Writer's Convention: Conestoga - notes
Jul. 31st, 2008 08:09 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chase_acow
Here we go, I had a really good time at Conestoga last Saturday and here are my notes from the panels I went to. I tried to keep my own opinions out of them, and just took notes from the actual professional editor, agents, and writers. That was a really neat experience, and I'd encourage y'all to see if your regions have anything like this.
If there are any questions, I'll do my best to add context and explain my notes. I don't mind.
9:00 Liar's guide to getting Published
* Look up an editor/agent, (it doesn't matter what kind so don't bother researching to see what they work with) find their home address, show up and ask to spend the night.
* If you absolutely must research, then wikipedia is your one stop shop.
* Cover letters should be written in crayons, preferably with glitter in the envelope.
* Always make it very clear that they owe it to you to publish your manuscript.
* Make friends with authors expressly so you can ask them to introduce you to their agents.
* Publish on your blog and wait for the agents and editors to start sending you money.
10:00 First book in a Series
* Concentrate on world and character building.
* Write each book and know that they'll all be different as you grow.
* Don't pull your punches or try to save the "good stuff". Trust yourself to come up with entertaining twists when you need them.
* Each book builds on the character's back-story. Do not info dump unless it's relevant.
* Avoid bigger and better syndrome.
11:00 Religion in SF/F
* Religion to explain, find meaning, or hope for something better/larger.
* Politics and religion are usually intertwined.
* Religion grows naturally and is a reflection of the culture. (including the economy)
* mulligan religion?
* Choices, especially from religious characters need to make sense ethically/morally OR the author must spend time to make the change believable and begin a new path.
* Clichés – The Chosen One, The Sacrifice, Blood
* If Gods are all powerful, where is the story?
* Make rules for you universe and stick with it.
* Religion vs Magic // Belief vs Science.
* Cost for indulgence ~ Cost for magic?
1:00 Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang
I talked about lining up to get Mercedes Lackey and Larry Dixon's autographs and how awesome they are over here. After that I slipped into the panel next door.
I didn't really make notes for this panel, because I just enjoyed sitting in there. The point of the panel was discussing how to balance romance (intercourse) with action. There were five women on the panel, and a couple were kind of shy for saying the s-e-x word, so Dakota Cassidy would grab the microphone and stage whisper "intercourse" loud enough for people from the hallway to hear. Mostly they talked about the need to break out of tension driven action to give the readers a bit of a breather, and character driven sex.
2:00 Killing your Characters
* Noble death should be foreshadowed. -> "Well, the author told me, but I didn't believe it."
* Death should either be quick and sudden or have weight to give the reader catharsis.
* Action vs violence
* One of the panelists said that the difference between writers and normal people was that writers have the ability to imagine or get to high level of violence.
Larry Dixon and Mercedes Lackey crashed the panel about now.
* Larry wants more mazers. (concentrated microwave bursts)
* Good outlines for a novel should be anywhere from 30-60 pages. They say it'll save time in the end.
* The fade to black is a good technique because whatever the reader imagines will be much more vivid than anything you could write. (specifically for horror/torture/death)
* Larry and I talked about how much the movie Transformers sucked and how tight the script for Die Hard was.
3:00 the Business of Writing
I had a really bad headache, and I only stayed for the first hour of this panel so basically the only thing I remember was that someone said, "Getting an agent is easy, it happens when you're ready."
4:00 Clichés in SF/F
* End of the World with a cop out ->"And their names were Adam and Eve."
* Secret Heritage -> destiny, history, prophesy
* Killing things and taking their stuff -> (that was from the gamer)
* Doppelganger -> Buffy/Faith is better than movie! Spiderman/Venom
* First Contact -> we have more in common w/ aliens than we think OR they just want to kill/eat/enslave us.
* Chain mail bikini
* The mystical experience -> the hero learns something necessary through extra!special (and well timed) something.
* The Wizard
* You killed my parents! -> overused and a cheap way to create the need for revenge.
* Reset buttons -> fun, but they get tiring. See the Star Trek franchise.
* Indy shoots the swordsman -> fine for a comedic one-shot, but not for the climax.
* Usually, clichés are a BAD THING when just used as a cheap, lazy throw away.
* Sometimes we would be disappointed to miss the cliché -> Someone always wanders away by themselves in horror movies and gets painfully murdered. We want to yell at them and feel smarter because of course, we wouldn't do that.
* It's a fine line for genre writers, the key is to be fresh and NOT lazy.
* Some cliché reversals have been used so much that they're cliché now. Spunky alpha woman? These rise to fill a dramatic need -> some work, some don't.
5:00 Art of the Slush Pile
* No one is interested in your "Hitler in the Amazing Land of Oz" story.
* Just say no to metaphors. If you're not sure if it's overly flowery, assume it is and cut it.
