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Tuesday 15 July 2014

Why go to a writing conference?


Katie Fforde, Pia Fenton, Jenny Barden, Richard Lee, Nikki Logan
Panel: 'The Future for Romantic Fiction'
 
Last weekend I went to the annual Romantic Novelists’Association (“RNA”) Conference at Harper Adams University, an agricultural college in Telford, near Birmingham and what a fabulous weekend it was! Apart from the scent of manure which lingered in the air and the din of cows mooing during Melanie Hilton’s talk on The New Writers’ Scheme (I expect in agreement with her invaluable advice), the compact campus was perfect for such a weekend as it took minutes to get from accommodation to the building where food and drinks were served and again to reach the building which contained the lecture theatre and meeting rooms. The food, locally sourced (I believe from the campus itself, which we tried not to dwell on too much) was delicious with breakfast fry-ups, including hash browns and fried bread; a Gala Dinner with fillet steak, crème brûlée and local cheeses; and to round it all off on Sunday, roast beef in a giant Yorkshire pudding with lashings of gravy before the drive home on a series of motorways all the way back to Surrey.
Speakers shared knowledge about writing and the publishing industry, changing rapidly due to the e-book revolution. E-books bring positives and negatives with established writers being able to self-publish backlists or other books. Unpublished writers can now self-publish easily and cheaply, managing their own careers. Getting an agent or publisher seems to be increasingly difficult and I hear so many success stories now about self-published writers that perhaps I’ll consider doing it too if I don’t get anywhere when submitting Book 2. Advice I hear from many self-published writers is to pay an editor and to get the cover designed properly.

Ian Skillicorn, independent publisher and audio producer gave an informative talk about ‘‘Going Solo’ –everything you wanted to know about publishing and marketing your backlist or new writing as ebooks’. I took a lot of notes during his talk as he provided so much information, especially about how to put your book onto Amazon and other handy tips.
Jean Fullerton was a witty and inspiring speaker-I listened to every word, despite having a two-day hangover. She gave a talk ‘Don’t Lose the Plot’-developing and refining successful plot structure. Jean used Pride and Prejudice to illustrate some examples with photographs and a plot diagram with boxes and lines all over place to demonstrate how complex a plot can be. One tip I picked up from Jean this weekend, also mentioned at the New Writers’ Scheme talk was to write the last scene first. Many writers don't like to do this, but I may give it a go and see what happens. 

There were interesting panel talks with, amongst others Matt Bates, Fiction buyer for WH Smith Travel; Richard Lee, Chairman of the Historical Novel Society; Gillian Green, publishing director for fiction at Ebury, a division of Penguin Random House; and Lisa Eveleigh, literary agent.
I had a one to one meeting with an editor for a top publisher, a real opportunity. She liked the sound of my Book 2 more than Book 1, said the plot was ‘meatier’ (there seems to be a meat theme running through this post), so I shall get on with finishing it then…

As Jane Holland said in one of her blog posts for 52 Ways to Write a Novel (highly recommend you read this blog), ‘Fake It Till You Make It.’ An unpublished writer needs to mix with other writers and stay up to date with the publishing industry and most of all to write as if they’re already published. Being around writers who have written many books is inspiring and a privilege when they give out advice.

Finally, I must mention the power of Twitter. I went to the last RNA conference in Greenwich a few years ago knowing hardly anyone, but at this conference I knew many writers through Twitter beforehand, and met some in real life for the first time (Rosemary Gemmell, Sarah Callejo-hello!). If you’re not on Twitter already and you’re a writer, it’s worth signing up, although don’t get addicted to it like I do sometimes, because then you won’t write anything! If you’d like to find out more about the conference through Twitter, click on hashtag #RNAconf2014 where there are lots of photos, updates and links to blog posts about the weekend. I’ve posted a few photos on my Facebook Page: Anita Chapman Writer.