Last September 14, I received the terrific opportunity to speak at Mommy Mundo Expo Kid, an event geared toward supporting kid entrepreneurs as well as businesses with children as target audiences. Invited a week before by Mrs. Mocs Javier, a friend of my mom, to talk about tips for young writers along with my own writing process and journey, we were under immense time pressure to get everything streamlined and ready to go in time. Dear reader, I strongly suggest you avoid the perennial stress of having to print promo copies of three different books before the typesetting and cover designs of either are done. I also strongly suggest you refrain from cramming lecture slides at 11 p.m. at night. My brain tends to grow fuzzy after 10, so this was not the cleverest strategy.
The other Book Writers’ Club authors were invited as well, and they set up a booth somewhere within the expo to promote their own books. Keep in mind that the books for which we made promo copies weren’t completely finished in terms of typesetting and cover design; the copies of The Five Dragons: Root and Branch and Thornsong: The Lantern Bearer were pre-launch. Remember what I said above about cramming so much in a short amount of time? We only had ten copies of each of my books printed, but we gave most of them away to people whom we thought would read and spread the word – a marketing strategy, if you will.
We were there during both the day of my talk and the day before, attending the expo all the way through. During that time, I was able to get most of the promo copies out to advance readers, and I also spoke with many of the concessionaires. That shirt I was wearing during the talk, the one that says, “Different, not less”? It came from one of the booths, and the quote is from Temple Grandin. And one of the best possible quotes I could be wearing on a shirt.
We also made the first business cards, fully furnished with a QR code to the pre-order form, a link to my website, and the name of my podcast! I liked the cards so much that I kept one at the back of my phone case as an emergency copy. I gave it away within a few hours of having put it there.
Here are some photos from the “tips for young writers” talk! As you might see, here I am discussing the plot rollercoaster. Although, when I asked my enthusiastic audience about what the diagram resembled, they said it looked like a mountain. Or a unicorn horn, or a carrot, or – strangely – a pointy nose. Still don’t know where they got that idea.
My talk covered what I call the three pillars of a story: characters, setting, and plot. Generally, in creative writing classes, they teach you six (character, plot, conflict, setting, theme, and point of view), but seeing as I couldn’t lecture an audience ten years old and below for more than an hour, I boiled it all down to three. To be fair, plot and conflict might as well be lumped together, as well as point of view with character. I left out theme for this one, but I’ll try to cover it next time I do something like this.
Here are more photos from the expo (with faces blurred). You might notice that I smile in the exact same way in each and every photograph, for reasons you (and I) may never know. I think it’s because we used to have this family competition to see who could smile the widest, and because I was competitive, I overcompensated – and acquired the habit of smiling in this manner whether the occasion be formal group photos or ID pictures. You can see how this can sometimes become problematic.
And here is a picture of the acclaimed business cards! As previously mentioned, the QR code leads to the pre-order form, though if you’re reading this you can just click this link. I signed the back of the card in my own hand, which explains the messiness (I had to redo it numerous times before satisfaction was achieved). Also, if you can guess who’s depicted on the front of the card: here is a metaphorical cookie!
The Mommy Mundo Expo Kid was my first time speaking publicly on writing – we were definitely under a time crunch to get the books printed and the slides ready, but all in all, it proceeded fairly smoothly. We chose to give away the promo copies for free to those whom we believed would read them – and in turn spread the word. Plus I was approached by numerous kids, some of whom were interested in creative writing as a hobby as well! If you’re interested in Book Writers Club, under which I published The Lantern Bearer, you can click here. And if you’d like to watch the recording of my talk, click on the video below!
Hi and Congrats!
From Lolo Ewn.
Thank you, Lolo Erwin!