A pop of the champagne cork to all my writing and reading friends out there! This is my first blog and since I am a sucker for champagne I had to title my blog that way. Every time I hang out with other writers I get new energy to keep my writing going. It hit me hard on Saturday when I attended a joint all day session featuring writers from the Heart of Denver Romance Writers and Colorado Romance Writers. What a fun day and what a rewarding experience.
I enjoyed our guests, Lara Baumbach from Passion in Print and Tamela Buhrke from iWise Bookmarketing and Coaching. In fact it was Tamela’s talk about joining the world of blogging, Facebook and Twitter that made me want to get started on my own personal blog. (I actually started a month ago, I just never finished it because I couldn’t think of anything to say.) Hopefully someone will follow me.
I do another monthly blog on critiquing with Sue Viders, and I’m not giving that up, but I am also going to start blogging on my own.
So what else did I learn Saturday? How much I enjoy gab sessions with other writers, whether over coffee, lunch or Happy Hour and a glass of wine. It was great just having a chance to talk with the other writers there – published, non-published and beginners. Everyone had something to contribute. We talked about the writing process, what everyone was working on, what they were reading and why some people weren’t writing at the moment.
Coming away from the event I was quite excited because during the course of the day I kept hearing new ideas, new thoughts and it gave me new impetus to come home and work on my own stuff. I Yesterday morning I had breakfast with three more writers and POW! It hit me again. It’s like a breath of fresh air to sit and talk about the process with everyone. We spend so much time alone in front of our keyboards it feels great to get a chance to chat. I enjoy hearing what their problems are, what they’ve heard in the publishing world, especially all about e-books and e-publishing and what they think the new publishing world will look like.
Actually it looks like a promising world for writers -- I don’t know about the big publishers or groups who keep ignoring the rapid changes in the face of publishing but for writers, I’ve never seen so many different options opening up. Lara Baumbach really brought that home in her talk. She told us how she enjoyed writing male/male romances but had trouble getting a publisher. Eventually she started her own company, MLR, and now it has grown to the point where she is offering other imprints as well. She even got a nice write up in Rolling Stone Magazine. Good for her! 
And a pop of the champagne cork to all the other writers out there willing to take a chance on this brave new world of publishing.
Listening to all those other writers and people who are working on becoming writers I could see there are plenty of great stories out there in all sorts of genres and more ways to tell them than ever. Okay, now to hit the keyboard and get back to some writing on my own. I am working on a new romantic suspense set in New Mexico and waiting for a release date on my gothic suspense, Shadows from the Past, coming soon from The Wild Rose Press. It’s set in the Pacific Northwest. I must post a picture to show you why I love visiting there. This is the view from downtown Vancouver looking toward Stanley Park -- the setting for the first chapter of my book Deadly Messages.
I hope someone visits my blog and at least leaves a comment on publishing, writing or what you enjoy about visiting with fellow writers.