author life – Juliana Spink Mills

August 12, 2022October 30, 2022

Summer 2022 Updates

It’s summer! Which means it’s time for a rousing game of ‘what’s been happening in J’s world?’

Writing

First off, I sold a story to a really exciting anthology. Fit For The Gods is a collection of diverse and inclusive retellings of Greek myths, edited by Jenn Northington and S. Zainab Williams, to be published by Vintage/Knopf. I know there were a LOT of submissions for the open call, so I was utterly thrilled that my modern-day Brazilian version of Circe and Odysseus was selected! Go here to read more about this project and to see the full list of authors.

The new fantasy anthology by the authors of DISTAFF is still in the works. It’s been rough getting moving, as COVID brought one disaster after another to our team. But I have hopes that this will be our year, and I can’t wait to share my story of fae seduction and addiction to wild magic with everyone!

Moving away from short stories, I’ve been working on something new for a while. It gave me some trouble as I searched for the right voice and angle, but it’s finally clicked, and I think this is THE version that will move forward. It doesn’t have a title yet, but I’m really excited about my sci-fantasy tale of ghost hunters, set in Brazil several decades into the future.

Community

In other news, my team and I wrapped up the 2022 virtual New England SCBWI conference, and feedback has been mostly positive. There were some truly great workshops and presentations, and you can click here to read my post-conference post. This marks the end of my tenure as conference director — what was supposed to last two years lasted three, due to COVID, and I can honestly say that I really enjoyed it, though I’m also happy to pass on the role to next year’s directors. I’m not stepping fully away from our fabulous regional team, however, as I’ve taken on the job of gathering and organizing Member News for our quarterly NESCBWI newsletter.

As for other organization updates, I decided to join the British Fantasy Society, after taking part and thoroughly enjoying one of their online events earlier this year. I also took the plunge and applied to the SFWA, recently renamed the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writer’s Association, and am now a full member.

I’m still avoiding large gatherings and am not planning to go to any in-person conferences or conventions in 2022. For next year, I plan to attend at least BOSKONE in February and NESCBWI in late April/early May, both of which will hopefully be in-person. I would really like to attend a horror convention, too, to connect with some of my horror community friends in person, so let’s see if I can make that happen…

Personal

On a personal level, we travelled to Austin, Texas in June to visit family, and had a wonderful few days. What a great city! We spent a day in neighboring Wimberley, too, and came home in love with the local landscape.

July brought our Big Family Trip: after four years (due to the pandemic), we finally returned home to visit our families and friends in Brazil. We managed to fit in a visit to the Iguaçu Falls, and to the beach, too! Leaving was, as always, bitter-sweet — we love our life in the USA but part of our hearts will always remain in São Paulo.

Now we’re home, with September all too close. This year we see our youngest off to college, so that makes both of them gone. Fingers crossed that it will all go smoothly!

Also, I turned fifty in April, and have been slowly working on completing my ‘50 for 50’ project — a list of fifty things I want to accomplish before my next birthday. Some are small and free, like the letter I wrote to my younger self or the walk I plan to take on that trail that I haven’t explored yet. Others require time and/or money, like the brand-new tattoo I got yesterday! And some of the things on my list are shared experiences, like the back painting my youngest did for me or the family visit to a local Renaissance Faire… It’s been a fun project, and I may just repeat this next year too, though perhaps on a smaller scale!

Anyway, that’s it for updates, and I hope you have lots of lovely creative and personal plans of your own to carry you through to the end of the year, no matter how big or small!

April 11, 2021

Paring Back

It’s been a strange and busy few weeks since my last blog post. First, my laptop was out of commission for a solid fortnight, after an OS update went very wrong. Then, there was all the fuss in setting things back up the way I like them, which included running a search-and-rescue for lost files, photos, and emails. (Yes, I had backups of most things. But there’s still time spent finding and replacing everything.)

Personal life has also been busy. Anxiety about COVID vaccine appointments, trying to make college decisions with my son, and ramping up driving practice, as my daughter takes her test this week. Lots of distractions and minor worries, alongside the normal, usual, everyday cares and concerns.

Surprisingly, to me at least, I’ve managed to keep up my writing routine through all of this. When my laptop froze, I was luckily in a place where I needed a break from revising my sci fi novel to think a few plotlines over. I spent time letting my mind wander and writing poetry — a nice breather after many months of solid prose. And then, as soon as things were up and running again, I was back into my manuscript.

