everchanging industry. The last session in particular was hilarious!

Happy writing, and bye for now.

Rebecca J. Chaney is the author of middle grade stories full of science, mystery, and mayhem. Her debut novel, Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops, was the first children's book shortlisted for the Newcastle Writers Festival Fresh Ink Emerging Writers Prize. Rebecca was also awarded Runner Up for the Writing NSW Fellowship, and Honorable Mentions in the global Kids' Choice Kidlit Writing Contest and the Just Write for Kids' Pitch it! competition for this novel.

Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops is the first book in The Sketcher Series and is available on Amazon as well as at Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org, Waterstones, Book Face, and most bookstores worldwide. Book Two in the series will be out in 2026.

You can find links to major bookstores and most of the digital platforms where Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops can be found here.

If you’d like to learn more about Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops and read the first chapter for free, or book Rebecca for a school or library visit, please visit Rebecca’s website here.

But it hasn’t all been writing and re-writing and pulling my hair out, no sirree! Last weekend, I dragged myself out of Stu’s latest adventure to travel to Writing NSW’s Kids and YA Festival in Sydney for some networking therapy.

I attended the Writing NSW Kids and YA Festival for the first time back in 2016, when it was run under Writing NSW’s former name of the NSW Writers Centre. You can read about that day here. I loved it so much, I attended again in 2018 and yep, you can read about that day here. AND again in 2022 - read it here.

So when I trekked to Sydney, I was bubbling with excitement to catch up with kidlit writer friends I hadn’t seen in AGES, make new book-mad buddies, and listen to enlightening and entertaining (read, hilarious) discussions on the current state of the Aussie kidlit industry.

The day did not disappoint so I thought I’d share tasty titbits of the conversations I attended. There was SO MUCH on offer that I’ll dish them out over three newsletters to give you time to digest it all. Today’s Part One newsletter covers the Keynote Address. Parts Two and Three, to be shared in the coming weeks, will cover the rest of the sessions I attended.

It should be noted too that while most of what I’ll share is relevant to writers worldwide regardless of genre and targeted age readership, some aspects do have specific significance to the Australian kidlit publishing landscape.

Regardless, I hope you get something out of it! So, drumroll…here are my main points and stats from the Keynote Address with the 2024-25 Australian Children’s Laureate, Sally Rippin, in conversation with my writer friend, Jacqueline Harvey – Oh! Hang on, here’s a bit of background info on these two lovely authors first:

Sally Rippin is Australia’s highest-selling female author, with more than 10 million copies of her children’s books sold in eighteen countries around the world. Sally is also the only children’s author on the board of the Australian government’s newly formed Writing Australia organisation. Visit Sally’s website here.

Jacqueline Harvey is the author of a wide range of children’s books, from picture to middle grade. With more than two million copies of her books sold, Jacqueline is also an ambassador for Dymocks Children’s Charities and Room to Read. Visit Jacqueline’s website here.

Right, housekeeping done. Now the main points and stats I gleaned from Sally and Jacqueline are:

Sally said:

• There will be no book industry (in the future) without child readers. (Powerful quote, huh?)

• However, things are not all doom and gloom, with lots of ways that writers and other industry professionals are working hard to keep children interested in reading. For example, there is more access now than ever before for children to meet authors in real life, such as through author visits to schools and libraries. (I know I never had the opportunity to meet my author idols growing up.)

• Regarding the books vs. screens debate, it’s important to note that screens are here to stay, so an either/or answer to this debate is not going to work. Plus, screens can be used to entice teens back to books – hello, #booktok? Plus plus, it’s not that children and teens are on screens that is the problem, it’s what they’re doing on those screens that is, for example, the doom scrolling. (There was more audience head-bobbing at this last comment than you’d see at a heavy metal concert.)

Jacqueline said:

• In a Harper Collins UK survey, less than half of the parents surveyed thought reading was fun, and Gen X parents are the most likely to see reading to their children as work or a chore. (Sigh.)

• A worldwide OECD study with 690,000 participants found that teens spend an average of 49 hours per week on screens, with 40% of fifteen-year-olds spending more than 40 hours per week and 20% spending a whopping 80 hours on screens. (YIKES!)

• Publishers are not giving debut books time to “take off” in bookstores before they churn the next batch of books out. This continual process means books are often replaced every month on bookstore shelves, which doesn’t give debut books enough time for readers to discover them or their authors. (Grrr!)

• The non-profit Australia Reads program is seeking ideas for reading campaigns. A current suggestion is the “Get Caught Reading” idea where children and teens who are caught with a book in their hand, for example, on a tram or train, are asked interesting questions about, and their opinion of, that book. In return, they receive a book voucher to spend at their local bookstore. (Yay!)

So the above are what I scribbled down from the festival’s Keynote Address. I hope you found them interesting – and not too depressing! I promise there will be some lighter points in Parts Two and Three of my festival day!

