Mina Witteman – author | editor | teacher of creative writing

Posts tagged “Young Adult”

Bay Area Book Festival

Posted on May 1, 2019

What I am doing these days? Getting ready for an exciting, if not thrilling Bay Area Book Festival, for which I put together the children’s and young adult program. A stellar lineup of authors and illustrators, from the quirkiest picture books to the most gripping young adult novels: Cindy Derby, Andrea Tsurumi, Tania De Regil, Mylo Freeman, Rana DiOrio, Andrew Smith, Benny Lindelauf, Gennifer Choldenko, Innosanto Nagara, Laura Atkins, Steve Bramucci, Justina Ireland, Lee Wind, Cindy Pon, Zoraida Córdova and many many more. Two days of amazing panels and interviews and hilarious contests. New this year? Most of our middle grade and young adult panels moderators and interviewers are all local students! They come from Malcolm X Elementary School to Albany Middle School to…

Categories: A Bit of Everything, Books, Children's books, YA books

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Gone Writing – Day 7

Posted on January 8, 2016

Last year has been a bit of a self-inflicted overload, work-wise, and after summer I realized that I had no brain space or energy left for what I love doing most: writing. Spurred on by my best friend Sieneke, I mapped out jobs, tasks, responsibilities, assignments, school visits, teaching gigs, mentoring projects and whatnot. On my page – or my three pages – appeared a staggering number of commitments. No wonder my brain refused to engage in new writing projects. It had already way too much to process. I knew that if I wanted to go back to writing I had to whip my stubborn self into change. Luckily, it turns out I can be pretty persuasive with the whip. I shelved all my commitments until further notice, and…

Categories: A Bit of Everything, Books, YA books

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Daily Distraction: Hawks and Stories

Posted on April 23, 2014
Daily Distraction: Hawks and Stories

I took this picture outside the Montara Lighthouse in California. Never before had I seen the structure of wings from underneath as clear as in the wings of this red-tailed hawk. It reminds me of the structure of novel, with a plot that is small and muscular and around it the wide upper layer to keep the story afloat. Look at those feathers. They are perfectly in line with each other, like story threads woven into an intricate mesh.
There are more similarities between a hawk and a good story. Like the hawk, a story needs to be strong and powerful, capturing the reader with sharp, curved talons. It needs a strong beak that is kitted out to hook the reader and pull him in. And, particularly in Young Adult but maybe even in all genres, the story needs to be as swift a flier as this bird of prey.

I am nearing the final version of my manuscript, one of the darkest stories I have ever written, and I hope it will soar like a hawk once I let it go.

Categories: A Bit of Everything

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YA Writing Workshop in Amsterdam

Posted on July 15, 2013

Time to announce a writing workshop, my friends! Writing for Young Adults, an advanced writing course with Mina Witteman You have that YA novel brewing in the back of your mind and you want it out on paper? You are working on a — your first? — YA novel and need inspiration and guidance? You would like to hone your YA writing skills? This is your chance! From September on, I offer a course Writing for Young Adults, where we will go into the most important traits of the YA novel. We will explore structure, voice and character building. We will dive into famous and less famous YA novels to find out what it takes to entice young adults into reading your novel. And…

Categories: Amsterdam Views, Books, Children's books, The Views, Thrillers, YA books

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Boys Don’t Read! Boys Don’t Read?

Posted on July 21, 2011

There is a lot of buzz going on about boys not reading. Authors, publishers, librarians, booksellers, they all rack their brains to find ways to get them to read. Particularly young adult boys seem to have fallen in a deep and dark literature-less pit. I’m an inveterate optimist if it comes to reading, even when it concerns boys. They do read. But there are some preconditions. First of all the book needs to be good. It needs to be a stories about stuff they’re interested in. Young adult boys have a vast range of topics that appeal to them: girls, scooters or cars, experimenting, hanging about… Not necessarily in that order. Just kidding. There are way more issues that grab them. The young adult…

Categories: Books, Thrillers, YA books

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Why Writers Rock

Posted on November 1, 2010

These past few months my life seems to revolve around words and chords, around writing and music. It made me rethink the name of my blog and my dear friend Jay unwittingly told me what it should be: Writers Rock. Words come in multiples as I am working on the revision of my thriller Dark Fiber. One day I hit 5,000 words and the next day I don’t even come close to a mere 500. But no matter how many words do find their way from inside my head to my manuscript, music accompanies them all. If I am on a roll, I switch my iTunes controls to repeat and listen to the same song over and over again, until I almost fall in a…

Categories: A Bit of Everything, Books, Thrillers, YA books

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Amsterdam view: high school research

Posted on October 14, 2010

    It was a almost like a trip down memory lane. I had to report at school, at 12 sharp. High school, that is. Now I have been at high schools quite a bit these past years. It comes with the territory: children’s book writers go out for reading and signing sessions at schools. It’s fun and it creates an audience, it sells books. I often combine a reading session with a workshop creative writing. It’s amazing how much talent there is out there! After spending a couple of hours with kids I usually head home tired but totally replenished. My inspiration cup filled to the brim with intriguing protagonists and unexpected plot twists, and with the strongest urge to write, write and…

Categories: A Bit of Everything, Amsterdam Views, Books, Children's books, The Views, YA books

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