I fell in love with the young adult space watching 'Dawson's Creek' and 'Roswell.' I've been a fan my whole life, and it was always a dream of mine to contribute to that area.
— Rebecca Serle
If you're applying for a creative position, don't be afraid to get a little creative on your resume.
I really am so grateful to get to do what it is I love - build worlds. Most of my job is playing make-believe, getting to know the people in my head, and letting them help me tell their stories.
I was a children's yoga instructor in high school, which was a lot of fun but hard work. I remember once trying to teach 13 three year olds how to do tree pose... not so easy.
Some of these love stories can be destructive as examples of what it means to really love. To think that someone is your one and only, that you're fated to be with this person, is a really powerful, sexy fantasy - but it is a fantasy, at least in part.
I certainly think that there's a little bit of me in all of my characters, because I feel like the only way you can write is if you put a little bit of yourself in there.
My first novel, 'When You Were Mine,' was a very, very personal story and drew a lot on the people in my life and the relationships that I had.
Every writer, no matter published, unpublished, award-winning, or bestselling, faces insecurity. It crops up everywhere and, in my personal experience, nearly every day. It's just a part of the process.
'Wuthering Heights' by Emily Bronte has been my all-time favorite book since I was in middle school.
Seriously, I am a terrible plotter when it comes to my novels. Terrible. I love to kind of feel my way into a book.
At its heart, 'Mostly Good Girls' is about the pressures we put on ourselves to live up to ideas of perfection.
I get asked a lot what books I recommend for a nursery, home library, etc., and I always tell parents to start with what they loved as children, what they want to share, and broaden out from there.
Writing is probably the least glamorous profession there is. This doesn't change when you become an author.
Whenever someone asks me for career advice, I always tell them to find a mentor. Find someone who has done what you want to do, and study the way they got there.
No love story ends or begins out of accordance with how it needs to go.
I was lucky to have made it to 23 before my world fell apart, but when it did, I had no idea how to survive. It was a rough year. I cried - a lot. I complained - a lot. I also wrote - a lot.
In her book 'Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead,' Sheryl Sandberg talks about the mentor/mentee relationship - and how it needs to be organic. She goes on to explain how important it is for men and women to step into mentoring roles. I would argue that not only is it important - but it's important far earlier than we think.
My first book, 'When You Were Mine,' got optioned for film and went into preproduction as 'Rosaline.' That was the classic model: Hollywood calls, options book, and that's it. You sign on the dotted line.
If you want to be a writer, first and foremost, you must write. If you write, you're a writer. Period.
I think perfect happiness has a lot to do with peace. For me, I get peace from writing, from the people in my life, and from yoga - om!
I always say being a writer is the best gig around. I love it.
It's devastating when that happens, when someone just ups and leaves for no reason, but love does sometimes go wrong.
It was always a dream of mine to create a show.
I used to think that if I was ever so lucky as to get a book deal that I would write all the time. All day, every day. I'd write three books a year. The truth, though, is that writing all day isn't really feasible. I could do it, but I'd be folding in on a lot of other aspects of my life, things I care about. And I wouldn't be happy.
You don't write a book. You write a sentence and then a paragraph and then a page and then a chapter. Looking at writing 400 plus pages or seventy thousand odd words is incredibly daunting, but if you just focus on the immediate picture - say, 500 words - it's not so overwhelming.
I love anything by Deb Caletti. She's my absolute favorite young adult author. I love Ally Carter as well.
When I write novels, it's just me alone in a room.
My favorite 'Eloise' book is probably 'Eloise in Paris.'
I often lament that new picture books don't get read because the classics hold up so well. It's a ridiculous complaint because, um, the classics hold up so well.
For many writers, selling a book is the ultimate dream.
The idea that success is limited is an easy one to believe. We buy into it, and often without even thinking. There aren't enough resources. Something for you means less for me. I understand it, too. It's the give and take of the human experience. If you have the apple, I can't then hold it at the same time... or can I?
That's the funny thing about time. It is only in looking back that it's easy to connect the dots. To see exactly why everything needed to happen the way that it did.
By refusing to lend a hand, we are not only robbing our colleagues and peers of the opportunity to gain guidance, but we are also robbing ourselves of the opportunity to lead.
At 22, and on my fourth day in New York, I was lucky enough to meet my mentor.
The best way to get me to write more books is to read the ones that exist!
I don't really think of past experiences as 'mistakes' - I think everything brings us where we need to go and teaches us what we need to learn. I'm grateful for all my wobbles because I wouldn't be here without them.
I'm a total fangirl for Nancy Meyers. I love all her movies - 'Something's Gotta Give,' 'Father of the Bride,' 'The Parent Trap,' etc. I also love Woody Allen - 'Annie Hall' and 'Manhattan' are my favorites.
We need to take a far more active role in love than 'Romeo and Juliet' would lead us to believe. Perhaps that's what Shakespeare's saying, in a way. We can't leave it all up to fate.
Shakespeare is so fundamental to the way we see story. A tremendous amount of narratives come from him - more than many authors are aware, I think.
I am a very big 'Vampire Diaries' fan, and I was a huge Stefan and Elena fan. That love story was one of the most beautiful ones I had ever seen on screen. I loved it.
Writing isn't manual labor. Nor is it emptying the dishwasher or paying bills. It's work, sure, but sometimes it should be fun.
One of the things that defines YA is a really strong narrative. Adults love YA because, at the end of the day, they're good stories and page-turners. The other element is emotion. The teen years are a very emotional and intense time, and I think it's a time we that we can all relate to and remember.
I think that one of the reasons Shakespeare withstands the test of time is that his themes are so universal.
Defining success is an ongoing challenge.
'The Borrowers' is the story of tiny people who live beneath the floorboards of houses and borrow from the occupants. I may have tried to pull up a plank or two because of it.
I don't have to mumble something under my breath when someone asks me what I do anymore. I can just say, definitively, 'I'm an author.' And the best part? That's not a myth. That's just the truth.
When someone around you succeeds, it does not mean they've taken that spot from you. What it means is that you are in the atmosphere of someone who is creating.
I am a young adult author, and so are quite a few of my friends. We all write books for the same demographic; many of us are even published by the same publishing house. Two of us, in fact, share the same editor.
'When You Were Mine' is about heartbreak.
If you see someone struggling, offer input. If someone comes to you with a question, don't assume they should seek a higher up for the answer.
