In two weeks, Liz Maverick and I will be presenting a workshop on social media during RWA’s National Conference. It’s titled:
Tweet it, Blog it, Face it: Self-Promoting with Social Media
and it’s all about, yeah, how writers might use social media to promote themselves and their work.
So–as an author, what would you most like to know how to do? What to do? When to do it?
Thanks for the help!
RWA National, here in New York City, is coming up. For people who might not know, RWA is the Romance Writers of America, and our national conference is 2000+ people strong, plus this year it’s in my hometown!
(Which just means, sadly, I am not rooming with Risky Carolyn, instead staying at home, since justifying a hotel room wasn’t within my powers of persuasion.)
But on a happier note, it does mean I can see my writing friends. Even though they might think of me as their ‘non-writing friend,’ since I haven’t done more than poke at my mss. in the past few months, since taking on the new job. The agent is still out with several projects, so hope springs eternal that something will happen, writing-wise.
Okay, fine, yay me. But if you’re coming to NYC also, we should be announcing plans for Risky get-together, plus you’ll get to be in NYC! Where the food is amazing and despite rumors to the contrary, cheap. You just need to know where to go, and where not to go.
I heartily recommend Carolyn and her mad baking skillz find time to visit Momofuku Milk Bar, which offers the Crack Pie. In addition to other insanely good cookies, etc.
Banh mi is a Vietnamese sandwich that includes a baguette, pork, pate, jalapenos, cilantro, pickled carrots and is pure nom. There are many, many places to obtain this sammie, and it is well worth it (not likely worth the French colonial domination of Vietnam, but the collision of cultures is obvious, and delicious).
Apparently, Koreans kick butt on making fried chicken, although I haven’t tried it yet myself. It’s on the list. There’s a Koreatown right near Macy’s.
And when in doubt, go ethnic; it’s cheap, it’s usually delicious, and can be found all over the city.
And now I am hungry. Darn.
I’m on my way home from RWA Orlando, still on the road with my friend Julie. The conference was a delight, even if I never had even a peek of Disney World! Of course, we was robbed in the RITAs. Amanda and Carolyn did not win this time. They will be finalists again, though, mark my words.
Wednesday night’s Literacy Booksigning and the Soiree, the Beau Monde (Regency) Chapter party, seem a long time ago, but I did promise some photos.
This is Aztec Lady! I was so happy to see azteclady in person at the booksigning to thank her for commenting on Risky Regencies. You frequent commenters are like family!
At the Soiree, from left to right: Louisa Cornell (frequent commenter), Amanda, Megan, Keira (frequent commenter) and welcome guest author, Cara Elliot
Me (Diane) and Louisa
Regency dancing. They were just getting started. Janet dragged me onto the dance floor where I made an absolute cake of myself.
Janet and Amanda striking a pose.
Keira and Kris Alice Hohls, the editor of the German Romance magazine, Love Letters. Doesn’t Keira look lovely in her Regency dress and bonnet?
The Mills and Boon (UK branch of Harlquin Enterprises) editors attended the Soiree. From left to right, Amanda, Linda Fildew (senior editor of Harlequin Historicals and Mills and Boon Historicals), Kim Young (editorial manager for M&B series and Mira), and Jenny Hutton (editor for Modern Romance)
Here it is Saturday night right before the Awards Ceremony.
Amanda with the cutest dress ever, frequest guest author Michelle Willingham, and Mills and Boon editor Joanne Grant.
As I was searching my photos for this blog, I realized I do not have even one photo of Carolyn! I have no idea why, except perhaps she really is a vampire like Janet said!
I won’t be commenting much today, because I’ll be on the road or exhausted when I get home, but I’ll be more with it next week. Til then, tell us your favorite part of the RWA conference if you attended, or tell us about your favorite Disney heroine, because I think Amanda looked as if she stepped out of a Disney animation at the Awards ceremony.
Greetings from the Enchanted Kingdom of the Mighty Mouse where this Risky is battling technology with a new camera and the internet of our grandfathers. Suffice it to say that we endured the worst shuttle service ever from airport to hotel as Carolyn so eloquently reported yesterday, and we had a real fun time at the Beau Monde Conference yesterday.
Here are pics of Riskies at the Literacy Signing last night. For some reason I found Carolyn extremely difficult to photograph–I think she’s a vampire–I kept missing the top of her head.
And note the blue banners denoting that both Carolyn and Amanda are RITA nominees–more to report on that later. The awards ceremony is Saturday night.
After a day of stimulating workshops–I don’t believe anyone slept through mine, and I was awake and on my feet which is always good for a presenter–we changed into Regency finery for an evening of incompetent dancing, gambling away our estates, and gossip.
If you’re attending the Conference, please join us for breakfast tomorrow morning!
Oh, for the romantic days of coach travel!
Today I am on the road with my friend Julie. We’re driving to Orlando for the Romance Writers of America Annual Conference and it will take us two days. Should be fun, especially since we’ll spend our overnight at our friend, Maggie Toussaint‘s house.
But what if this were Regency England and we were traveling by carriage?
For one thing, we’d be hard-pressed to find a journey from one end of the UK to the other that would as long. Mapquest says our journey will be 852 miles; from Plymouth, England to Kirkwall, Scotland is only 798 miles.
If we were taking such a journey in Regency times, we would undoubtedly be traveling by coach, and at our middle class income levels, we would probably be passengers on a stage coach, like these.
On the other hand, Julie does drive a convertible, so maybe we’d be in a more sporting vehicle, and not public transportation at all.
Mapquest says our trip will take a total of 13 hours 19 minutes.
The trip from Plymouth to Kirkwall by coach, assuming there wouldn’t be the problem of mountain roads and bad weather, would be a great deal longer.
When figuring travel time in the Regency, I always rely on Shannon Donnelly who is such a great horse and carriage expert! Shannon says that a coach in the Regency could travel 4 to 12 miles per hour. (For my books, I usually estimate travel time by using 9 mph), but horses have to be rested or changed every 10-11 miles. A crack group of stable workers at a coaching inn could change a team in two minutes. Most would have taken longer, I’d guess.
So using the 9 mph estimate, our Regency trip of 798 miles would take 89 hours. That’s a whole lot more than Julie’s and my 14 hours.
I figure Julie and I will travel about 10 or 11 hours before we stop at Maggie’s house, then the next day we should only have to travel 4 or 5 hours. If our Regency selves also travel for 10 to 11 hours, we’ll go a distance of 99 miles in a day. That means our trip to Kirkwall would take us about 8 days.
And I’m not even discussing the differences of spending the night in inns, getting meals and…….BATHROOM BREAKS.
Are you traveling this summer? If you are coming to Orlando for RWA, how are you getting there? If you are coming to RWA, join us for breakfast on Friday. We’ll find a table at the free breakfast and try to make it easy to find us. If you are not coming to RWA, where are you traveling and how?
Julie is coordinating the Literacy Booksigning and I’ll be helping her all day Weds. If you have some time to spare, come and we’ll put you to work!
Thursday I’ll be blogging at Diane’s Blog and I hope to post some Conference photos. Next Monday Julie and I will be on the road again, but I’ll try to post some photos of friends in their Beau Monde Soiree Regency finery. Or SOME photos from Orlando! Maybe we’ll even get all the Riskies together for a photo!
Til then, Bon Voyage!!