* If you've just written the best line that you've ever written ever -> cut it, it'll just distract from everything else.
* Do not under any circumstances begin your story with someone waking from a dream. Especially if they wake up in a white room, naked, with no memory, or they're being tortured.
If there are any questions, I'll do my best to add context and explain my notes. I don't mind.
9:00 Liar's guide to getting Published
* Look up an editor/agent, (it doesn't matter what kind so don't bother researching to see what they work with) find their home address, show up and ask to spend the night.
* If you absolutely must research, then wikipedia is your one stop shop.
* Cover letters should be written in crayons, preferably with glitter in the envelope.
* Always make it very clear that they owe it to you to publish your manuscript.
* Make friends with authors expressly so you can ask them to introduce you to their agents.
* Publish on your blog and wait for the agents and editors to start sending you money.
10:00 First book in a Series
* Concentrate on world and character building.
* Write each book and know that they'll all be different as you grow.
* Don't pull your punches or try to save the "good stuff". Trust yourself to come up with entertaining twists when you need them.
* Each book builds on the character's back-story. Do not info dump unless it's relevant.
* Avoid bigger and better syndrome.
11:00 Religion in SF/F
* Religion to explain, find meaning, or hope for something better/larger.
* Politics and religion are usually intertwined.
* Religion grows naturally and is a reflection of the culture. (including the economy)
* mulligan religion?
* Choices, especially from religious characters need to make sense ethically/morally OR the author must spend time to make the change believable and begin a new path.
* Clichés – The Chosen One, The Sacrifice, Blood
* If Gods are all powerful, where is the story?
* Make rules for you universe and stick with it.
* Religion vs Magic // Belief vs Science.
* Cost for indulgence ~ Cost for magic?
1:00 Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang
I talked about lining up to get Mercedes Lackey and Larry Dixon's autographs and how awesome they are over here. After that I slipped into the panel next door.
I didn't really make notes for this panel, because I just enjoyed sitting in there. The point of the panel was discussing how to balance romance (intercourse) with action. There were five women on the panel, and a couple were kind of shy for saying the s-e-x word, so Dakota Cassidy would grab the microphone and stage whisper "intercourse" loud enough for people from the hallway to hear. Mostly they talked about the need to break out of tension driven action to give the readers a bit of a breather, and character driven sex.
2:00 Killing your Characters
* Noble death should be foreshadowed. -> "Well, the author told me, but I didn't believe it."
* Death should either be quick and sudden or have weight to give the reader catharsis.
* Action vs violence
* One of the panelists said that the difference between writers and normal people was that writers have the ability to imagine or get to high level of violence.
Larry Dixon and Mercedes Lackey crashed the panel about now.
* Larry wants more mazers. (concentrated microwave bursts)
* Good outlines for a novel should be anywhere from 30-60 pages. They say it'll save time in the end.
* The fade to black is a good technique because whatever the reader imagines will be much more vivid than anything you could write. (specifically for horror/torture/death)
* Larry and I talked about how much the movie Transformers sucked and how tight the script for Die Hard was.
3:00 the Business of Writing
I had a really bad headache, and I only stayed for the first hour of this panel so basically the only thing I remember was that someone said, "Getting an agent is easy, it happens when you're ready."
4:00 Clichés in SF/F
* End of the World with a cop out ->"And their names were Adam and Eve."
* Secret Heritage -> destiny, history, prophesy
* Killing things and taking their stuff -> (that was from the gamer)
* Doppelganger -> Buffy/Faith is better than movie! Spiderman/Venom
* First Contact -> we have more in common w/ aliens than we think OR they just want to kill/eat/enslave us.
* Chain mail bikini
* The mystical experience -> the hero learns something necessary through extra!special (and well timed) something.
* The Wizard
* You killed my parents! -> overused and a cheap way to create the need for revenge.
* Reset buttons -> fun, but they get tiring. See the Star Trek franchise.
* Indy shoots the swordsman -> fine for a comedic one-shot, but not for the climax.
* Usually, clichés are a BAD THING when just used as a cheap, lazy throw away.
* Sometimes we would be disappointed to miss the cliché -> Someone always wanders away by themselves in horror movies and gets painfully murdered. We want to yell at them and feel smarter because of course, we wouldn't do that.
* It's a fine line for genre writers, the key is to be fresh and NOT lazy.
* Some cliché reversals have been used so much that they're cliché now. Spunky alpha woman? These rise to fill a dramatic need -> some work, some don't.
5:00 Art of the Slush Pile
* No one is interested in your "Hitler in the Amazing Land of Oz" story.
* Just say no to metaphors. If you're not sure if it's overly flowery, assume it is and cut it.
* If you've just written the best line that you've ever written ever -> cut it, it'll just distract from everything else.
* Do not under any circumstances begin your story with someone waking from a dream. Especially if they wake up in a white room, naked, with no memory, or they're being tortured.
