| |
SCBWI Wisconsin
NEWS FOR YOU
Kathy Randall, Editor
| | | | |
Greetings, Friends!
Do you have some suggestions for future programs and presenters for SCBWI Wisconsin?
Questions about this form? Please reach out to Joyce Uglow at wisconsin-ra@scbwi.org
| | | | |
Celebrating Our New U.S. Poet Laureate
Arthur Sze
Arthur Sze was named the 25th U.S. Poet Laureate on September 15, 2025. In 2024, Sze received the Rebekah Johnson Bobbitt National Prize for Poetry for his lifetime achievement in poetry. Mr. Sze is a poet, a translator and an editor. He has written 12 poetry books, including Sight Lines (2019), which won the National Book Award for Poetry. He wrote his first poem while a freshman at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Sze is an observational poet, influenced by the imagery of nature. Congratulations to our 25th Poet Laureate.
| | | | | | |
Member Meet and Greet
Join John Krause, Membership, Listserve, and Critique Coordinator for a Member Meet and Greet.
For new members who have joined in recent months, this will be a great chance to meet other members and learn more about what SCBWI-WI has to offer.
For longtime members, please attend to meet some new faces.
| October 8 from 7-8 pm on Zoom | | | | | |
|
Established in 1919, Children's Book Week is the longest running national literacy initiative in the country. This year it runs from November 3-9.
Join WI authors and illustrators at the Burlington Public Library on November 9.
Start your holiday shopping while supporting wonderful causes such as the Library Capital Campagn and the Adopt a Family Santa's Village campaign of Love, Inc.
| | | | |
| |
|
Spotlight Your Book with SCBWI BookStop!
Get ready, BookStop is back! From September 10 through December 8, you can purchase and create your very own page on the SCBWI website. This exclusive member benefit puts your book in front of thousands of readers and book buyers, thanks to paid advertising and social media promotion reaching over 100,000+ followers and millions more!
Your book will be featured during the prime shopping season, from October 22 through December 12, which includes Black Friday and Cyber Monday shopping days, giving readers the chance to discover (and buy) your work!
Each page is just $25, a small investment for a big opportunity to shine on SCBWI’s highly visited site. Don’t miss this chance to showcase your book and connect with new readers!
Purchase a BookStop page through your MEMBER HOME beginning on September 10!
| | | | |
|
Patience
Submitted by: Jane Kelley, SCBWI WI member
https://janekelleybooks.com/
We’ve all been there. Submitted a manuscript. Waited and waited for a positive response, wondering when will it be my turn? Sometimes we’d like to bin it (as they say on my favorite baking show).
I was tempted to give up––on four monarch chrysalises. But these future butterflies weren’t just members of an endangered species, they were an omen for a family musical I was creating. I hoped metamorphosing an unpublished MG novel would end a long dry spell in my writing life. Needless to say, I needed those monarchs to fly.
But they didn’t come out when they should. More weeks passed. Summer had ended. I couldn’t bear to look at the chrysalises any longer. Then, while putting them on the compost pile, I discovered their green had become transparent. I could see orange wings inside. A few days later, the monarchs broke out and flew. Since it was fall, maybe they migrated all the way to Mexico.
Writing is rewriting, metamorphosing, and being patient.
| | | | |
| |
We celebrated the joy of reading during the month of September with International Literacy Day (Sept. 8) and Library Card Sign Up Month.
Librarians, teachers, authors, publishers, and readers promote the freedom to read during Banned Books Week which takes place this year from October 5-11, 2025.
| | | | | | |
ART
with Anna Aronson, Wisconsin Illustrator Coordinator
Dairyland Illustration Critique
(Zoom)
7PM Central
click the date to register
October 13
November 10
| | | To access the Book Buzz recording, please register for the event. | | |
LIFE IN THE PASSENGER SEAT
Author: Amanda Zieba
Format: YA
Publisher: Beaver's Pond Press
Release date: June 24, 2025
ISBN: 978-1-64343-490-2
A foster care coming-of-age story where one determined gymnast must fight for her future—both in the gym and in her heart.
Purchase Link
| | |
SNIP AND BITTERSWEET
Author: Amy Laundrie
Illustrator: Anthony M. Grimaldi
Format: 8-12 year olds, paperback
Publisher: Three Towers Press
Release date: 8/15/25
ISBN: 9798998725296
When a fall off a sandhill crane leaves cautious Snip and daring Bittersweet stranded in a Wisconsin snowstorm, the two tiny Podkins must brave the wild, escape a human boy, and find their way home before winter swallows them whole.
Purchase Link
| | |
THE DAY SWEETIE PIE DIED
Author: Laurie Sharp
Illustrator: Emily Hurst Pritchett
Format: PB
Publisher: Belle Isle Books
Release Date: April 29, 2025
ISBN:978-1-962416-75-7
Maggie loves attending school, where she and her friends get to play, collect nature treasures, and ride trikes together.
Moved to October from August 21
| |  | |
HUDSON’S MONARCH NURSERY
Author: Laurie Sharp
Illustrator: Rachel Novel
Picture Book
Publisher: Mascot Kids!
Release Date: October 7, 2025
ISBN: 979-8-89138-274-9
Every year, like clockwork, a young boy named Hudson visits the same hidden, special spot to find monarch butterfly caterpillars. He takes to heart the message, “If you remove something from nature or its natural habitat, you must learn how to take care of it.”