Stay tuned for Part Two, where discussions cover topics such as why series fiction is still a winner with kids, why Australian teens need Australia stories, and how two writers are creating communities of authors, illustrators, and readers.

Enjoy the rest of your week!

Rebecca J. Chaney is the author of middle grade stories full of science, mystery, and mayhem. Her debut novel, Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops, was the first children's book shortlisted for the Newcastle Writers Festival Fresh Ink Emerging Writers Prize. Rebecca was also awarded Runner Up for the Writing NSW Fellowship, and Honorable Mentions in the global Kids' Choice Kidlit Writing Contest and the Just Write for Kids' Pitch it! competition for this novel.

Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops is the first book in The Sketcher Series and is available on Amazon as well as at Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org, Waterstones, Book Face, and most bookstores worldwide. Book Two in the series will be out in 2026.

You can find links to major bookstores and most of the digital platforms where Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops can be found here.

If you’d like to learn more about Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops and read the first chapter for free, or book Rebecca for a school or library visit, please visit Rebecca’s website here.

However, this dialogue with librarians is also reaping me another reward: offers to hold events in their libraries. I ran my first library event this week, a writing workshop for kids aged 9 to 13, the targeted readership of my novel. Centering on writing adventure stories, the workshop booked out in ten days.

Now the pressure was on!

I do have prior experience running school education programs, but they were predominantly held outside. And last century. So how did I prepare?

I prepared a running sheet of the things I planned hoped to cover in the one-hour session, and this is how it looked:

A) Introduce me, my book, and lay out my ground rule: I’m not looking for perfect writing, rather for exciting ideas. (5 mins)

B) Ask my audience: What makes a good adventure story? What is your favorite adventure story, and why? Who has written an adventure story before? (5 mins)

C) Briefly explain the three elements of any good story: The WHO, the WHERE, and the WHAT. Tell them my WHAT for Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops came from a “What if…” question. (5 mins) NB: As part of this, I prepared colorful worksheets for the kids to use, including my website details at the bottom. These worksheets were for the kids to take home to hopefully work on their story further and consisted of two pages, shown side-by-side below.

D) Read a short passage from Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops, where the kids are asked to guess the “What if…?” question for this book. What if time stopped and everyone became “Stiffs” except you? (In my book, “Stiff” is the term Stu gives to all those who freeze.) Before reading, fill the kids in on the premise and what happens prior to these pages, and leave out anything they may not understand without additional context. (5 mins for premise and what happens prior, another 5 mins for reading)

E) Follow the reading with a quick game. NB: For legal reasons, any participant under twelve years of age had to have an adult present, either in the workshop room or the main library next door. But every adult chose to stay in the workshop room, so I got them involved! We played a quick game where time stopped and the adults “froze” (except me—I needed to speak!) The kids then debated what they would do if they were the only one who could move. (5 mins)

F) Next is the writing exercise. Scatter word prompt cards to help those stuck for ideas, and show props related to my book. See examples of both below. While participants work, walk around the room and approach each one individually to see if they need any assistance. Offer a Q & A session during this time. (20 mins)

G) Last item: any book purchases and signings. (10 mins)

So how did the workshop go and what did I learn?

Considering that one child walked in announcing that he DID NOT like to write, and a young teen’s parent said to me that, “It might be better if you don’t read what she writes,” and a third child still shrank away from me even though I approached her desk on my knees after sensing her fear…the workshop went amazingly well!

And here are my key takeaways:

Don’t read too much of your book. I only read three pages and had previously timed myself reading aloud to make sure I did not read for more than four minutes. Any longer than this and you risk losing the kids’ attention. And if their attention does wander? Don’t stress, just finish the passage and move on. Oh, and pick a passage with high emotion/suspense. The passage I picked included beats I could act out while reading. I don’t know how well I went with that, but I didn’t have any pencils thrown at me so I mustn’t have been too bad! 😂

Include a fun break-out activity that aligns with your book. While only two adults performed a “freeze” during our stopping-time game, it was enough to keep the kids engaged as they visualized people stuck in time while running, jumping, etc. Any remaining ice within the group was firmly broken and they were eager to write—even the initial I-don’t-write child!

Only two participants used the word prompt cards, which surprised me a little. The rest were brimming with inspiration, and some had come to the workshop already with an idea to work on. I gave short verbal feedback for those. I also had a sheet of writing-prompt sentences which I passed around the class, but next time I will bring more copies, as it stalled on one desk and most of the kids didn’t get to see it.

My visual props garnered quite a few questions from the kids, like Are those gems real? 🙂 as well as a discussion on the various colors of corn snakes from the adults. 🤷‍♀️ My props also led to a chat about other aspects of my book, so take props! And mention comps for your book if you can organically include these: once I mentioned Stu’s similarity in behavioral traits with Kevin from Home Alone, the kids were hooked!

