Showing posts with label Panels. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Panels. Show all posts
Friday, August 9, 2013

Live! From Las Vegas!

2:00 AM | Posted by Maureen | | Edit Post
Yeah, I'm still alive. Toasted. Very toasted. Exhausted, hoarse, but content.

I had my big panel today, crew. The one about everything I learned from almost dying...about 7 people there, but it was good.

I was articulate, didn't sweat, never stumbled...

Okay that's all a lie.

I was a wreck, but I think I bluffed through enough to make it work. I know it worked for at least one young woman who came up to afterward and thanked me for being so honest. She admitted she suffered from panic attacks and held a lot of fear of rejection. We sat and talked for a good 15 minutes afterward and ... you know... if you can help one person with something you say or something you write, then life is good.

So, even thought I sweated like crazy and wasn't sure of where I was most of the time, because I'd scribbled all over my notes and kept getting lost... It was good.

And if I ever do this again, I will be better organized.

But to top it all off, at the costume ball, I was visiting with a friend I sorta smuggled in with me, and Jennifer Ashley stopped to chat with some other people at the table... I nudged Siobhan and said, "That's Jennifer Ashley." Siobhan had already admitted she was fan... It was great! Siobhan introduced herself, got a picture, was glowing. I stood up and got a picture... and then...

Jennifer said she'd seen the write up for my panel and wanted to go but wasn't able to...had I really almost died? And she asked about it all and I stood there and talked with her...and she remembered who I was from RWA two years ago and ... it was a good night!

So, I'll be on and off the blog today. I have panels to attend and a water slide to ride that takes one through a shark tank... I also hope to do the zipline out at the Fremont Street Experience... And buy a drink with a coupon I got... 24 oz for the price of 16 oz. I really want to see what I get with this! And there is an awesome chocolate store here...must visit!

Anyway, the theme of today's blog, at the heart is what I wrote earlier. If you can help one person with something you say or something you write, then life is good.

Can you remember when someone helped you out of a bad vibe? Or a book that helped? A particular thing someone said, or did? Have you ever felt that humble warmth of knowing you did right? Let's hear about it, share the goodness, crew!

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Friday, May 10, 2013

Convention Season – Where is My Basket?

12:00 AM | Posted by Maureen | | Edit Post



So, here we go…convention season has started. Panels are one way to do well, as an author, at a convention…since you spend a shitload of money to go, and money on swag and bookmarks and lots of sleepless nights with the up and down of will they even KNOW WHO I AM???

Yeah, basketcase season.

I imagine authors aren’t the only ones who go thru this. Any professional who ever has to give a presentation must wonder about some of these issues.

First, will they want me to give my presentation/panel? Did I write it up with enough wit and interest to stir them? Will they find room on the schedule for me? Do they know WHO I AM?

Yeah, you have to get over that barrier first. Now, if you know people, you might be able to be sneak into someone else’s panel. Be the extra body at the table, offering up quips and reflections on their 
topic. Great gig if you can get it.

(I might be on the luck side of this at PhilCon. A good friend who knows people who put the con together. He’s promised me panel spots. I get to kill him if he lets me down.)

(Hear that, Bob?)

Second, your panel was accepted! Whoohoo! Now, can you deliver? I’ve put together a panel idea for the Romance Novel Convention, in Las Vegas, in August. On what I learned about writing from almost dying. It’s sorta a pep talk panel. For those in doubt and beginners. If it’s accepted, I have to figure out something to offer them. More than just my story and lots of words. I need a handout. Of what helped me get going, websites, classes. Buttons to promote me and the topic… I have to be entertaining…how many feathers can I bring to Vegas with me for my hat?

I have a lot to deliver…this was my pitch. I sure hope Jimmy Thomas lets me know soon…

What I Learned About Writing From Nearly Dying
You can learn a lot from nearly dying. Especially about fear and how it can hold you back. But once the worst has happened, that’s when second chances appear. And third, or fourth. However many it takes. Let me inspire you, tell you my story and how I went from ten days in a hospital, to attending my first romance convention a year later, to pitching a year later, to an agent a year later and signing a book that next year. Eight books later, I’m still writing, I’m still publishing and I still believe in facing the fear and laughing in its general direction. It is possible. I’m proof. I can inspire you to see past the roadblocks and hold onto the fun of writing.

Thirdly. Will they come? Now, some of this is out of your control. I’m sorry, at a romance convention, if you are scheduled opposite Cherry Adair or Jade Lee or the Unwrap a Cover Model…you’re toast. 

One convention I was at, Shelley Adina and I had two women show up. What did we do? Well, we invited them to sit near the front, we took chairs and we talked to them. About our topic and answered questions. One person shows up? Give them all you have. They can go out and chatter to their friends at how great those authors were!

If I am accepted for this panel, I intend to promote it like crazy on FB, on twitter…everywhere I can. 

Try to get some excitement moving forward before I’m at the con. Same thing for PhilCon.

I love doing panels. I love teaching something, sharing something, or just blathering…I don’t know. If this panel isn’t accepted for the RNC, then I’m going to work on refining the pitch and proposing it for other conventions.

What are your experiences with panels? Attending? How do you decide on what you’re going to attend? Ever been to one where you’re one of two or three attendees? How did the presenters handle it? Any ideas what you’d present?

And let me take this chance to point out that yours truly has a bag o’ swag available on the Brenda Novak’s Annual Online Auction for Diabetes Research. The bidding is going well, but let’s do the pirate world proud and get this really moving full sails! How? Promote this link! 

Mention that the bag continues to grow…I add stuff all the time…it will be one stuffed swag bag!
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