SCBWI Brazos Valley Writers' Conference

As previously mentioned, I can be very awkward, and no where are my minimal social skills more tested than at a writers' conference.  But I'm happy to report that I did not make a TOTAL fool of myself at yesterday's SCBWI Brazos Valley Craft and Connections Conference, well at least not compared to the last conference I attended.

Well, I did walk in late to the pre-conference dinner just as Kathi Appelt, our gracious hostess, started a mini-speech, so everyone stopped, turned around, and stared at me as I stood there grinning and clutching a bottle of wine. And I did manage to stutter and mispronounce words almost every time I spoke to Senior Editor at Katherine Tegen Books, Claudia Gabel.  My brain was like, "Ah! She's an editor.  Quick, forget how to use English!" Thanks brain.

I also made one mistake. The night before the conference, I knew I needed to figure out how to summarize my book in a sentence.  I started to come up with a one-line pitch and memorize it, but then thought, "Nah, I know this book so well, it's SO easy to talk about it!" Big Mistake.  When Claudia asked me what my book was about, I think I said, "This girl has powers and stuff." Great.

But overall the conference was pretty fantastic and I learned a lot. I was pretty impressed with the quality of presenters for our little SCBWI chapter and a small venue.

Claudia Gabel started off with a keynote craft lesson on plot structure, characterization, and the importance of outlining.  She explained the difference between crisis and conflict in a way I wish I would have heard back when I taught English. She also flashed a bit of the proposal for Elusion, a book she's co-writing with Cheryl Klam and sounds Ah.Ma.Zing.

Next, Brian Floca, author/illustrator of some amazing picture books, did an awesome visual presentation about how he got where he is.  He included a hilarious Spiderman picture book he wrote and illustrated when he was a kid.

Local author Doris Fisher talked about breaking into the magazine market and another local writer, Molly Blaisdell gave a workshop on how to write a paragraph synopsis of your story.

Newbery Medal winning author and local legend Kathi Appelt did a gerat audio/visual presentation about the blues and how we can learn to write a character's emotional arc and sorrow by studying blues songs.  She discussed and showed examples of spirituals and the call and response structure.  She posed the question, When your main character calls, who responds? She also pointed out the role of the devil in a lot of blues music and asked, What does your main character want so badly she'd sell her soul to the devil for it?  Both questions gave me a lot to think about in terms of my main character in my WIP.

Finally, up-and-coming super star agent Elena Mechlin at Pippin Properties talked queries and answered the attendees' burning questions.  We finished off with an entertaining panel with all the speakers.

We went to dinner at Cafe Eccell after the conference and I think was the cause of only 2 awkward pauses and I'm pretty sure only said 3 stupid things, which is a total record for me.  Very proud. :)

I think it helped I already knew some the Brazos Valley writers and this wasn't a high stakes conference for me. I wasn't there to pitch anyone and I didn't get my work critiqued. I'm not an author with a book to sell, but I'm also not asking questions about queries. I felt like a writer in a murky middle area which allowed me to relax and do what I could to help out at the conference.

I can't say it enough, if you have a chance to go to a writers' conference, do it!

Some Conference Tips from a Social Dweeb

So, it's conference season in the publishing world and now that I've attended a handful of writers' conferences, I thought I'd share what I learned.  Now there are plenty of blogs and interviews from agents and other publishing peeps with advice on conferences.  Except for some great tips about how to pitch, most of the advice out there comes down to this: Don't be crazy.

Now chances are, if you're reading blogs looking for advice about attending a conference, then you probably aren't the type to pitch in the bathroom or get irate at rejection.

But I've learned there are so many more subtle ways you can screw up at a conference.  So here's some of my mistakes and what I've learned.

Start Early

• It's intimidating to attend an event in different city with people you don't know, and all that possibility and potential hanging in the air.  And if you're like me, you might like to take a moment, or a day, to sit back, observe, and figure out how these things work before plunging in.  This is a mistake.  Don't wait until the closing cocktail party to pitch that agent or talk to that author. 
• At the last conference I attended, most of the agents came to the first hour of the closing cocktail party and then left.  People have planes to catch and if no one is pitching them in the first hour, they figure they might as well go drink and talk amongst themselves somewhere where there's not a bunch of drooling writers staring at them from across the room.
• So, if you see that agent you're dying to pitch hanging out by the coffee the first morning of the conference, go pitch him/her! Everyon waits until the last event of the conference to gather their courage, but then you'll have to fight off the other vultures or you'll be disappointed when the agent has to take off to catch a plane, or go get a tattoo, or whatever.

Socialize

• Ha!  How I wish I could tell you how to do this well.  I'm terribly awkward person with this huge, looming fear of social rejection following me wherever I go.  I'm timid and shy at first but once someone actually makes eye contact with me and starts talking, then something kicks over in my brain and I can't be stopped.  Once I realize I won't be rejected, I just talk and talk, getting louder and louder, making weird noises, flailing my hands about and knocking things over.  It's awful.  But I do it anyways.  Force yourself to talk to people.
• The same start early advice applies here.  As soon as you have the name badge around your neck, start introducing yourself.  don't know what to say?  Here are the basics:
• "Where are you from?"
• "What do you write?"
• "How's your conference going?"
• "Which panel did you/are you going to attend?"
• Found yourself awkward and alone? Go stand by the food or coffee, people will come to you!  Then hit them with one of the abover lines.
• Also, don't be clingy.  Once you've broken the ice with that first person, don't follow her around all day.  Branch out and keep mingling.
• Exchange contact info and follow through, it's easy to shoot someone an email or follow thier blog or twitter and say, "It was great to meet you at the conference."