Make sure worksheets and/or other takeaways have your website details on them, which in turn, should have details of where else to buy your book, etc.. You never know, maybe a parent will decide to buy copies of your book after they leave. I also gave out coloring sheets of my book’s front cover during my book signing at the end of the workshop. Like the worksheets, this also has the QR code for my website on it.

And take a water bottle to the event. All that talking dries out your mouth real quick.

I had several participants who were clearly younger than the suggested age for the workshop, but that’s okay. Make sure the language you use is easy to comprehend for all ages and comprehension levels in your group, and ask questions to gauge if audience members understand particular terms and the overall meaning of what you’ve said

Some kids speak up a lot more than others, and some don’t like to speak out for fear of embarrassment if they get an answer wrong. And that’s okay too. The important thing is to make sure every child who wants to say something has an opportunity to do so.

You may not have enough time to do everything you want to do, but make sure you have enough activities in case one falls flat and doesn’t work. Then, you can easily move on to the next. And aligning the activities somewhat with aspects of your book is a great marketing tool.

I was extremely lucky that all of my activities seemed to strike a chord with the kids. However, the downside of this was that everyone became so engaged in their writing that I ended up with only five minutes left for any book sales and signings. I needed to keep an eye on time (pardon the Stu-pun), but we were having so much fun! Luckily, our room was not booked after the workshop was due to end so we were able to extend the event until everyone left.

Oh, and every family bought at least one or two copies of my book—one parent bought four! But even if they hadn’t, I had a great time.

It’s a privilege to work with eager young readers, so share your enthusiasm with them for writing, try to relax, and have fun!

I’d like to thank children’s book authors, Claire Fayers and Malia Maunakea, who shared tips with me from their own workshop experiences, prior to my event. I hope by writing this, I can pay it forward and help others. Feel free to pop any questions or your own tips in the comments.

Now back to writing the second book in The Sketcher Series. More on that soon!

Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops is Book 1 of The Sketcher Series, and is available on Amazon as well as Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org, Waterstones, Book Face, and other bookstores worldwide.

You can find links for most of the digital platforms who supply Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops, as well as links for major bookstores where Stu can be ordered, here.

If you’d like to learn more about Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops and read the first chapter for free, please visit my website here.

Getting your children’s book into libraries is not easy as a self-published author, but it can be done. This is how I’m doing it with my debut middle grade book, Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops. I call it my Get-Stu-Into-Libraries Campaign.

First of all, I’ve only tackled this so far for public libraries, like those in local councils. I’m yet to tackle school libraries and the education system…

Second, I’ve only done this so far for my print formats, that is, for hardcover and paperback. Why? More on that at the bottom of this newsletter. *

Third, it’s A LOT of work and quite time-consuming (pardon the Stu time-pun), especially when also writing the second book in The Sketcher Series. But writing and marketing are a constant juggling act, and I’m a firm believer that one cannot exist without the other if you want to get your book into the hands of readers.

So what did I do? How did I get Stu into libraries across the world?

First, I uploaded Stu’s print formats (paperback and hardcover) to Ingram Spark. This listed Stu in the catalogues of many—not all—of the library/bookstore wholesalers, as well as online with retailers such as Bookshop.org (link here), Barnes and Noble (see here), Waterstones (and here too), and bookstore chains worldwide.

A note here: after Stu was listed on these websites, I noticed some did not display the book cover, meaning it did not transfer across in the meta-data. Apparently this is not unusual, but sending emails to the relevant entity soon rectified it, as they allowed me to upload my cover to them direct, and voila! All fixed.

Anyway, I next prepared a sell sheet for Stu, which is basically an information sheet on my book: what it’s about, where it can be ordered, ISBNs, award listings and credentials, a reputable review (one is enough when space is scarce), and a short bio on me. Oh, and I know of at least one library who bought Stu from their local bookstore, and two libraries who ordered Stu from Amazon. Below is the sell sheet I prepared for Australian libraries:

Next, I prepared an email mailing list for library services around Australia – What, for the whole country? I hear you say. Uh-huh, but it must be said that many public libraries in Australia combine, for example, by geographical area, to use the one ordering and cataloguing library service. Plus, many local council areas use one email address for all of their libraries. A library service which received one email from me ordered a copy of Stu for every one of their nine libraries.

Of course, this is harder to do internationally, so I asked international supporters of my work, like my ARC readers and online writing groups if they would mind requesting Stu at their local library. I’ve since had a number of North American sales on Ingram Spark, which I believe is mainly due to this support. The writing community is the best!

The downside to Ingram Spark is that they don’t differentiate in their reports between sales to libraries and sales to bookstores. They also only show sales at country-level, not state or county/local level, so I can’t be exactly sure where a sale occurred unless someone tells me their library got Stu in (and some people have!) But I guess it’s no different to how sales are reported in KDP on Amazon.

