Are You Ready For This?


So remember a few posts ago when we told you that we were almost done with our book and ready to find an agent? Well, we are back from the first step in that process: a whirlwind weekend at the San Diego State University Writers' Conference. It was AMAZING! An awesome collection of talent, inspiration, professionals, tips and tools. We learned more than we could have imagined and have retained most of it (there was A LOT). For the stuff that overflowed out of our filled-to-the-brim brains, we have our notes...pages of them!

We arrived on Friday with great excitement and hungry for the experience of our first conference. We didn't know what to expect and our "best case" scenario was that we would get good feedback from the agents that were reviewing our work. Let's just say that it FAR EXCEEDED our expectations!

Most of the time I think we both felt as if we were floating around (on cloud 9...oops I used a cliché!) We were affirmed and encouraged to the point that we kept waiting for someone to say, "Oh, we were just kidding!" But that NEVER HAPPENED! What did happen was a weekend full of what we LOVE to do and great people that turned our burning passion into a roaring bonfire! We CANNOT WAIT to get started on making our finished first draft the best that it can be. So you locals out there, when you see us at CP with our noses in our computers, if we don't look up and say "Hi," it isn't you, we are just hard at work and on a deadline and only have so much time away from the kids!

If you have an interest in what a writers' conference looks like, here's a snapshot of our weekend:

ONE "Conference Choice Award" (see above)

TWO networking mixers (we met so many great writers, agents and editors!)

THREE "Ask the Agent" panels (i.e., the pages of notes...)

FOUR advanced reading appointments with literary agents (pure gold people!)

FIVE workshops on writerly topics (again with the notes...fingers cramping and all)

SIX "New Adult" genre writer friends that we met (forming a new writing group as we write this!)

SEVEN hours of sleep (each night) in a fabulous house with gorgeous views, water and chocolate placed lovingly by our beds, and TIME to discuss our day without interruption

EIGHT outfits each, just to cover all our bases

NINE dollars for each "Happy Hour" cocktail...we sipped them slowly as we networked

TEN is the rating we give this FABULOUS conference!

We will see you again SDSUWC and we can't wait!

{J&H}
Holly and Jenn

2 comments:

  1. It was great to meet you both at the Conference! And congratulations on the award -- that is so awesome!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Leah! It was great to meet you too! Thanks for stopping by our blog...we love yours! Can't wait to swap some posts.

      Delete