Blog of Camilla Chester - Children's Author

Authors Aloud UK

7/7/2023

In order to reduce my administration time and, to help increase my marketing for school visits, I have decided to join the fantastic Authors Aloud UK.

It will take a little bit of time to get me up and running, so in the meantime if you'd like to make a booking for an author visit feel free to contact me.

I'm off for a two week holiday now, so apologies if you've ordered a book in that time. I'll pick up any requests on my return.

Have a lovely summer!

Professional Photo Shoot

1/7/2023

I bit the bullet and had some professional photos taken. If you're an author reading this and thinking of doing the same I can highly recommend Rebecca Cresta We had a lot of fun and it was more affordable than I expected. This is my favourite and probably the one I will use most, but the other three are on my website and if you search hard enough you'll find them.

Library Spot

25/6/2023

I love it when Call Me Lion is spotted 'in the wild' and the person takes the time and trouble to let me know about it, particularly when it's in a library.

The other two books jutting out are by fellow Firefly Author Jo Clarke; the first two books of a fun detective series. Jo's first book, Parisian Puzzle, was published in 2022, the same year as Call Me Lion, and we are in a Twitter group together. The photo was taken in Waltham Forest Library, by Jennifer Claessen, author of The October Witches. Jen is in the group too.

It's important to me to offer support to fellow children's authors and when I do I find the love is returned. This photo is a good example of that.

Remember to support your libraries. They offer and amazing service and us authors benefit too as every time you borrow a book a small fee comes to us. We love libraries!

In Leicester on Tour

21/6/2023

I was thrilled with Whatever It Takes asked me to take part in their Authors on Tour initiative for 2023. I was allocated to half day visits in two different primary schools in Leicester. The first was Rolleston Primary School in Glen Parva. It was raining heavily when I arrived and unfortunately the security of the school stopped my presentation from being loaded. I had to do my author talk from memory which was a first. It all went well and even the staff joined in with the dancing!

Next it was to the North side of Leicester for my afternoon visit with Sandfield Close Primary School. Luckily the presentation worked fine and the children were thrilled to meet an author in the flesh as they'd only had virtual visits before. It was one of the biggest workshops/masterclasses I have ever delivered as the whole of Y3 and Y4 wanted to take part. We did some fun empathy based exercises and used Call Me Lion to think like writers. I like these before and during photos of the school hall.

A huge thank you to the staff and pupils at both schools for welcoming me so warmly and for embracing Call Me Lion. It was a total joy to talk to so many of you who knew all about Leo and I even met a real life Richa who spoke Gujarati. Wonderful! Thanks again to Whatever it Takes for such an incredible programme. Hope to work with you again.

Authors On Tour

17/6/2023

I am delighted to be taking part in Authors on Tour 2023. On Tuesday 20 June I will be visiting Rolleston Primary School and Sandfield Close Primary School, both in Leicester. Can't wait!

WON!

26/5/2023

I'm absolutely thrilled to announce that Call Me Lion has won the SCBWI Crystal Kite Award 2023 for UK/Ireland.

This award is hugely important to be both professionally and personally.

The Crystal Kite is a peer vote. This means fellow SCBWI members have voted Call Me Lion as their favourite book to be published in 2022. There were a lot of entries so this is a huge achievement and I'm incredibly grateful to everyone who voted.

SCBWI is a huge part of my life. I have been a long-term member and have volunteered in several different roles.

The people I have met through SCBWI have become the closest friends and being a member and volunteer means I've been able to progress professionally in my career in so many ways. This is a representation of how far I have come in my author journey.

At the conference in Manchester which this year is on 4&5 November, I will be delivering my acceptance speech - proper Oscars style.

Can't wait!

Mentoring/Coaching

26/5/2023

I've recently started offering mentoring and/or coaching services for children's writers. I'm completely flexible and can tailor make my services to your needs. I charge a standard hourly rate of £35. if you're interested in finding out more please visit my coaching/mentoring page and then, if you'd like to go ahead, please contact me

Terrific Tweet

6/5/2023

Absolutely love getting tweets like these.

It means the world to know that Call Me Lion is out there doing such good work, inspiring and encouraging readers and opening discussions around anxiety and empathy.

By tagging me I was able to reach out to Rob and ask if he would like a quick virtual Q&A visit for his avid reading group.

We'll be setting a date for the summer term and I can't wait to meet them and see what questions they have for me.

If you're interested in a virtual visit for your school or library you can find out more by visiting my author visits page and make it happen by contacting me.

Hope to hear from you soon.

Author Visit for Empathy

4/5/2023

Yesterday was my first visit to a school to deliver Empathy Awareness talks and workshops. I was lucky enough to be invited to the famous Haberdashers' Boys School in Boreham Wood, a very impressive prep school in extensive, pristine grounds.

The staff and boys were all very welcoming and I delivered four workshops to each year group (Y3-Y6) and a short 'meet the author' overview assembly to the entire school.

One of the activities we did was to add post-it notes to flip charts dotted around the room with the prompt: Sometimes I Feel... See the photograph below for some of the boy's responses. You'll see that some of the results were very moving. The exercise allowed the children to realise how we can all feel differently and helped them understand the varying perspectives of their classmates.

If you're interested in organising an author visit around empathy for your school please visit my empathy page to find out more and then just get in touch. I look forward to meeting you.

Crystal Kite and Other Awards

25/4/2023

You may remember that Call Me Lion was shortlisted in the Oxfordshire Book Awards way back in September last year. They just announced the winners and there was no sign of Call Me Lion in amongst the titles. I am still waiting to hear news about the Portsmouth Y5 Awards which I'm guessing will be the same news. HOWEVER...

Here is Call Me Lion as one of only four finalists in the SCBWI Crystal Kite Award. This is a very special achievement as voting is only by SCBWI members. Not only that but I am alongside my friends. I know and respect all of the fellow authors in the final line-up so whoever wins I am happy (obviously I hope its me ;)) I'm totally thrilled to still be in the running and very grateful to all my fellow SCBWI members who read and voted for Call Me Lion. If that's you then THANK YOU! It really means the world.