Anyway, after my concerted Get-Stu-Into-Libraries Campaign, Stu climbed to #14 in Ingram Spark sales for one of BISAC's highly competitive juvenile fiction categories, Humorous Stories. Woohoo!!!

For those unaware, BISAC is a global code system used to categorize the genre of your book. As part of your book’s metadata, it aids libraries and bookstores in identifying your book’s characteristics and “where it belongs” on bookshelves. Humorous Stories is one of the categories that characterizes Stu within the juvenile fiction section—and as an aside, children’s fiction should only be categorized in the juvenile fiction section too.

I should add, Stu may be ranked higher in other less-competitive categories in which he is listed, for example, in juvenile fiction science-related categories, but I’ve been told Humorous Stories is one of the most popular children’s fiction search categories for librarians, so I think it’s a better reflection of how well my title is selling than rankings in less-populated categories are, where title numbers are more limited.

I’m hoping Stu’s ranking will climb higher still, as I know quite a few Australian libraries have ordered Stu from their supplier but the sales haven't gone through yet, so are not reflected in my reports.

Like everything in the book publishing industry, things can take awhile but, given that my marked increase in sales occurred in the six to eight weeks after my campaign mail-out, I’m assuming that most of them were due to sales to libraries, especially as quite a few libraries kindly emailed me back to confirm they were ordering Stu!

October and November were my best overall sales months to date, even surpassing sale numbers in June and July, the two months after my Amazon release (I only released on Ingram Spark at the end of July).

My Get-Stu-Into-Libraries Campaign has also resulted in another bonus, my first library event:

Bookings for this FREE event open on 16^th December and can be made here or by ringing the library on +61 2 4304 7650. Hopefully, I’ll sell a few more copies of Stu at this event too.

I hope all of the above has been helpful. If you’d like to help me get Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops into libraries, I’ll be ETERNALLY grateful if you request it at your local library. I’d love to give more kids access to Stu, especially those who rely on libraries for their reading.

Have you had success getting your self-published book into libraries?

* This campaign only applies to my print formats (so far). This is because my exclusive period with Amazon’s Kindle Unlimited (KU) for my ebook of Stu only ended a week ago. Starting off exclusively with KU while I found my self-publishing feet meant I was not permitted to upload and distribute my ebook with any other supplier. Now that I have taken Stu out of KU, I am keen to access library/bookstore ebook distributors and retailers through Draft2Digital. Was it a big decision to take Stu out of KU? Not really, as I’d only received a minimal number of page reads, all within the first month or so after release. Of course, my ebook is still listed for sale with KDP.

Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops is Book 1 of The Sketcher Series, and is available on Amazon as well as Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org, Waterstones, Book Face Erina, and bookstores worldwide.

If you’d like to learn more about Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops and read the first chapter for free, please visit my website here.

I had a great day recently at my first bookstore signing event, held at Book Face’s Erina store. For those unaware, Book Face is a family-run group of six bookstores scattered along Australia’s east coast who are staunch promoters of local indie-published authors. Their Erina store has been selling my middle grade adventure, Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops, for the last few months, and the manager kindly offered me a spot on their event calendar.

Unlike previous events I have done like this one here, this event was just for me. I was the only author signing, and Book Face kindly set a table up for me just inside their front door. That meant I was pretty much the first thing customers saw when they entered the store - and yes, I did let them pass. Eventually. 😉

Anyway for this event, I organised a few things I hadn’t tried before, including a puzzle page of my book’s front cover where kids had to find key details from my story. Here’s the “answer” version:

I also had snake lollies for every child who purchased a book - individually packaged so young fingers weren’t touching every snake to pick the color they wanted - and had props on the table that are relevant to my story, including a gold stopwatch, a pouch of colored gems, and coiled up toy snakes. All of this cost me a sum total of $10.

I printed sheets of reviews and award placings for the parents/guardians, as well as a bunch of coloring-in pages for the kids. Actually, the pages were giveaways for anyone, not just those who purchased Stu, and I hoped that by people taking them home (and hopefully not just dumping them in the trash or recycling bin), they might lead to a few extra sales later on.

So how did it all go?

While things started off slow - the bookstore was REALLY quiet for the first hour - it soon picked up and I met some awesome kids, sold a decent amount of books, and had an amazing time!

And here are some things I learned:

• young readers are THE BEST - okay, I already knew this, so this point is really just a reminder.

• coloring-in pages of your book cover can be a great marketing tool - I sold a book for every three coloring-in pages I handed out and had at least two sets of grandparents take a coloring-in page to give to their adult children when they tell them about Stu. If their adult children think Stu is suitable for the grandkids, they will (hopefully!) come back to the store to buy it.

• the snake lollies were a hit too with sales. There’s nothing like a sugary bribe to add to the intensity of a child’s plea to their parent that they MUST have this book.