Purchase Link
| | | | |
Chair of SCBWI Wisconsin's Publications Promotions
Please email your book release information to Laura Bird. Her email is labird@att.net
| | | |
TITLE (your title in all caps)
Author
Illustrator
Format: (choose PB, CB, GN, MG, YA)
Publisher
Release date
Include a purchase link
ISBN
Brief description:
Cover image: (attach your cover image in png or jpg with in your email)
Your email address:
Phone number:
___ I would like to participate in the Wisconsin KIDLIT Book Buzz and BEYOND on Zoom. What month in 2026 works for you?
___ I would like to donate a book for the book give-away at the Book Buzz.
___ I will donate a book for the SCBWI Wisconsin booth display.
| | | | |
October 5-11, 2025
George Orwell's 1984, published in 1949, provides us with a stark warning about oppression and censorship.
In 2023-2024, over 4,000 titles were removed in book bans in schools. According to PEN America, this is the highest recorded number of school book censorships.
This year's theme for Banned Book Week, chosen by the American Library Association and the Banned Books Week Coalition, is: "Censorship is So 1984. Read for Your Rights."
The right to read belongs to each of us. We have the right to read books that help us understand ourselves and others, that expand our worldview, and inspire our creativity. This year's theme reminds us all to advocate for our freedom to read.
For a list of actions you can take to support our freedom to read, provided by the Banned Books Week Coalition, click here.
Kathy Randall, News for You editor
| | | | | | |
SCBWI Wisconsin's
Member of the Month!
June: Brooke Baum
July: Julia Flock
August: Kelly Nelson
September: We are celebrating our four SCBWI Wisconsin Area Representatives.
October: Liza Wiemer
| |
Liza Wiemer is the SCBWI Wisconsin
October Member of the Month
| | | | | |
SCBWI Wisconsin Area Happenings
| |
North WEST Area
Jeanne Styczinski
North EAST Area
Cindy Schumerth
South WEST Area
Samantha Cora
South EAST Area
Erin Krase Minchk
To all our volunteer SCBWI Area Representatives, THANK YOU! We now have representatives across the entire state.
| | | | | |
|
Date: October 18, 2025
Time: 10:30 to noon
Place: Muskego Public Library room 3
My name is Erin Krase-Minchk. I am excited to be the SE Wisconsin Area Representative and create opportunities for authors and illustrators to connect. I am a middle grade writer and a 7th grade Cross-Categorical teacher. My first two books, Between the Lines and Seeing Eye to Eye, highlight my love of all things middle school and social thinking. I can be reached at the address above or via the contact form on my website (erinminchk.com).
| | | | | | |
South WEST Area Representative: Sam Cora
Meet-Up RSVP and Survey for Topics
(please fill out here by 10/15)
Date: Saturday, Oct. 25, 2025
Time: 2:15-3:00 p.m. Meet & Greet, 3-5:00 p.m. Official Meeting
Place: ART House 360, 401 W Verona Ave, Verona, WI 53593
| | | | |
North WEST Area Representative:
Jeanne Styczinski
Hello, I'm Jeanne Styczinski. I'm an author and acrylic/collage illustrator of children's books. My studio is in Colfax, WI. Looking forward to helping out the NW Region. Our first meet up is Thursday, October 16 at 4:30-6:00 at the Rice Lake Library, 2 E Marshall St, Rice Lake, WI 54868
| | | | | | |
North EAST Area Representative
The NE WI SCBWI area will be having our next meeting on November 1, 2025, at the Kress Family Library, 333 N. Broadway, De Pere, WI. from 10:15 am to noon. Our main theme for the meeting will be log lines and elevator pitches. Members are encouraged to bring log lines and/or elevator pitches for one of their manuscripts and any news or information they'd like to share with the group. Any questions, please email Cindy Schumerth at schumerthc@gmail.com.
| | | | | | |
We are thankful for our SCBWI Wisconsin family! | | | | |
| |
Announcing...
ENGAGING STORIES
SCBWI Wisconsin 2026
Save these dates!
Registration for the October in-person conference will open on May 1. Stay tuned for details on submission opportunities. Come meet agents, editors, an art director, authors, and illustrators!
| | | January 2026 | February 17, 2026 | March 10, 2026 | | The next SCBWI In-Person Winter Conference takes place January 16-18, 2026. This Conference is an opportunity to meet IN PERSON with industry professionals and fellow children’s book creators! | Trust Unreliable Narrators (and Characters) to Attract Readers: Tips, Techniques, and Traps webinar with Author and Book Reviewer Sandy Brehl | Panel by Panel: How to Write Comics and Graphic Novels (Even if You Can't Draw) with author Marcie Colleen | | April 14, 2026 | May | June | | Stories as Springboards: Using Picture Books for Cross-Curricular Learning with educator and author Lindsay Moretti | Stay tuned | Stay tuned | | July | August | September | | Stay tuned | Stay tuned | Stay tuned | | October 8-10, 2026 | November | December | | SCBWI Wisconsin's ENGAGING STORIES Fall Conference at the Green Lake Conference Center. | Stay tuned | Stay tuned | | | | | |
