Tuesday, October 9, 2007

Post Conference Buzz

MENTAL STATUS: "Refreshed." My getaway at the conference made me feel like a new woman.

So I guess everybody and their mother probably knows by now that I just got back from The NJ RWA "Put Your Heart in a Book" conference...

I really don't know where to begin. Hmmm, how about at the point where I was late getting to the conference because I missed my exit. Trust me, not something you want to do up there in central Jersey. It's like navigating a LA highway. I was doing almost 85 m/h (because I had to; it was a do or die situation) and I still had a guy riding my butt. As a result of my lateness, I missed a seminar workshop I really wanted to attend. And I just checked. I can't even buy it, because it wasn't taped. Figures. This is my life.

Anyhew, I feel the whole weekend went in a wild blurr. I can, thus, sum up my experience in a movie title: Gone in 60 seconds.

The speakers, Karen Robards and Sherrilyn Kenyon, were awesome, to say the least. Sadly enough, I've never read a Sherrilyn Kenyon book, but after her speech, I don't think I can stay away any longer. The words of her speech actually had me laughing and crying at the same time. They were that good and that inspirational.

I loved seeing my old friends from last year's conference and meeting new ones. Although, I would have liked a few more freebie books. Oh, and the size of the coffee cups at breakfast were a little small for my taste, as I had to keep signaling the server to refill my cup. My hand got tired.

I took a workshop on plotting from a screen writer's perspective, and a workshop (I forget the name) that had a pretty cool idea of creating mottoes for your characters that should set the stage for how they act. I thought that was interesting.

This year I brought a camera. But I only remembered I had it when there was about 3 hours left in the conference. **sigh** Again. This is my life.

So here's one of the two pics I had taken. (The one of Sherrilyn Kenyon speaking was too dark to come out)


Here's me (I'm the blond with all the teeth) with Wild Rose Press author Elizabeth Owen (on the left/black blouse), writer Lisa Howland, and Regency author Gail Eastwood (on right of balloon)





Oh, well. One picture is better than none.

And that's about it in a nutshell. I'm already looking forward to next year's conference!

7 comments:

Chicki Brown said...

Even through everything didn't go according to plan, I'm glad you were able to attend. Right now I'm still regretting not being able to attend the Georgia Romance Writers' "Moonlight and Magnolias" conference last month.

That session about the mottoes sounds interesting. Can anyone order CDs or do you have to be a member?

Tempest Knight said...

Sorry to hear you missed the workshop. But at least the rest of the conference went well. *s*

As for Ms. Kenyon's books, I LOOOOVE her Dark Hunter series. My favorite is Zarek's story ("Dance with the Devil") so far. Although Valerius, his half-brother, story is great too. Oh heck, they're all good! *wg* Since the new stories on this series are coming out in hardcover format first, she has created the Dream Hunter series, which is released on paperback. Each book is released about a month after a Dream Hunter book comes out on hardcover.

Chelle Sandell said...

What a cutie you are!! Pretty teeth btw! LOL!

I thought driving in Oklahoma City was bad...girl, you couldn't drag me to LA or NYC!!!

Our conference will be good but it's the weekend hubby is home on R&R. There's three workshops I want to go to so maybe that won't take up too much time.

Kristen Painter said...

I must say, it looks so festive with those balloons!

The character mottos thing sounds interesting. Are you doing it?

Cyndi Sweet said...

Well...at least you made the conference! That's a positive! (she said, green with envy...)

You look like a romance writer already, Jennifer. It's just a matter of time before--blam!--you're in like flynn and doing a booksigning. (I'll help you by passing out bookmarks. :p )

Anonymous said...

I went to the NJ conference a few years ago and loved it. Everyone was so friendly. Hubby and I were talking about it the other day in fact.

Sounds like you had a great time!

PatriciaW said...

The important thing is you made it to the conference!

When I used to drive from OH to NY, if I got a little sleepy, I knew I'd be fine once I hit the NJ turnpike because you have to stay awake at those speeds. LOL!

Enjoy feeling refreshed. Hold on to it as long as you can.