This post is Part II of the highlights from the SCBWI conference in Spokane, Washington. I had the pleasure of attending the conference this past Saturday and as always I learned a ton.

If you missed it, my previous post Part I discussed BookStop Literary agent Kendra Marcus‘ lecture on The Picture Book in 2010 and this post will examine Simon Pulse editor Annette Pollert’s lecture on revising.

It’s a Dirty Job, But You’ve Gotta Do It: Advice for Revising Your Middle-Grade or Teen Manuscript

1. Concepts she’s seeing with current submissions: Demon slayers and car crashes.

2. After you finish your draft, put it away for a month or more. You need distance in order to gain more perspective to fix your manuscript.

3. While you have your draft put away, read other books in the market, and while you read jot down what you liked and what you didn’t like about the writing. Also, go online. There are great communities including many teens with blogs. It’s good to hear their perspectives on books because they do not hold back their opinions. Last, start a new project. Writing something else will give you even more insight for the manuscript that’s cooling in your drawer.

4. After you’ve let your manuscript sit, examine it. Ask yourself: What is this about? What’s the plot? What are the sub-plots? What are the action and emotional arcs? You need to make sure to have internal & external conflict for the character and when these arcs are all done, ask how has your character grown?

5. Suck your readers in @ the beginning. Annette says she has a short attention span and wants to be drawn in right away. So make sure to raise some type of question at the beginning of your manuscript for the main character.

6. Immediacy is key for young readers. They want to feel aligned with your characters. So readers need to know about what your character cares about and why.

7. With middle-grade novels there are a lot of gate keepers (librarians, teachers, parents) who buy the books and they have certain moral expectations of those novels. This is not as true with YA. Simon Pulse likes edgy books, and don’t shy away from issues like teen cutting or suicide. Nothing is taboo to YA, but make sure that strong concepts are inherit to the plot or part of the characters (not just for shock value). Cussing is okay, but do not do it gratuitously as it loses its affect. Use it to pack a punch.

8. Having great dialogue is important. Make sure to read your dialogue out loud. One of Annette’s pet peeves is when everyone sounds the same. Make sure all characters talk or speak differently.

9. To help hone your internal editor constantly ask yourself: Why am I telling a reader this and why now? Also, always think of your audience and ponder upon what they want to hear.

10. As far as word counts for YA a good aim is no shorter than 55 K and no longer than 80 – 100K for paranormal.

Annette had a lot of great suggestions and an electric personality to boot. She really loves her job and is a fabulous editor. As a side note, she only takes unsolicited submissions from conference attendees otherwise Simon Pulse’s policy is to only accent agented submissions. However, if you get a chance to go to a conference that she’s speaking at, I highly recommend it. She critiqued my manuscript and was super friendly, helpful, and positive!