• my puzzle page didn’t get as much interest as I thought it would, although with all the interest in the coloring-in pages and lollies, I guess I forgot about it after a while.

• the page of award placings received some interest from parents/guardians, not so much the reviews page. That was interesting.

• I had a couple of people message me on social media to say they couldn’t make it to this event, so I replied to tell them the bookstore will still have signed copies in stock after the day. I signed extra copies before I left and about half were sold in the next week or two. Did this include sales from these people? I really don’t know.

• several kids really wanted Stu but from their parent’s body language, I guessed money was tight, so I suggested they request my book at their local library. I know my local library has already purchased Stu, and by suggesting libraries as an option, not only will any library requests hopefully increase the number of libraries who source my book, but it may increase the likelihood of Stu being read by those who cannot afford to buy it. I’ll speak more about how I’ve been getting my indie-published book into libraries worldwide in my next newsletter.

• for anyone writing chapter books, I had several people interested in buying for that age group and while that meant I didn’t make a sale (Stu being aimed at middle grade), I was more than happy to suggest something else. Once a bookseller, always a bookseller, I guess.

Anyway, you may already know all of these points from your own book-signing experience but if not, I hope it is insightful.

I’d love to know ideas you have tried which worked well - or didn’t - at kidlit book-signing events!

STU AND THE SKETCHY TIME STOPS is Book 1 of The Sketcher Series and is available worldwide on Amazon (link here) and can be ordered in most bookstores, including Barnes and Noble and Waterstones, and on Bookshop.org where indie bookstores are supported. And of course, Stu is still available in store at Book Face Erina.

Getting your self-published middle grade book in front of its targeted readers (and gatekeepers) can feel as impossible as stopping time.

My first IRL event for my debut middle grade adventure, Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops, was a book-selling stall at the Words on the Waves Festival’s Family Fun Day. I was offered a last-minute spot after a participant pulled out the week before. The event was being held the week after I was offered the spot.

A few days after Stu’s worldwide release.

Yep, I didn’t have much time to organize my display and, as my book’s release was an online affair, I hadn’t organized any display material at that time.

Bit of a mistake, perhaps. For now I had to play rapid-fire catch-up.

The first thing I did was rush off a media release to the local newspaper, knowing that I’d probably missed their deadline anyway. But I was in luck: they added my piece to an article they had already drafted on the event. I emailed my words through one day, and it was up online the next and in the print edition a few days later, I kid you not. Maybe timing was on my side.

Next, I hastily printed color copies of the front and back covers of Stu, and bought clear plastic display holders.

I also printed entry forms for a competition I held with kids on the day, where I asked a question: What would you do if you could stop time? The most creative entry won a hardcover of Stu which at the time was not available in Australia (only the paperback).

For any purchases, I bought a Square card reader and also made sure I had change in dollars and coins for anyone wanting to pay cash (no one did). And luckily, I had already ordered a box of author copies for my own sales, so I had plenty of books on hand to sell.

I prepared social media posts in advance of the day, as well as a wet weather plan (plastic covers for the books and table, that sort of thing). Even though my stall was undercover, it was still outside where things get damp if it rains. The forecast looked dreadful so the day before the event, with rain bucketing down and the wind howling like a werewolf, I did a poll…

…and decided to go ahead. I didn’t want to cancel anyway. I really wanted to see how I went, using the day as a practice for later, hopefully better-organized stalls. I had to remind myself more than once that pretty much all of my hasty preparation was done the SAME WEEK as Stu’s actual release into the world. You can revisit the release here.

Thankfully, the Family Fun Day went well—and even the forecasted foul weather didn’t eventuate. It was mainly sunny and warm. See how much I’m squinting in the photo below?

The day was SO MUCH SKETCHY FUN! I met amazing kids and parents, mingled with fellow Aussie kidlit authors, and sold my first stash of Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops! This is what it’s all about, my friends, mixing with awesome young readers. And I was doubly pleased to see quite a few young male readers in that mix.

So what would I do different at my next event?

Props. I’d definitely have more props. Something more than a hastily-devised competition to entice kids and parents to my stall.

I was lucky that I was located right outside a marquee where better-known kidlit authors were holding writing and illustrating sessions. That meant I had a steady stream of foot-traffic pass my stall to the marquee. If I wasn’t given this location, I doubt I would have had so many people stop by without interesting props, giveaways, or large banners/posters to entice them. But I guess I did what I could in the limited preparation time I had.

So what were my lessons learned?

Be better prepared in advance of any book release (even if that release is only online), in case unexpected event invitations come up. And bring more props to events.

I lifted my game for my next gig, which was also my first solo one: a book signing at my favorite bookstore, Book Face, who have been hugely supportive in stocking and selling self-published Stu. I’ll share how I went in my next newsletter.

Did you learn anything from your first book-selling event (or from any of your book-selling events) that helped you moving forward? I’d love to know what you learned!

Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops is Book 1 of The Sketcher Series, and is available on Amazon as well as Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org, Waterstones, Book Face Erina, and bookstores worldwide.

If you’d like to learn more about Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops and read the first chapter, please visit my website here.

I will send newsletters from here for the foreseeable future, and have transferred my previous blog posts here too (it’s a shame their comments and reactions don’t transfer in the process, but that’s life, I guess).

I hope you continue to subscribe to receive the meanderings and mishap tales of this indie-published kidlit author. Of course, the choice is yours to unsubscribe below if you so wish (but I’m hoping, you don’t).

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And for those who do stick with me, I thank you from the bottom of my heart!

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It’s a move I don’t regret for a millisecond, but like with any journey, there have been ups and downs:

What indie publishing taught me about myself:

The Down: The path is a steep obstacle course, with a huge learning curve, during which I doubted myself (a lot), broke out in a stress rash, and had more sleepless nights than I care to admit.

The Up: But the indie publishing community has been with me on this path, happy to answer questions, offer insight and – most importantly – tell me what didn’t work for them. I’ve had amazing help from people like my mentor, Stuart White. I’ve also realised I am the one leading this journey, so have not been as complacent about tackling things as I might be if traditionally published. I’m more eager to think outside the box and take risks too, as long as I do the research first. And on research…

What indie publishing taught me about the process:

The Down: No matter how much I researched, I still made mistakes (formatting in particular was my nemesis).

The Up: But the beautiful thing about indie publishing is YOU CAN CHANGE/FIX THINGS. Even after publishing your book, you can usually fix errors and republish immediately (you don’t have that same flexibility with traditional publishing). Plus, what’s that saying about learning from your mistakes???

The Down: Everything took at least 25% longer to do than I thought it would, even though I was (mostly) in control of the process.

The Up: But I still had greater control than I would’ve had with a traditional publisher, especially over the quality and appearance of my book. From working with an editor and cover designer of my own choosing, through to formatting my pages myself. Plus, I controlled the release of my book, picking my preferred date (one much earlier than traditional publishing timelines allow). But then there was distribution…

The Down: Distribution is still problematic, and what works for one printing/distribution service may not work for another. While I found uploading to Amazon quite easy, I’m still having issues with Ingram Spark. Sigh. And while the royalty rates on Amazon are higher, they don’t print hardcovers (yet) in my home country of Australia, only paperback. If I want to order hardcovers from them, including proofs, it’s international shipping from the USA – and a much longer wait time.

The Up: But distribution itself is getting easier. Amazon is gradually opening up more marketplaces across the globe, and services like Ingram Spark cater to bookshop and library networks in many countries. And that’s where marketing comes in…

The Down: I don’t have the marketing reach or the contacts of traditional publishers.

The Up: But marketing reach is becoming easier with technology, and I do have a supportive and growing network. I’m actually holding my first author gig this weekend at a writers’ festival, because of that network. Most traditionally-published authors must do the lion’s share of their marketing too, and let’s face it, no one knows my book better than me or will go into bat for it more than me. So who better to market it than me?

What indie publishing taught me about others:

The Down: Some people still view indie publishing as something for those who couldn’t make it with a “proper” publisher.

The Up: But the numbers of these people are declining. I read somewhere that the argument is no longer between traditional and independent publishing, but between professional and unprofessional publishing, and I’ve seen many examples of both, no matter which path is taken.

So…would I do it again?

After more than a year of querying, where ‘you are so close‘ and ‘I love this book…but no‘ rejections took their toll, becoming an indie author taught me to believe in my writing, my book, and myself again. So it’s a resounding YES from me.

I know there’ll be more hills to climb and more obstacles to overcome, but I’m a firm believer that if you don’t try, you’ll never know.

I plan to keep trying.

I’m staying on this path.

Stu and the Sketchy Time Stops released worldwide on Thursday 23^rd May. You can find out more about it here, and buy it at bookstores worldwide, including Barnes and Noble and Waterstones, or on Amazon. The second book in the series will be released in 2025.

This post was originally published in Stuart White’s newsletter here.

I am so excited about Stu and his friends (human, animal and ghost-like) making their madcap way onto bookshelves and Kindles! Huge thanks to everyone who helped STU AND THE SKETCHY TIME STOPS along the way.

First of all to Lily Uivel, my book cover artist who captured Stu in phenomenal style. Then there’s Stuart White, my publishing mentor. I cannot thank Stuart enough for his friendship and guidance. And Claire Fayers, my amazing mentor from WriteMentor who also eagerly endorsed my book. Thanks also to Marissa Graff, my talented editor, and Heidi Fiedler, who critiqued an early version of the story.

Thanks too to my local CoastWrite group, whose weekly write-ins kept me on track, and also to the MGWaves, THE most supportive middle grade writers group on the planet. Thanks as well to Funny Business – may all our stories make readers laugh – and to WAB for their ongoing support through good times and bad.

