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Writing process

GenreCon — Part II

Karen and I went to GenreCon, a genre writers’ conference held in Parramatta. Karen has blogged about her experiences, I am adding my two cents worth.

GenreCon 2012. Where romance met horror, space crossed with crime, and fantasy and paranormal danced together. From the first drink on Friday 2nd of November to the last fun-filled debate between the plotters and the pantsers on Sunday afternoon two days later. Where brinklies—those almost there—met with published authors—those who are there—agents, editors and everyone in between.

The program was full. No free time and too many sessions to choose from. I wanted to go to all the workshops and talks but had to choose one of three each time. Lucky there were two of us so while Karen went to one session, I went to another.

Two workshops I attended were Writing Popular Fiction with Helene Young and Getting Your Characters Moving with Karen Miller. These were informative, reinforcing what we already worked with. Good information given by successful writers.

The panels were great as well. The repartee between the panellists livened up the sessions. I particularly enjoyed After the First Draft with Jodi Cleghorn, Sarah JH Fletcher and Bernadette Foley, chaired by Irina Dunn.

The Pistols and Parasols themed banquet on Saturday night was fun and we were with a great table of people. I wasn’t one of the those who partied on afterwards. I hear the normals—racegoers in this instance—and convention goers clashed as to who had rights to the bar. The normals lost.

For me, the highlight of the conference was Ginger Clark talking about The Future of Agenting and I thanked the god of writers out there that we have our own wonderful, uber agent, Caitlin. I think she deserves every cent she earns from her clients. She is more than welcome to her job. I’ll stick to writing, thank you.

But I can’t finish without mentioning the great debate. All debaters—Kim Wilkins, LA Larkin, Narelle Harris, Anna Campbell, Lisa Heidke and Daniel O’Malley—put on a great show for us all. What I got from the debate, apart from a lot of laughs? Plotters know what they are doing and are much more organized, but the magic, unexpected moments come from the pantsers. Let’s hope I have a bit of both in me.

Thank you Meg Vann, Peter Ball and all the ninja’s, plus anyone I should have mentioned but didn’t. A great job. I am looking forward to GenreCon 2013.

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