PNWA Conference Day 3

Today was all about listening to successful writers and how they do their craft, how they found success and what we need to do to get there.  I met more famous people this weekend than I have met in my entire life.  Joseph Finder, Robert Dugoni, Will North, Caitlin Kittredge, Cherie Priest, Richelle Mead, Lisa Mantchev, Kevin O’Brian, Mike Lawson, Royce Buckingham, and many more. Some of these aren’t world wide famous, but are certainly big writers within their own genre, and they know their stuff.  They’ve been doing it for a while.  They study their craft.  They work at it.  They love it.  They want other people to be good at it.  It was like attending a three day Nerd Dinner for writers, and it will have a huge impact on my writing career.

I loved to hear how different writers write.  Mike Lawson did all his writing when he was getting started riding the ferry from Seattle to the Bremerton ship yard, much like I do my work on the train. 

Royce Buckingham and I talked through one of the short stories I was working on and I think we figured out how to novelize it, and how to get around a particularly bothersome issue in the plot.  He liked the story, and that may lead to other opportunities as well.  Connections are so important.

I have a really good lead on an agent now, but have some serious work to get done before I send it to her.  She said she would wait, and would remember me (for good reasons).

I also met a couple of folks who I am going to work with to try to set up a writing group, which will be good for all of us.  I’m excited to read their stuff, and to get feedback on my stuff.

It was also good to get home and see the kids for a few hours before they went to bed.  I was talking to Lisa about the possibility of me taking a weekend to go to Manitoba to do some research for my book, and Reece looked at me and said ‘Daddy, don’t go away.’  Awwww.