Talk to the Published Authors

• If you've read an author's work and loved it, tell her.  I've made the mistake of trying to give authors meaningful looks at signings, hoping they'll remember me.  Or I think, "Why should I say I loved their book?  They must hear that all the time, if I can't be original, then I won't say anything at all."  Stupid!
• Also, it's ok to talk to an author if you haven't read their book.  I still quite haven't learned this one.  At my last conference, an author stood behind me in line at a signing and we just stood there in silence, awkward.  If we were at the grocery store, I would've talked to him, but I felt ashamed or embarrassed that I hadn't read his book.

Pick your Panels Wisely

• I know you're probably attending conferences in hopes of getting an agent.  But there's also tons of other opportunities for learning and meeting other writers.  Don't attend a panel simply because the agent of your dreams is on it.  Giving strong looks from the audience will not make them offer representation, I promise.  And a lot of the time, the agent panels are usually about how to get an agent or trends.  Both of which agents usually don't like talking about and both of which you can learn an ENORMOUS amount from this thing called the internet.  Don't get stuck in a How to Query panel with the blue-haired lady asking, "What's a query?" and "Don't you just love rhetorical questions?"  You'll smack yourself in the head, wanting to scream, "HOW CAN YOU SPEND $300 ON A CONFERENCE BUT HAVE NEVER READ NATHAN BRANSFORD"S BLOG??!!"  Ahem.  In other words, try to attend panels where you'll learn something you can't find bu googling it.

So, I'm incredibly awkward and have made lots of mistakes, but I've managed to attend a few conferences without being blacklisted from publishing.  I've learned tons and met lots of great people.  If you're a social dweeb like me and the only thing holding you back from going to a conference is fear of going alone, then I say, forget fear, and go for it!  Be awkward with other writers!

WLT YA A to Z conference

This weekend I attended the first ever WLT YA A to Z Conference in Austin, Texas. I guess it was also the first ever conference that focused only on YA, which is pretty awesome.

The conference was great.  There were panels Friday and Saturday, an opening cocktail reception on Friday, a keynote lunch with Tim Wynne-Jones on Saturday, and a closing party on Saturday night.  You could also sign up to pitch to agents, consult with editors or authors, and/or get your work critiqued by an editor or author.    I didn't partake in any of the consultations, I was just there to meet other writers and learn as much as I could.

Kay, I'd be totally lying if I didn't tell you that the absolute highlight of my conference was meeting my idol/agent-sister Carrie Ryan.  I'm pretty sure I did something stupid and embarrassed myself each time I talked to her, but I'm just proud of myself for not jumping up and down and screaming, "OMG, CARRIE RYAN!  I LOVE ZOMBIES!"

I also met many awesome Texas YA writers.  Haley, Sian, Donna, Zana, Jaimie, Sian, Tori, Yasmine, and Kayla, it was so great talking to you!

OK Junkies, I also took NOTES on all the lovely tidbits of KNOWLEDGE floating around the conference.

From a panel about the MARKET

• YA historical is easier to sell to school and library market than commercially  
• Agents and editors are still looking for men writing YA for boys (there was some good discussion about what that looks like)
• Agent Regina Brooks said she and the editors she works with are looking for YA mysteries.

From a panel about writing Fantasy

• Carrie Ryan explained her brilliant world-building believability points system.  Basically, since she asks her readers to suspend their disbelief and just accept that zombies exist, she has to work hard to make sure she's not asking them to suspend their disbelief on too much else.  So she works to make everything else as TRUE as possible, including the NY subway system.
• Remember the kryptonite! All powerful characters are boring.

From a panel about writing for tweens

• Greg Leitich Smith said (roughly), "Although I wish every child in America would read my book, I know that's not the case.  We're not writing for every child.  We're writing for the child who reads, and the child who reads is probably much smarter than the average adult."

And I wish you all could have been there for Tim Wynn-Jones's brilliant key-note address.  He discussed the writer's inner genius, or subconscious, or what he likes to call, Brenda.  He talked about how our minds put little gifts on the page for us to find later.  He said, when you're writing and come across a problem, the first place you should look is your own text.  We subconsciously leave a road map within our own stories.  Varian Johnson also touched on the idea of inner-genius in his workshop on metaphor. Metaphors and symbols shouldn't be forced, we should find things already in our own text and simply expand and refine them.

Well, after this weekend, I sure am inspired and motivated to write!  I've been floundering a little lately, but after some good advice this weekend, I have a clear idea of what I need to be working on.

If you get a chance to attend the WLT YA A to Z conference next year, I highly recommend it!