Pitching Children's Stories to Publishers

Remember the dog story idea? Well, I took it down to London last Friday and showed my sketch sheets to a couple of my editors. It's always a wee bit scary, pitching a project that you think is really fun, and hoping that other people think so too.

On the train down, I did my usual people-sketching, which takes so much concentration that it is a great way to take your mind off thinking too much about how things are going to go.

I enjoy going down to London. It's 20 years since I lived there and a great many things have changed, but in some ways it still feels the same and I feel very at home travelling about. I do like the buzz of the frenetic activity that is going on everywhere; I even enjoy the craziness of the tube, but these days that mad buzz is more fun as a visitor than if I had to live there every day.

It turned out to be a really positive day. I read my story aloud to give it as much life as possible, I even did all the voices! One publisher in particular was very interested (hurrah!). 

She liked the unusual idea behind the story (which I can't divulge of course, at this stage) and she loved the humour. There is a little bit of extra work to be done before she takes it to meetings, to try and sell the idea to the rest of the team: I have to add in an extra section, involving some cats.

I'm really looking forward to getting stuck into that, but I still have so much else on at the moment that I haven't had a moment. 

Anyway, once all the important stuff was done, I just had time for a quick culture-fix: an hour's whip round Tate Britain, before I had to head back to St Pancras for my train home. 

I enjoyed my sketching again on the way back, as you can see. Definitely a very positive day (thank goodness!).