Are You Going to San Francisco?

I'm already preparing for the Romance Writers of America annual national conference in July/August. This time it'll be held in gorgeous San Francisco, which means many of us in Romance Writers of Australia can afford the slightly cheaper airfares to the West Coast. One way to offset the cost is to apply for a scholarship awarded by the lovely ladies at Romantic Inks.

On offer to RWAmerica members is a scholarship to attend the 2008 national conference in July/Aug. If you haven't already paid the registration fee (US$425), you can give it a shot. All you have to do is write a 1,000-word essay on what makes you a deserving recipient and upload it here.

Full details are available through the link above. The rules in a nutshell: You must be a financial member or RWAmerica, be able to cover your own hotel, travel and meal expenses, have a polished full ms ready to go, and not be published in trade or mass-market paperback in the last five years. The deadline is midnight Feb 10, EST. Winners will be announced on the RI blog.

Good luck!

Too Tired to Title This

‘Tis the morning after the Romance Writers of Australia annual conference and I’m functioning on borrowed brain cells. This time I was far more relaxed than last year, when I had to pitch to Miriam Kriss, but no less excited for my buddies Fiona Lowe, Sharon Arkell, Tracey O’Hara, Rachel Robinson and Allison Withers who were up for awards.

We spent all of Friday with the incomparable Jenny Crusie. She’s every bit as warm, funny and entertaining in life as she is in print. And she even signed my copy of Anyone But You with the inscription “To dear Vanessa, who is a great writer.” Gosh, she’s so smart. How did she know? (I’m kidding – she forced all of us to chant, “I am a great writer,” out loud all weekend.)

Anne Stuart, whose genteel exterior belies a twisted* mind, talked about dark matter of the literary variety: heroes and heroines who maim and murder. If your heroine must commit a crime, make her goals, motivation and conflict clear, said Anne. Give the reader a reason to empathise with the protagonist. Psycho killers are generally boring because often they kill without emotion or reason.

From Allison Rushby I learnt about applying the three-act play/film structure to novel writing. One of my crit crew members, Janette, found it useful to identify the three acts of her ms and major turning points, and then base her editor pitch on it. (P.S. Worked like a charm.)

Dynamic duo Annie West and Anna Campbell unleashed alpha heroes on us. They cleared up a lot of misconceptions about the definition of an alpha male. Very nice of them to use visual aids, like pics of Indiana Jones and James Bond (the latest model) too. In short, a real alpha male can take many forms but he’s never a bully or brute.

Okay, now I have to go cultivate some more brain cells. Tell me, what have you learnt from a conference or workshop?


* Anne Stuart even describes herself as twisted, but she’s really very sweet.