Romantic Times, Part 4 (the last part, I think)

Okay, in that I've delayed the tail end of this report so long, I'm going to try to summarize Friday and Saturday in one entry instead.

On Friday, we had more panels. The one I attended focused on world-building, creating believable fictional worlds. One of the more interesting tidbits I picked up was about the "rule of strange," which goes something like this: You can't overwhelm readers with the strangeness of these new worlds at all once. It's too jarring and it makes reading too much of a struggle for them. I'm sure those of you who read sci-fi have read books like this. It becomes too difficult to read because you have nothing familiar to relate to in the story. So the idea with the rule of strange is to only introduce roughly one strange concept per page. That helps readers stay in the story. I'm sure there are more details on this idea somewhere, but I can't remember where to find them (Linnea, do you know where?)

Also important--making sure character names are pronounceable. I mean, even my character names cause a little stumbling, but you can kind of work it out. They're real names. Most of them, anyway. The example they gave was using names made up of all punctuation marks or something. Yeah, that would be sort of difficult to wrap your mind around.

And swearing in an alien culture--this was really interesting. Our insults are based heavily on our culture, particularly our moral or religious beliefs. "Bastard" being a prime example. That's only an insult, in the traditional sense, in a culture that values children born in a marriage. So your alien culture and things valued within that culture dictate how insults are created. Very interesting.

After lunch, I waited in line for a bit to meet MaryJanice Davidson. I love her "Undead" books. I also sat in the Hospitality Suite for a little while longer. While on a trip out to Promo Alley to get more of my bookmarks, I bumped into Jon, Laurell's husband, who then introduced me to Laurell's agent. Very cool! And very nice of him. It's difficult to manage these introductions, particularly for someone like me who is too shy to walk right up to someone and introduce myself coherently. But because it happened this way, I didn't have time to be nervous. I just told what I wrote and gave her my postcard. : ) Huge thank you to Jon for saying the nice things he said about me to her agent!

Then it was pretty much time to get dressed for the Vampire Ball. Again, this is another big event hosted by one author, Heather Graham. Some people get dressed up in costume. I wore--you guessed it--another black dress. But I love this one as it has panels of sheer fabric mixed in with the velvet in the skirt. Linnea called it my Morticia Addams's dress and she's right!!!! It looks exactly like something Morticia would wear : )

At the Vampire Ball, I sat with Linnea and Denise and we ended up at the same table as the bookseller who would be managing the big bookfair the next day. The bookseller(s) brought their daughter and a friend, who were just a few years younger than my sister, so I had fun talking to them, finding out what they thought of all that they'd seen. And man, there's a lot to see there. : )

After the ball, we retired to--where else?--the bar to drink and hang out.

Saturday was the day of the big bookfair. All the authors who signed up got a table and a place to sit. The Ballroom was just filled with tables. We got to the ballroom a little early to set up and to check out where all the other authors (whose books we wanted to buy) were sitting. I found myself sitting right next to Isabo Kelly (yea!!!). So glad to have a friend right next to me. The two of us, however, were placed between Sherrilyn Kenyon and Angela Knight--two big name authors. They were both very, very nice. Sherrilyn's line stretched out the length of the table, pretty much hiding Isabo and me from view, but that was okay. We handed out bookmarks to all the people waiting in line for Sherrilyn and Angela's books. I ended up selling 19 that day! Not bad, right? : )

By the time the bookfair was finished and we paid for our purchases, it was pretty much time for the cover model competition. We sat pretty much front and center thanks to LTD Books, a publisher Linnea knows. And my, my this is not something you want to see from the back row, let me tell you. These gentlemen work very hard on their form and presenting the right image. They had to answer questions and do "pose-downs" with female cover models. A pose-down is where they pretty much re-create a book cover in position and body language. Listening to them answer the questions, though, is what I found most insightful. Some of them knew exactly how to play to the audience, a bunch of screaming women. Not that I was one of them. I mean, I was there, but I wasn't screaming or anything. Just blushing...pretty much continuously.

After the cover model competition, Linnea, Denise, Bonnie and I went out for dinner. We went to Max and Erma's! I love the salads there! And we had just a good old time talking. That is one thing that is really fun about hanging out with other writers--everyone has their own tricks and tips to make things easier and they're willing to share them which is so helpful!

Saturday night we didn't even bother going to the party. We hung out at the bar, drinking and chatting. At one point, the cover model winner, Mr. Andrei Claude showed up at the bar and we took a picture with him. He will be appearing as a contest on the Mr. Romance show on the Oxygen network next year--so make sure to check that out. He was actually very nice : )

Saturday night turned out to be an early one as everyone was exhausted after the bookfair. We all retired early in preparation for leaving on Sunday.

On Sunday, I got up earlier and met Linnea before her flight. Okay, so here's the thing. True, I haven't known Linnea or any of these other authors very long, but we'd just spent fourteen hours a day together for the last four days. So, when it came time to say goodbye, I found myself really sad at the prospect. I said goodbye to Linnea and Bonnie (they were both going home to FL) and found myself at loose ends for the first time in days. I went upstairs and packed up my stuff. When I headed home, I felt glad to be going home (I missed my husband, my dogs and my bed!), happy that I'd had SUCH a great time, but sad because I knew it would be awhile before I saw any of those people again.

So, a huge THANK YOU to everyone who made my first RT experience so wonderful! I can only hope that each one after this will be just as great.

Side note: I apologize if my thoughts seem scattered or my typing poor--had myself a minor anxiety/asthma attack this morning and my inhaler makes me all jittery! Makes it hard to concentrate and hard to type sometimes.