Who’s Ingrid?

Ingrid Sundberg is a young adult writer and illustrator. Her debut YA novel All We Left Behind will be coming out in 2015 (Simon Pulse).

She earned her MFA in writing for children and young adults at the Vermont College of Fine Arts, and has a second MFA in screenwriting from Chapman University. She is represented by Melissa Sarver White at Folio Literary Agency. It is not uncommon to find Ingrid attending workshops and seminars, writing essays on craft, or reading like a mad-woman (not to mention writing). You never stop learning! She created this blog to share what she has learned with fellow aspiring writers and artists.

A Brief History of Ingrid

Ingrid Sundberg wrote her first novel in the third grade. Sure, it was a gleaming homage (bordering on plagiarism) of Roald Dahl’s The BFG, but that didn’t stop Ingrid from forcing her mother to type up all thirteen pages and distribute them among her family. Ingrid grew up in small town Maine, where she woke daily to face murderous clowns, monsters in the mist, un-dead cats, and the everyday paranormal riff raff. Perhaps you’ve read some of the works documenting these events by local historian Stephen King. Okay, maybe there weren’t any un-dead cats. But Stephen King did teach her one thing: your imagination gets plenty of exercise when the cold ten months of winter set in.

Ingrid channeled that imagination into the craft of screenwriting in her adult life, earning herself a Masters degree in Screenwriting from Chapman University. Several short films have been produced from her scripts and she’s received multiple screenwriting awards. She’s also worked on several TV movie sets, performing important show-stopping duties such as holding actress Lea Thompson’s purse.

Ingrid is also an artist, with a Bachelors degree in Illustration and an affinity for drawing polka-dot-covered beasts. She’s a self-proclaimed monster creator who’s taught college level drawing and painting, and runs her own freelance illustration studio. Her work has been published in a variety of children’s and new age magazines; and her work has shown in galleries throughout the Los Angeles and coastal Maine area.

On weekends you may find Ingrid baking and blogging about it. Recent creations include bacon cupcakes and drunken tres leches cake.  She also enjoys wine tasting, dyeing her hair purple (or pink, or blue), and tweeting in haiku.

Writing Awards:

• 2010 Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators Work-in-Progress Grant – Runner-Up
• 2009 Warner Brothers Television Writing Competition – Finalist (Top 5%)
• 2005 Twenty Twenty Screenplay Contest – Finalist
• 2004 Chapman University Cecil B. Demille Award for Best Television Writing – Winner
• 2004 Screen Gems Short Script Contest – Honorable Mention
• 2004 Moondance Short Script Competition – Finalist
• 2003 Chapman University Location Filmmaking Grant – Finalist
• 1998 New Haven Short and Neat Play Contest – Winner