The biggest thanks of all must go to my husband, Graham, for his unwavering support, and to my kids, Jack, Liam and Rhiannon, for their beta-reading and cheer-leading. And of course, I cannot forget my canine muse, Louie, who offered me moral support every day for the price of a treat.

Thank you everyone!

STU AND THE SKETCHY TIME STOPS is currently available worldwide on Amazon (link here) and is available to request in libraries and order in most bookstores, including Barnes and Noble and Waterstones, and on Bookshop.org.

A COVER REVEAL!!!

I’m thrilled to reveal the cover of my upcoming middle grade speculative heist adventure, STU AND THE SKETCHY TIME STOPS! And here it is!

The above is actually part of a wrap-around image, but you’ll have to wait for the release of the hardcover and paperback formats to see the amazing back cover. (Sorry!) Needless to say, I love my cover, and I must give massive thanks to my super talented cover artist, Lily Uivel, for capturing my Stu in phenomenal quirky Stu-style!! Let me know what you think of it.

And here’s the blurb to this story:

What would you do if you could stop time?

Twelve-year-old Stu is new to Las Vegas, and he’s lonely.
His best friend back in Australia has dumped him, and his only friend here is his pet snake.
He wants more friends, but it hurts too much to lose them.

Then Stu runs into a pair of casino thieves with an amazing ability—they can stop time!

But when the whole world freezes in place, Stu keeps moving.
And when Stu discovers he can stop time too, the thieves come up with a criminal plan for him.

Can Stu master his new powers and stop the thieves, while finding the courage to make new friends?

Only time will tell.

STU AND THE SKETCHY TIME STOPS has been such FUN to write, and has actually stacked up a few award shortlistings too! It was the first children’s book to be shortlisted for the Newcastle Writers Festival Fresh Ink Emerging Writers Prize, was awarded Runner Up for a Writing NSW Fellowship, and received Honorable Mention in Just Write for Kids’ Pitch It! competition, among others.

STU AND THE SKETCHY TIME STOPS will be published 23rd May 2024 in hardcover, paperback, and eBook. Preorders (eBook only) are available now here!

I can’t wait to share it with you all in May!

Now on to my second announcement…

I HAVE A NEW WEBSITE!

But that doesn’t mean this one is floating away into cyber oblivion. No, not at all. While my new website will focus specifically on my middle grade books and writing, I will continue to blog here on wider industry news, including book reviews of amazing books I read that are not getting the attention they deserve, as well as my thoughts on the ramifications of changes to the book industry, you know, the good, the bad, and the ugly.

Anyway, my new website can be found at rebeccajchaney.com. Feel free to take a peek! Oh, and it’s still an infant, so I will be making changes (and hopefully improvements) over time as I continue to develop my fledging skills as a website designer.

So that’s my news. What’s yours?

And in the meantime, happy writing!

But although I love all things sci-fi, I especially applaud anyone who can convincingly write stories that involve time travel and all the possible conundrums that come with it. Like, how do you change the past without changing the future in such a way that you wouldn’t be able to change that past…and so on. And as someone who has written a middle grade novel with time-stopping as a key feature, I believe that writing a time-travelling adventure that doesn’t end up in a plot mess is extremely hard to do. It is hard to make it believable.

Yet my mentor and writer friend, Stuart White, has done just that, and Astra Firestar and the Ripples of Time releases into the multiverse today!

Here’s the blurb:

When new girl and time-fugitive Astra crashes a space-octopus into twelve-year-old Sam’s school, he swaps his unhappy home life for a timeless adventure to the stars. On the run from the time-police, they travel to far-off planets, in space and time, meeting new and unexpected friends, as well as many enemies, and growing a closer friendship than Sam could possibly ever have imagined. But when given a chance to resurrect his dead brother in exchange for Astra’s freedom, he must decide – change his past or forge a new future.

So what did I think of it?

From the moment a space-octopus crashes through the roof of Sam’s school, the thrills (and more than a few spills) do not let up in this fast-paced tale of friendship, family and loss. Astra has just the right amount of sass that I’d expect from someone travelling in a time-machine, but lovable Sam is more than a match for her. Plus, this book has enough extra-terrestrial creatures to satisfy the alien biologist in us all and, to top it all off, the decisions made with far-reaching consequences – a necessary feature of any time-travel story – are written with just the right mix of humor and sensitivity for a middle grade audience. Not an easy feat!

I thoroughly enjoyed Astra Firestar and the Ripples of Time. Five stars!

You can buy it here and learn more about Stuart’s writing here.

Oh, and I received a free copy of the ebook for an honest review.

I’m also finding that I’m using Bluesky and Mastodon less than the other platforms.

Like most other kidlit creators out there, I’ve been watching our community slowly jump ship from the platform formerly known as Twitter.