Of course, some things have to give. There are only so many of those darn pesky balls a person can juggle at once. I haven’t touched my blog in forever, and I took a semi-hiatus (for a while) from social media. I didn’t read much, either. But I did spend a lot of time simply breathing and existing; sometimes, that’s all we have mental space for, and that’s okay.

Paring back when life ramps up is fine. It’s necessary. And there’s no formula to it: sometimes the writing gets paused, sometimes it’s other activities. AND THAT’S OKAY. And that’s all I want to say, really. It’s okay.

December 31, 2020December 31, 2020

Starting Fresh

New year, new dreams, same old Coronavirus. COVID-19 isn’t going anywhere just yet, and despite the start of vaccinations here in the USA, there’s a long road to travel before we can begin to meet up in person again. But I can’t help but feel hopeful that there is light ahead, and make plans for an amazing 2021!

Before 2020 is completely over, however, here’s a quick look at what went on in my life…

Writer things

Feeling the need to step away from YA for a bit led to writing my first ever adult fantasy novel. I had a blast with it! It’s now at the final revision stage, and feedback has been extremely positive.
I had one short story — The Sugar Cane Sea — published in the Not All Monsters anthology (Strangehouse/Rooster Republic Press), a collection of stories by women of horror. The anthology came out in limited run illustrated hardback and paperback versions in April, and in October in regular paperback and e-book versions. It’s already made the Stoker reading list!
Another short story has been submitted, accepted, and edited for an upcoming collaborative anthology of women fantasy authors: Femmes Fae-Tales. My story, Taste of Honey, is set here in Connecticut and is about a woman who becomes addicted to nature’s magic.
I took part in a roundtable interview organized by Not All Monsters editor Sara Tantlinger —see link on my press page.
I managed one Con as panelist and with a reading (Boskone in Boston) before the world shut down.
I recorded a video for the Shrewsbury Library in the UK with a short reading from Taste of Honey (see link at bottom of page).
I attended a number of online book and writing events and writer meet ups.
With all in-person events cancelled, this included our New England SCBWI conference, which we will be doing an online version of in 2021. With everything being moved forward, I’m now co-director of the 2021 and 2022 regional conferences.

Fun stuffs

Favorite books this year include Leigh Bardugo’s dark and moody Ninth House and the first two books in Brandon Sanderson’s riveting YA sci fi trilogy, Skyward and Starsight. I thoroughly enjoyed Kin by Snorri Kristjansson, a murder mystery set in Viking times. I’ve also been working through the Rivers of London books by Ben Aaronovitch, and am now up to date with the most recent installment in this excellent urban fantasy series.
A couple of movies I loved were Knives Out and Birds of Prey, both of which I missed in movie theaters but caught up with at home. It was a good year for classic musicals, too — we managed to see Jesus Christ Superstar live in Hartford a few weeks before lockdown started, and then Phantom of the Opera (hello, endless earworm loop!) during the Shows Must Go On COVID fundraiser, among others.
TV shows! This, of course, was the year of The Mandalorian. But there were plenty of other shows to keep us busy. Season 2 of The Umbrella Academy was overall very good, and I’m slowly making my way through three DC shows: Doom Patrol, Young Justice, and Titans, now that they’re all available on HBO. Speaking of DC, Stargirl was a fun CW release, with a great family dynamic. What We Do in the Shadows was a big hit in our house, and all four of us loved it. Britannia is absolutely bonkers, but my husband and I enjoyed both seasons and are looking forward to the next one. Queer Eye and Nadiya’s Time to Eat were probably my top reality TV feel-good options.

Personal bits and pieces

Lockdown meant all four of us (five with the dog!) sharing space all day for most of the year — the kids did return to school for a couple of months, but have been back in full remote learning since then. It took a bit of adjusting, but on the whole things went pretty smoothly, and we are all now pros at Getting Things Done without bothering each other too much.
As we were all adapting our workspaces, I took advantage of the flurry of reorganization to move my writing hutch to a brighter (and quieter) spot by my indoor jungle, and have really enjoyed working there. Very inspiring!
My father visited in March, and had the misfortune to be here when all borders closed down. It took a lot of last-minute juggling to get him on an early flight back to Brazil, but he made it! Even though his trip got cut short, we still managed a great week together.
It’s been a quiet year, for obvious reasons, but we went away for a week in July, up in the White Mountains of New Hampshire, for a COVID-appropriate holiday that included lots of fresh air and hikes.
My youngest how has her learner’s permit, and my oldest is waiting to hear back from university applications. Having big kids is terrifying!

