Five Critiques, Five Authors!

Donated by: Jeannie Mobley, Jennifer Nielsen, Olugbemisola Rhuday-Perkovich, Jeanne Ryan and L.B. Schulman

Item Description:       Five authors from the Erin Murphy Literary Agency, one of the top-selling U.S. literary agencies representing children’s books, will each provide a critique of your work. Each month, over the course of five months, one of each of these EMLA writers (Jeannie Mobley, Jennifer Nielsen, Olugbemisola Rhuday-Perkovich, Jeanne Ryan and L.B. Schulman) will critique up to twenty pages of your YA or MG manuscript. How you divvy up those critiques is up to you! For example, you can choose to work sequentially through the first hundred pages of a manuscript (providing a brief recap of prior scenes to each subsequent reviewer), keep reworking your opening pages until they’re polished to a high gloss, or use the critiques to focus on “problem” scenes that could use a fresh set of eyes. Our collective work covers a broad range of genres (fantasy, mystery, contemporary, suspense) and includes published and soon-to-be-published YA and MG novels.The winning bidder may schedule their first critique between December 2011 and April 2012, and then will proceed with the remaining critiques monthly from that time on.

Their Amazing Author Bios:

Jeannie Mobley writes historical fiction for the young and young at heart. Her debut middle-grade novel, KATERINA'S WISH is being published by Margaret K McElderry Books, an imprint of Simon and Schuster, in fall, 2012. Jeannie grew up roaming the west with her family, which included falling in love with its heroes and heroines and imagining herself in their roles while spending long hours in the car. Today she translates those imaginings onto the page. In her spare time, she is a professor of anthropology and a Southwest Archaeologist. Okay, that isn't her spare time, it's her day job, but once she starts writing, she doesn't always get her priorities right. You can learn more about Jeannie and her work at www.jeanniemobley.com.

Jennifer Nielsen is the award-winning author of THE UNDERWORLD CHRONICLES, beginning with Elliot and the Goblin War (Sourcebooks, Oct 2010), and the ASCENDANCE trilogy, beginning with THE FALSE PRINCE (Scholastic, Apr 2012).  She is a member of SCBWI and a former theater and debate teacher.  Her website is www.jennielsen.com

Olugbemisola Rhuday-Perkovich was the ‘new kid’ at school many times over, in more than one country, and currently lives with her family in Brooklyn, NY, where she loves walking and working on crafts in many forms.  Her middle grade debut novel, 8TH GRADE SUPERZERO, received a starred review from Publisher's Weekly and was named one of Amazon's Best Books of the Month. It was also chosen as an IRA Notable Book for a Global Society and NCSS-CBC Notable Social Studies Trade Book for Young People. Olugbemisola holds a Master's in Education, and a Certificate in the Teaching of Writing from the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project at Columbia University, and has a great time incorporating all of her different ways of working and playing into author visits and workshops. She is a member of SCBWI, a PEN Associate Member, and a former Echoing Green Foundation Fellow. Visit her online at http://www.olugbemisolabooks.com.

Jeanne Ryan decided to become a writer at age eleven, but her career path took a few huge detours along the way, from controlling war game simulations in Germany, to working as a researcher in the area of delinquency prevention. Naturally, the next step was to write commercial fiction. Her debut, NERVE, a young adult suspense, will be published by Dial/Penguin, and her website is www.jeanneryan.com.

L.B. Schulman is a writer of middle-grade and young adult books, contemporary and fantasy. Her debut novel, LEAGUE OF STRAYS, comes out with Amulet Books, a division of Harry N. Abrams, Inc. in fall, 2012. She has a blog on lbschulman.com and participates in another blog with debut writers from her literary agency, Emu's Debuts. She is represented by Ammi-Joan Paquette of the Erin Murphy Literary Agency. L.B. lives in California with her husband and two daughters.

Market Value: $200
Starting Bid: $10