Since the change in this platform’s ownership (and name), I’ve noticed a steady decrease in community engagement, so much so that even pics of my white fluffy pup now go unnoticed! (He’s truly offended.) A lot of people have jumped ship.

Even more disturbing, my X feed nowadays reads more like political commentary and less about kidlit. But I’m not prepared to subscribe to X Premium to change that.

So like many of you, I’ve been investigating other options. I’ve had Facebook and Instagram accounts for years, Facebook mainly for a few GREAT writing groups of which I am a member, and Instagram for…I’m now not sure what. I prefer old Insta, back when it focused on photography, on images. Now it’s trying to be more like its social media cousins, a platform with scrolls of text. While we’re talking about images, the quickest way to turn me off a platform is to cram it full of selfies, which is what Insta has become (and that goes for those cringy videos on TikTok too – yeah, you know the ones). Plus, Insta doesn’t have my favourite curation tool: lists.

And what about Threads? I’ve yet to find a valid reason to try it (let me know in the comments if you have one). Same goes for Post and Spoutible. I did sign up to Hive a while back, but it was too wobbly and unreliable for my liking, I think due to a lack of funding? Anyway, I don’t use it now.

I also joined Mastodon on its writing.exchange server, and while my visits there are sporadic, I like that I tend to engage with different members of the writing community on this platform, compared to others. It’s refreshing, to say the least!

Which leads me to Bluesky, the newest member of my social media family. I’ve only been a member for a month, and while I’m not seeing a lot of community engagement yet – partly my fault as I haven’t had a lot of time to become heavily involved in this platform yet – Bluesky is so far giving me the warm fuzzy feels of the early days of Twitter, full of conversations more so than self-promotion. And now that you can pin feeds to the right side of your profile page, it’s starting to get that can-be-curated vibe to it as well. Maybe this can be my new home?

It doesn’t mean I’ve abandoned X. After all, it still has useful features that Bluesky lacks (for now), features like DMs and private lists. Although if the rumours are true and Elon starts charging users to use the platform…

So I’ve added to the family. Just in case.

If so inclined, you can find my social media family members below. Would love to chat!

The newest member, Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/rebeccajchaney.bsky.social

The patriarch, X: https://twitter.com/rebeccajchaney

The matriarch, Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rebeccajchaney/

The showy Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rebeccajchaney/

The shy but steady Mastodon: https://writing.exchange/@rebeccajchaney

And this may be my absolute social media limit. After all, who wants to spread themselves too thin? And more importantly, the writing must come first.

So on that note, I’m out of here.

Oh, but a couple of questions before I do: With all the social media upheaval, have you also added to your list of platforms? And what are your favourite platforms, and why? Okay, technically that’s three questions.

Stuart is the founder of WriteMentor, a UK-based writing industry support organisation (I was fortunate to be selected by one of their mentors for their 2022 summer editing mentorship program, and wrote about it here and here).

Stuart is also the indie publisher of middle grade and young adult speculative fiction, including the widely-successful middle grade novel, Ghosts of Mars, and the newly-released (one day ago!) young adult novel, The Nameless. Check these awesome books out, if you haven’t already!

This mentorship ties in nicely with my desire to expand my writing and become a hybrid author, to have some titles published independently and others through a contract with a publishing house.

I can’t thank Stuart enough for giving me this opportunity, and I can’t wait to get started. Wish me luck!

• The real Jimmy’s hiding inside

• Ned Kelly’s giving him the evil eye

• Mum’s stopped going to work and stays in bed

• There’s no eggs in the fridge – or anything else

AND there’s new jobs, bad-at-school brains and a whole lot of trouble called Duke.

But then… there’s Mac.

Being Jimmy Baxter is the debut novel of fellow Central Coast kidlit writer, Fiona Lloyd, and it tells the tale of Jimmy, a six-grader in the early 1990s who must grow up faster than any kid should. What Jimmy first thinks will be a holiday for him and his mum is actually an escape from a violent father and husband, and Jimmy must learn to deal with a new school and community – and a new last name.

Grappling with his new reality, things get worse when Jimmy’s beloved mum sinks into depression and won’t leave her bedroom. However, Jimmy’s grit, imagination, and love for her never wavers, even when the pantry is bare and life seems at its darkest. And with the help of his ‘brain notes’, his innate ability to see the ‘shiny’ side of things, and the support he receives from unlikely friendships, the future becomes brighter.

This story covers heavy topics such as domestic violence and mental health, and as someone with lived experience of childhood domestic violence, this story packed a personal emotional punch. While reading, I couldn’t help but revisit my own dark memories, but was also reminded of my resilience as a kid (and like Jimmy, the use of imagination played a big role in that).

I hope young readers of this book who are fortunate enough not to experience any of the adversities Jimmy faces, will find compassion and form a greater understanding of those who do.

Being Jimmy Baxter is a gently funny yet emotional read, and one that will stay with me for some time.