Houston's Lynne Kelly

Lynne Kelly, from our own Houston SCBWI regional team, has turned her lifelong love of animals into three published books.

In 2006, while working as a special education teacher reading with her students, Lynne became interested in writing. To hone her craft she joined the SCBWI, found a writing group, attended conferences and seminars, and read books such as Stephen King’s ON WRITING, Anne Lamott’s BIRD BY BIRD and multiple books by Lisa Cron.

To write, Lynne begins with something, usually a fact about an animal, that sparks her interest, then she figures out the characters who will live in the story and the plot to go with them.

Her first manuscript started as a picture book, but the leader of her writing group suggested it would work better as a novel. She agreed and it became her first book, CHAINED. It took three years to write and edit, but she found an agent quickly. It sold in 2010 and came out in 2012. Her next book, SONG FOR A WHALE, which now has almost 2,000 5-star reviews on Amazon, came out in 2019. THE SECRET LANGUAGE OF BIRDS came out in April 2024 and her next book, THREE BLUE HEARTS, is scheduled for publication in 2025. Only one book, a mystery written after her debut, has not been published and she doesn’t think it ever will be.

She is currently represented by Molly O’Neill at Root Literary, whom she first met at a conference when Molly was an editor. By the time Lynne felt her first agent was no longer supportive of her work, Molly had become an agent and she submitted her mystery book to her, with a short sentence about the book she was currently working on, SONG FOR A WHALE. Molly passed on the mystery book but said, “Send me the whale one when it’s finished.” The rest is history!

Fun fact:

Lynne has worked as a sign language interpreter since graduating from college, and as a freelancer, she is able to split her time flexibly between interpreting and writing. During the pandemic, the interpreting jobs dried up, and she was able to focus on writing. She plans to always do some interpreting work because she enjoys it, but also so she doesn’t lose her fluency in sign language.

Check out Lynne's website to see a picture of Abigail and Eloise, her two adorable dogs, as well as learn more about Lynne and her books.

Comments

Kelly Bennett is coming to town!

By Margaret Lea Kelly Bennett credits an elementary school teacher for praising her writing and sticking it on the board. This gave her confidence to write more. And surprisingly, it was Kelly’s unhappy first marriage that also spurred her writing. In 1985, while trying to make this marriage work, she decided to do something solely for herself. She wanted to take a volleyball class at the university near her, but they didn’t offer that. So instead, she took a class on writing and marketing children’s stories. There she fell in love with writing for children. She also met another woman, Ronnie Davidson, who became a writing partner for twenty years. They published their first book together in 1987 and five more over the years. Kelly has now published around 25 books, both by herself and with others. She credits writing friends for keeping her accountable. For example, she and one friend would set a...

Sheila Fernley from Storm Literary Agency

By Margaret Lea Sheila Fernley joined Storm Literary Agency in March 2024 as an Associate Literary Agent, and is an agented picture book author herself, as well as a former editor and special education teacher. If you are reading this before November 2024, and would like to hear her speak, register for our free Zoom meeting . Here are her answers to some of querying authors’ most common questions. 1) Do you prefer a query salutation to be Dear Ms. Fernley, Dear Sheila Fernley, or Dear Sheila? I prefer query letter salutations to be personal – Dear Sheila, or even Hi Sheila. 2) How far do you read of each genre (PB/MG/YA) before you usually know it’s a pass? Do you represent all three categories? I represent authors who write PB, MG, and YA subgenres, requesting a full manuscript for picture books and the first three chapters of a MG or YA. I also represent author/illustrators. I can usually tell by the end of the first page if the project wil...

Deeba Zargarpur

By Margaret Lea If you had met Deeba Zargarpur ten years ago, she would have been working in the medical field. Now, she’s a senior editor at a Big Five publishing house, finding herself in surreal conversations with the likes of Christopher Paolini (Eragon) or Malala Yousafzai (I Am Malala). What caused this dramatic shift? After growing up in Virginia, Deeba earned her psychology degree from Drexel University and began applying her knowledge to that field. But her passion for books—long kindled through avid reading, fan fiction writing, and even finishing a novel—eventually pushed her to pursue a career in publishing. Her family's protests of, “Are you crazy?” calmed when she got an editorial assistant job with a company they’d heard of—Disney Publishing Worldwide. She then spent several years working for a book packager, generating ideas for their projects. In March 2020, Simon & Schuster hired her, where she works as an editor for their Books for Young Readers imprint and...

Space City Scribes

Search This Blog