RT

As I mentioned last night, the past week I spent at the 2010 RT Convention in Columbus, Ohio and it was fantastic! I learned so much about writing and lots of other things, since I want to be a writer. It was very informative and not to mention fun!! There were a ton of people there, including dozens of authors. Not to mention some big NYT bestsellers like Charlaine Harris, JR Ward and Jim Butcher and of course others. But those were the BIG names that drew in the HUGE crowd. There were more convention attendees this year than last year apparently.

As much fun as I had and how I wish I could go again, next year it's in LA and since I didn't win the free convention contest, where you enter to win the convention fee for free for 2011, I think I might have to pass because the airline tickets and hotel fees are going to be killer enough, not to mention that $400+ it costs for the convention itself.

But as I said, I had tons of fun. I met other readers of my genre and could talk to them about anything and everything about tons of authors. I even got to talk to some authors. Charlaine Harris talked with a group of us because we were students of Judi McCoy's Aspiring Writer's course that took place 2 days before the convention and she was enjoyable. I was reading her when I first transitioned from YA to adult, but of course now I read both. But I love her Southern Vampire Mysteries and loved the Harper Conelly ones too.

I even got to talk to one of my other faves Rachel Vincent!! That was truly a great part of the convention. And other authors came and joined us, such as Jenna Black, Jocelynn Drake and Devon Monk--all authors who I read and love! I even got to have lunch with Jenna, Jocelynn and Devon, Rachel had to go to talk to another author for a panel she was on later that day. And I learned so much just from listening to them talk about their work and what they were going through and everything.

I came home with a handful of free books, since I am mostly an urban fantasy reader so the straight romance novels got left behind. Not enough luggage room, which they ended up searching it because my strap around the suitcase was undone and it took me forever to pack and cram everything in that thing! Luckily not too much was done to it. A few covers got rumpled and one had a little tear which teared at my heart but what can I do?

But the trip was literally the 2nd best one I ever took, the first one was when I went to Greece and Italy, nothing can top that! But this was the second best one ever because I met so many new people who share common interests and got to meet my authors. Of course other author meetings I've had in the past are still in that same category, like when I met Maria V. Snyder back in 08 at the Pittsburgh Convention which I went to for the Saturday signing as well.

Below are some pics I took:This was a panel I went to the first day with Vicki Pettersson, all by herself! The panel was Get over Yourself and Get Writing. It was very informative and fun. Vicki basically said that we must motivate ourselves to get behind the computer and write. We have to keep writing, set goals. Basic things but they needed emphasizing, so again, it was a very helpful and fun panel.

This is some of the authors who were on an Urban Fantasy panel about Alpha Males and why we love them. Also in relation to the alpha females since we are talking about urban fantasy, a genre highly populated by female authors, the readers are males and females, but possibly a few more females. I think a stat was 60/40 for one author according to her estimations.


This was a vampire panel of some kind...might have been Count Who? Expanding the Dracula mythos of the vampire and how it has changed. Very fun! Charlaine was there as you can see.

Another urban fantasy panel with authors Mario Acevedo, Jeanne Stein, Richelle Mead, Kelley Armstrong, Vicki Pettersson and Rachel Vincent.


This is me and Rachel Vincent with her Peep cupcake on the other side of me. A reader brought in cupcakes for the whole panel with Peeps on her. There was another story that happened later with that Peep, but I won't tell it. Ask Rachel on her blog or at the Pride.

And here I am with Jocelynn Drake. She wasn't on any panels this time, but she was drifting around and I saw her several times. She's a fabulous writer and was very fun to talk with. I was at lunch with her along with Devon Monk and Jenna Black as well.

And now I've used up all my space for photos. I have more. Of course some came out a little blurry. Must have been my shaking hands because these authors are my celebrities! Meeting them was the best thing that has happened to me in a long time and they love to meet their readers as well. At these conventions they get to hang out with their author friends who they don't get to see too often and meet their readers!