Coming in 2021

I have no Con participation scheduled for 2021, though as co-director, I’ll be putting in an online appearance at the NESCBWI regional spring conference. I miss in-person events! Hopefully, we’ll get back to seeing each other offline at some point…
The Femmes Fae-Tales anthology should be out by May, containing my short story Taste of Honey as well as work by a fabulous group of fantastic writers.
Writing goals for 2020! I’m hoping to be ready to submit my fantasy novel by the end of January. After that, while I wait for (fingers crossed!) replies, I’m going to do a rewrite of my SF YA novel. I do have several other projects lined up, like a couple of short stories that exist in first draft form and need reworking — one of these is a horror story set in the mangrove swamps of southeastern Brazil that I think will work better as magical realism… But ‘Void’ and ‘Beastie’ are my initial priorities. (Yes, I nickname all my writing projects!)

WISHING YOU ALL A WONDERFUL 2021!

Click here for Shrewsbury Library video on the library Facebook page!

March 13, 2020

Con Round-Up Part I: SCBWI NYC

2020-03-01 16.17.39

On February 6^th, I headed down to New York City for the 21^st SCBWI Winter Conference — one of two national events organized by the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. It had been a while since I’d been to the national conference — since 2014 to be precise — and I was looking forward to seeing the changes.

I arrived early, as the New England team (including myself and my regional conference co-director Casey Robinson) had a meeting on Friday morning. Business attended to, I escaped for a couple of hours to meet a friend from Brazil for a visit to the Met. Oh, important detail: my friend is a tour guide, so I had an amazing personalized glimpse at the museum’s permanent collection. If you’ve never been to the Met before, I thoroughly recommend this ‘taster’ version, where you get to sample a little from several different rooms and wings. After a post-museum lunch, it was time to head back to the hotel and relax with friends before getting ready for the Golden Kite Awards at night.

“Yeah… I’m so done with this!”

Cheeky rat

Watching the awards ceremony on Friday evening was definitely one of my personal highlights (and not just because of the strawberries and champagne reception!). Besides opening words from Kwame Alexander, who reminded us that “in the end, we answer for the children, to the children”, and James Patterson, who urged the gatekeepers in the room not to get in the way of kids reading for pleasure, we heard moving acceptance speeches from the award recipients, challenging us all to strive for more in our own work. Find a full list of the Golden Kite awards at: https://www.scbwi.org/announcing-the-golden-kite-and-sid-fleischman-winners/

debbie nyc — NESCBWI team members with the wonderful Debbie Ridpath Ohi (photo credit goes to Debbie)

Saturday began with a great keynote by author Kate Messner, centering on wonder and curiosity, and setting the tone nicely for the conference. This was followed by two workshop intensives that took place throughout the day. My first was on writing genre fiction, with Tor editor Melissa Frain. We talked through the challenges of worldbuilding and the subsequent perils of info-dumping, and then she walked us through an interesting first pages exercise.

2020-02-08 09.37.53 — Kate Messner’s ‘Curiosity License’

I was particularly inspired by my afternoon intensive with agent Chelsea Eberly, who talked us through identifying our author brand. She broke this down into a number of key aspects, among which were to root our work in authenticity (what makes you YOU?) and to identify and focus on our strengths (where do you shine?).

The day’s programming concluded with a heartwarming keynote address by Jerry Pinkney, who talked us through his journey as an artist, starting from his earliest place of inspiration: his father’s basement workshop. Later, the evening centered around the traditional networking dinner, with regional tables set up so attendees could meet and mingle with others from their area, if they so desired. I lingered a while afterwards, chatting to friends (old and new!), but soon called it a night.

kris team nyc — Part of our fantastic NESCBWI regional team! (photo credit Kristine Asselin)

Sunday brought my last intensive session, with Harper Collins editor Tiara Kittrell. Tiara talked us through the key elements of a variety of genres, and shared tips on how to successfully blur the lines between them to create fresh ways to tell stories. I had to leave straight after, and was sorry to miss what I’ve heard was a wonderful final keynote with author Derrick Barnes, but I still carried home a head and notebook full of new ideas and inspiration to fuel my writing work. All in all, it was a fantastic, exhausting, amazing weekend, and I’m glad I decided to return to the New York conference after such a long break!