It’s Day 2 (or 3, or 4, depending on how you’re counting) of RWA 2010, but it feels like I’ve been in Orlando for twice as long. I’m packing so much in to each day, and judging by the other women dashing (or, like me, tottering) through the lobby in their high heels, most people have adopted the same frenetic pace. If we’re all moving so fast in sleepy, summery Orlando, imagine how bustling the conference will be in the Big Apple next year! (more…)

Thursday was the first day of RWA Nationals (or was it the second? Maybe third for some folks?

Anyway, the first official business was… official business.  RWA members, eager to hear what our board had to say, showed up for the Annual General Meeting at 9:30–only to learn there wasn’t a quorum.

Nationals attendees at the close of the AGM

So it was a short meeting, and we were on our way by 10:00.  But we did get to applaud the brave souls running for office (woo hoo Addison!)

The Dolphin lobby was soon swarmed with attendees awaiting the Keynote Luncheon (as well as confused families wandering by in bathing suits, mesmerized by the mysterious people whispering about heroes, tragedy, and sizzle.)

And what a keynote luncheon it was.  After eating our green chicken, RWA President Michelle Monkou announced that the literarcy signing had raised… drumroll…

$55,000!

representatives from literacy groups saying thanks

The funds will benefit literacy groups in Orlando and Nashville.

Go us!

This accomplishment is one to be proud of.  Readers are at the heart of what we do; how cool that RWA contributes to literacy in every city hosting our national convention.

Next, luncheon attendees were in for a real treat when speaker Nora Roberts gave us an amazing keynote address.

Nora Roberts keynotes

To paraphrase Nora’s themes:

• writing is hard
• your writer friends are worth cherishing
• RWA is a great organization for writers

I couldn’t agree more with all three points.  (And Ruby Sisters–thanks for all you do.  I’m just saying.)

At the conclusion of the keynote luncheon, we were all off to an afternoon full of workshops or retreats.  I volunteered to moderate the workshop “Pantsers, Plotters, and Plotsers: A Detente.”

Deb Marlowe, Sabrina Jeffries, and Claudia Dain

Our lovely and talented panelists are Deb Marlowe, Sabrina Jeffries, and Claudia Dain.  Three great authors; three individual writing processes.  Thanks for reassuring the rest of us that it is all about creating a process which works for us.

Thursday evening had no scheduled events–but for some, it was just as busy.  Publishing houses and agents hosted parties for their authors, while several special interest chapters held annual meetings.

YA-RWA Chapter Meeting

I attended the annual meeting of YA-RWA.  Rosemary Clement-Moore and Tera Lynn Childs were the panelists for a discussion about YA novels and its emergence within RWA.

So, I guess that’s it for now.  If I could pick three words to describe my first official day at RWA Nationals, I’d pick: fun, busy, inspiring.

The crowds surged in to Nationals on Wednesday–including Nora Roberts and Susan Elizabeth Phillips, who walked past fellow Ruby Sister Kim Law and I in the lobby within about thirty seconds of each other, while we tried very valiantly not to squee (“I love Conference!” said Kim).

Mobs descended on the Registration desks, trying to figure out if they were filed under their pen names or their real names. The Swan and Dolphin have become a weird mash-up of Disney tourists (strollers, sunburns, Mickey Mouse ears) and RWA members (eco-friendly canvas conference bags full of books, cute outfits and name badges, with lots of quick downward eye-flicks to check the name, often followed by “OMG! I KNOW you!!”) (more…)

Welcome to RWA Nationals 2010!!!!

This is one of my favorite times of year, but also one of the most stressful. It’s when we all dress up and spit-shine ourselves to pretend we like to network, enjoy small talk, and can’t hardly wait for the opportunity to sit down and “sell” ourselves and our stories to industry professionals. Eeek!!! (more…)

I’ve been a member of RWA since 2001. Aside from serving as a judge twice over the course of those years, I didn’t volunteer. There were lots of reasons not to: a demanding full-time job that required 50-60 hours a week, a baby, the belief that it might be nice to spend time with my husband occasionally. I was already stretched thin–I work through lunch, I watch virtually no television. I do get to see a movie in the theaters once a year.

What little spare time I had was saved for my writing. I don’t regret that choice–I think there are moments when we all need to choose what our priorities will be and it can’t always include volunteer work. Some women have trouble saying “no.” I’m not one of them. I said “no” repeatedly.

Nevertheless, this year I was on sabbatical and for the first time in more than a decade, I knew I was going to have some spare time. So I volunteered to judge in three contests. And when one of my critique partners, who was in charge of organizing the Washington Romance Writer’s annual chapter retreat in 2010, asked if I would help, I said “yes.” More than that, I told her she could assign me to whatever task she needed. With a gleam in her eye, she said, “Great! Why don’t you serve as the VIP liaison?”

I’m a classic “Type A” personality. I’m good with details, organized, and efficient. That made me good at sending out letters detailing our chapter’s financial commitments to its guests, ensuring that anyone with food allergies was taken care of, figuring out the A/V needs of the guest speakers, and then coordinating travel arrangements to and from the retreat for seventeen guest. Later, I found out that the work I did for that retreat had been done by three people in years past. I definitely put some time in.

And I’ll be doing it again next year. Yup, that’s right. My sabbatical year will be over (hear the sound of my weeping?), I’ll be just as busy as I was in preceding years, but I’m going to do it all again–although I’ll be splitting the work with one other person, this time. The benefits to that volunteer work were enormous–enough to make it well worth doing again, even though it means something else will have to give come next April.

The most obvious benefit to my particular volunteer position was getting to chat via email and then in person with editors, agents, and nationally-acclaimed writers.

But the more important benefit was one that I didn’t discover until I was actually at the retreat. I’m shy. Not deathly-afraid-of-meeting-new-people, but shy enough that after almost ten years with my chapter, I only knew a small handful of people. But I couldn’t be shy at this retreat. It was my job to reach out to our seventeen guests, to make certain they had everything they needed, and to make sure they felt welcome and at ease. I made the conscious decision to speak with every single one of our seventeen guests. At other retreats, I had been tongue-tied when an editor or agent sat at my table during a meal. This year? I don’t think a meal went by when I wasn’t sitting next to an editor or agent and doing my best to make them feel comfortable.

Volunteering pushed me to put on my “hostess” persona. And since I was in “hostess” mode, I not only met our seventeen VIPs, but I also reached out to retreat first-timers AND folks I’d been seeing around for years, but never really met or talked to. I walked into that retreat only knowing about six people. I walked out knowing WAY more than that. I would have had fun at the retreat without volunteering. But volunteering made the retreat much more than fun–it was phenomenal.

The other volunteer work that I took on this year was judging in three contests. As a judge, I put a lot of effort into the comments I give, so this was a big time commitment for me. One of the main benefits of judging is that you get to see a lot of first chapters (or first fifty pages). It’s a bit like sitting in an editor’s seat: once you’ve seen a lot of entries, you start to see patterns. You start to see what works well and what doesn’t. I left my judging with ideas about how to go back and strengthen my own writing.

Have you tried volunteering with your local RWA chapter? Or are you at a point where you don’t have the time, if you’re going to keep writing? Is saying “no” easy or hard for you? And what are some of the benefits you’ve found to volunteering for your local chapter or RWA? For those of you heading to Nationals, will you be volunteering there?