This past weekend I attended my local RWA Chapter writers’ conference, Chicago-North Spring Fling. It’s held every other year, and I can say with all sincerity that every conference is even better than the last. This year there were over 250 attendees, not just from Chicago but from all over. I met women from many other cities—and heard about someone from as far away as the Virgin Islands. Once a conference builds the reputation for bringing in some of the best editors and agents, it draws more and more attendees—but it’s still not as overwhelming as RWAs national conference, which draws over 2,000.
Here are some of the tips I came away with:
As usual, the agents and editors said all they want is a GOOD BOOK. Write the best book you can, and if it really wows them they’ll buy it. This seems to be universal advice from any conference I’ve attended, secular or Christian.
But that was quickly followed by the good news that despite the economy being in its current sickly state, people are still buying books. The market is healthy—at least in romance.
I sat in on an interesting workshop on what goes on behind the scenes in successful self-publishing. If you want to self-publish, one of the first things the facilitator, Courtney Milan, presented was to identify your own business temperament. Do you want to produce a large quantity of books for sale with potentially less quality, or the highest quality product with potentially larger investment costs, in both time and money? She spoke of paying content and copy editors (note the plural there), of asking twenty readers to proofread (yes, that was Two-Zero/20), of going through it yourself probably another twenty times (another Two-Zero/20). She said 80% of the mistakes will be caught by one reader, but there is a 20% chance they won’t see it. Lots of eyes on the same project are absolutely necessary.
All of which made me extremely grateful for Tyndale’s editorial staff.
It was interesting to hear her talk about where the mistakes come from. Some are in the original draft—just plain old typos and mistakes. But others appear from attempts to fix mistakes, if the person doing the fixing doesn’t read the spot in context. Other errors appear when you change the format to e-reader-friendly versions. She also offered a reminder about the dangers of doing a “Replace All” with words that might appear as partials in other words (Example: changing the name from Jo to Jill? How many times do j and o appear together? As in join, joy, rejoice, rejoined, etc… will all be changed to Jill. Jillin, Jilly, rejillice, rejillined…)
It’s best to do at least one read-through aloud to catch more mistakes, to read it in different formats, and depend on help—lots of help!
Cover tips included creating a small image that will compare with other online covers in the same size and seeing which one stands out. So many books are purchased online now, and getting your cover to show up in the “also bought” line at the bottom requires the look to be appealing even in a small version (preferably with the title still legible). Courtney was very thorough in her presentation, and she obviously knows what she’s doing, so if you ever have the chance to attend one of her workshops, I recommend it.
I sat in a workshop about various forms of media and being open to the idea of thinking beyond book format—re-purposing things like deleted scenes in a new format (offering that here on my blog, for example) or doing a news article format about one of my characters. Perhaps I’ll try that!
An Improv workshop taught by my friend Ruth Kauffman was very fun, and offered ideas on incorporating physicality in my writing. Actually standing up, stepping away from the desk to act out certain ways a character might move or behave and being aware of how different emotions for the same movement would change how such things would be interpreted. One game she demonstrated with a volunteer was the “Status Game” where participants are given a card from a regular deck. You can play it where the person possessing the card sees their rank (lower numbers being lower status, all the way up to the King) then that person acting in a way befitting that rank. Or else the person possessing the card has it attached to their forehead (rubberbanded? stickie-taped?) but unable to see their own rank. Others then treat them accordingly. I thought that might make a fun party game—but it’s also a way to see how people treat others when they peg them at a certain level.
A blogging workshop with Morgan Mandel shared ideas on how to keep blog tours under control, and how offering a list of blog appearances on my blog would make following the schedule easy to follow. A marketing workshop included tips on speaking at libraries and developing a program that relates to my writing/books/or something I’m passionate about.
All in all it was a wonderful conference! Hope that gives you a glimpse of it.
Join Me!