Jeri Smith-Ready

RWA Day Three

Aaa-OOOOOOOO!
--Warren Zevon, "Werewolves of London"

Thursday, July 27

The official opening of the conference (yes, we're just getting started). Went to two panels this morning, one by Natalie Eggeman, a video producer for NBC, who gave us some great tips on presenting ourselves either in front of an audience or in front of a camera. Hint: don't blow into the microphone, and try to fit some real words in between all your "like"'s and "um"'s.

Then PC Cast gave a fantastic workshop on creating believable teen characters. It turns out, no one says "phat" or "coolyio" anymore--can you believe that??? She also spoke about today's market for young adult (YA) novels. I was shocked (shocked, I tell you!) to discover that today's YA novels contain sex and profanity--in other words, they reflect real life.

Before coming to the workshop, I was considering rewriting Angel's Gambit (a Requiem sequel about Lucifer's daughter) as a YA series. Now I've definitely decided to go in that direction. YA novels play to my strengths--dialogue and action--and use less of my bane--description and narration, i.e., the boring stuff.

My agent, who specializes in YA science fiction/fantasy, says she thinks I'd have a great voice for teen dialogue. It's a nice way of saying I'm immature. But hey, it's about time I capitalized on my arrested development, don't you think?

My last workshop of the day was about body disposal. Everything you wanted to know about burial, cremation, decomposition, etc. People asked questions they'd get arrested for asking anywhere else. I love writers.

And by the way? You cannot dig your way out of your own grave--even if you could get out of the heavy-duty casket, you'd never get past the concrete or bronze liner surrounding it. So Buffy, it turns out, wasn't realistic. I'll give a pass to Kill Bill, Volume Two, though, since the Bride's burial was a bit informal.

The luncheon's keynote speaker was Meg Cabot, author of about a gajillion books for both adults and teens, most famously The Princess Diaries. She was hilarious, just like her novels. Her story about meeting Julie Andrews at the Hollywood premier ("Ms. Andrews, I love your books!") brought the house down.

The responsible members of RWA attended this afternoon's Annual General Meeting, to discuss stuff and vote on things, while most of us took naps.

Tonight I had dinner with my editor and two of her other authors, Carol Stephenson and Sandra K. Moore. They both write for the Bombshell series, which is Silhouette's exciting new romantic suspense line (emphasis on the suspense). We ate at Trader Vic's.

Yes, that Trader Vic's, like the one in London where the werewolf had a pina colada and his hair was perfect. Though the Suffering Bastard looked yummy, I had to have a pina colada, too, just so I could tell my Warren Zevon-crazy husband.

No one else at the table seemed excited at the pop culture reference. So it was one of those very cool moments I shared only with myself. After two days of fitting in and being one of the crowd, totally on everyone else's wavelength, it was kinda nice to be a geek again for just a minute.

Aaa-OOOOOO!!

I also had the most delicious Thai Curry Prawns--the only thing on the menu without a face--and a delightful time with Stacy and Carol and Sandra.

When I got back, my roommate and I went to the Harlequin Pajama Party, where we just missed getting free pillows. Saw a few of the people I met at the FF&P Gathering the night before (PJ, Lynda and Cyndi), but we could barely hear each other over the blaring music.

We didn't stay long, because the PJ party lacked somewhat in food, and, I should add, fun. They should have had a game of Twister or a Ouija board like a real slumber party, or at least one of those folded-up paper doohickey things that would tell us which boys we liked.

Still managed to get to bed late. I've only gotten 3-4 hours of sleep each night so far. Too excited to sleep, I guess.

Aaa-OOOOOOOO!

Labels: appearances

• posted by Jeri @ 7:35 AM
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