First of all….SNOW!! Yes, here in UT (at least the part I’m in) we’ve been enjoying our first snow of the season. I love when it paints the mountains white. What do you think?
Pretty awesome, right?
But, what I really want to focus on today is Writer’s conferences. I’m not necessarily organized about too much in my life. However, I’m kind of a psychotic pre-planner with my vacation time. I’ve generally got the whole of it divvied out for the entire year by the end of January. And this year, I’d really like to fit in an awesome writer’s conference. I’ve only been to two….(is that bad?) A brief history:
Algonkian Writer’s workshop in San Francisco. I attended in July 2007 for five days. The group was small – maybe 20 of us. We actually stayed in a place called Point Montara, which is south of SF. It was a hostel (not mentioned in brochure) and I shared a small room and bunk beds with 4 other women. Intimate. :) But, it was on the beach. There was a beautiful lighthouse on the property, and there was a focus on craft and pitching to agents that was really quite good. Agents Elizabeth Pomada and her husband/partner Michael Larsen were there. We group pitched to both of them. I just looked at the website for Algonkian and it looks like they’ve added even more venues. I would say “worth it” for the serious-about-publishing author. I, at the time, fancied myself “serious”. But, honestly - I was so intimidated by the talent of my fellow writers and so unsure about myself and my writing that I didn’t make the best of it. A regret, for sure.
The only other conference I’ve been to is the League of UT Writer’s Fall Roundup, which was in Sept. of this year. What I liked about this one is that it offered several different workshops and lunch/dinner opportunities for networking. It also had a panel of agents, publishers and authors for questions and you could sign up for agent pitches to one or all or none. Your choice! You could be a bit more anonymous here. More my style, but not necessarily better for my writing career.
So – I pose this question to all of you. What’s better? The big, anonymous writer’s conference with 100+ attendees? Or a private, one-on-one intimate conference with limited attendees? Have any of you been to a conference – either private or huge – that you really LOVED?
Have you checked out Shaw Guides list of writer’s conferences? Any good ones for 2011? Maybe, I’ll see you there. :)
7 comments:
I love small conferences! In the Cincinnati area Lori Foster hosts a Reader/Author Get Together the first weekend in June. It's laid back and very casual--and really affordable! $50 for dinner on Friday and three meals on Saturday! Lots of mini seminers take place, plus editor/agent appointments. It's like a large conference, but on a cozy,comfortable small scale!
Hi Queen of Procrastination - Nice to meet you. I like both small and large conferences. Even those one day workshops are good too. And I love affordable ones.
Maria, that one sounds like a lot of fun. Love the cost.
Maria - that does sound like a good one. Inexpensive is always a good thing!! Cincinnati might be too much for me to drive in a weekend, though... :)
And Ivy - nice to meet you, too!
Don't forget - (because I did, so sorry) that there's also WriteOnCon. I was reading about that just the other day - a free online conference??! Awesome! :)
I did as much as writeoncon as I could and it was awesome. I wanted to go to Leakcon, but don't have the money. I dream of going to Book Expo America and SCBWI, but WAY too expensive right now too. Oh, and a comicon one day too. I've been trying to find some mid-range ones to go to. Don't think I'd like the intimate ones as much as the big ones.
I haven't been to either a large or a small conference so for the first one I would say large, something to experience, maybe find a few buddies that I will mee there (a lot of girls room together - so fun) so I would do that and get to know how everything works.
After that, once the confidence has built I bet I'd choose differently.
Happy Friday!
I've never been to any conferences but I think I'm going to go to at least one next year. Thanks for all the great links, and nice to meet you!
Abby and Jen - thinking about it, I think I'm with you on the larger conferences. More offerings and anonymity sound good to me! :)
Hi Lydia! Welcome, welcome! Nice to meet you, too. I plan a follow up on this post when I do a little more research on some conferences for next year. Hopefully we'll both pick some good ones! :)
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