I will say that the post is slightly misleading because I didn’t attend most of the events that I reported on. I know, I’m terrible. But, I had lunch with Eloisa James and was too nervous beforehand to eat; then, I had a meeting with my agent, and was so hungry after that that I returned to my room, ordered room service, and talked to my parents before going out for dinner with some fellow writers.

All said, though, it was another great day; I’m really questioning where I’m going with Madeleine and Ferguson (particularly Ferguson), but at the same time I’m really excited to see where I end up with them. Now, though, I must go to sleep. I’m pitching to an editor tomorrow morning, so I can’t oversleep. And then I get to get all dolled up for the awards ceremony tomorrow night — I can’t wait to see who wins the RITAs and Golden Hearts!

I did rouse myself in time for lunch (shocking achievement, I know), which consisted of a strange green (pesto?) encrusted chicken and a fantastic keynote speech from Nora Roberts. Nora is the acknowledged Queen of Romance in RWA land, since she has written 150+ books and done so much to advance the cause of romance writing in America. She has a smoker’s voice and a no-nonsense approach to life; she doesn’t hesitate to tell people that they’re being whiners, and the main message of her speech is that writing has always been hard, that publishing is no easier or harder than it ever was, and that you can either shut up and write, or waste your energy wishing that things were different. Her speech made me want to start smoking a pack a day while writing nonstop, and while I think I’ll forsake the cigarettes (I would love to have that voice, but I don’t even know if she smokes, and I’m too much of a clotheshorse to accept the smelly consequences), I left feeling very inspired.

I spent the rest of the afternoon attending workshops; first off was the PRO retreat, for authors who have finished a manuscript but are not yet published, where there were some discussions of craft and agent hunting. I skipped the end to attend Ethan Ellenberg’s talk on what happens after publication, and he discussed a lot of the details about print runs, returns, marketing, etc. I’m in this strange middle area where a lot of the workshops don’t feel like they apply to me — I don’t need the agent or query workshops since I already have an agent, but I’m not published and so am not ready for some of the post-publication workshops.

And so, my focus really needs to be on writing my book, not distracting myself with news of the industry, thoughts about marketing, or endless trawling on Wikipedia. I’m spending some quality time tonight and tomorrow morning working on my next manuscript, since Madeleine and Ferguson are languishing in the middle of their first sexy times and are likely as desperate to climax and move on to the next part as I am (that implies that I’m desperate to climax too, but you get the idea). I still had a good time tonight, as I attended the Golden Network reception, where we celebrated the new Golden Heart finalists and the Golden Heart finalists from past years who have sold their work. But I’m excited to spend some time writing; I haven’t written since Sunday, which is too long.

Check back tomorrow for my recap of Day 2: if nothing else, I’m having lunch with Eloisa James, which should be noteworthy

So, I was quite looking forward to the retreat, and it didn’t disappoint. The first panel I attended was about a Regency romance seminar taught at Yale last year, which thrilled me to no end because I’m glad to see romance start to get a teensy tinsy modicum of respect in academia. The second panel likely would have shredded that teensy tinsy modicum of respect — it was all about courtesans, whores, and the men who loved them (or, at least, paid them a farthing to toss their skirts up against the nearest available alley wall).

After the Beau Monde lunch (with Gaelen Foley, acclaimed Regency writer, as the keynote speaker), I skipped over to the Golden Network retreat. The Golden Network is another special-interest online chapter, but this one is only open to current and former Golden Heart finalists. They had similar content as last year, but it was still eyeopening; in the most brutal display of sadomasochistic behavior I’ve seen since “Secretary” (or the Folsom Street Fair, perhaps), authors anonymously submitted first pages of their works, and then the moderator read those pages while a panel of editors and agents said ’stop’ at the point where they would stop reading. Only one entry made it all the way to the end of the first page without anyone saying stop; several of them lost every single agent/editor in the first paragraph. The bar for publication is so incredibly high that it can be scary and disheartening to hear this; but as I did not submit a page, I just sat back, drank my coffee (while wishing desperately that it was Diet Coke, my one true love) and enjoyed the show.

After the Golden Network retreat was over, I hung out for a couple of hours with Grace and Tina, who are both part of the San Francisco chapter. Grace is up for a Golden Heart in Regency this year (which I am presenting at the awards ceremony on Saturday, since I won last year!), and Tina is doing some fascinating stuff with self-publishing on Amazon — and more importantly, we seem to click well, and Grace and I share a love for Catherine Coulter and some of the other “ew, gross, 80s” romance novels that gave romance a bad name, what with all the abductions, rapes, bodice rippings, forced marriages, etc.

Tina, Grace and I then attended the Literacy Signing, at which published authors sell and sign their books, with the proceeds going to benefit literacy programs. I bought way too many books — on the first pass, I got books from Eloisa James, Courtney Milan, Elizabeth Hoyt, and Carolyn Jewel from the San Francisco chapter. I may have been utterly awkward with Eloisa James; I’m having lunch with her on Friday, which I won in an auction, but she now probably thinks that I’m a weird stalker fangirl because I a) knew that she had been in Paris, since I follow her on Twitter, and b) bought a paperback of the book she *just* released after saying that I already read it on the plane yesterday (but in my defense, I read it on my Kindle, and it was good enough that I want a paperback as a keeper). So, we’ll see if she shows up to lunch, and whether there are any hotel staff standing by in case I turn out to be rabid and crazy.

I parted ways with Grace and Tina, came back to my room with the intention of taking a nap before dinner — then remembered that I had forgotten a couple of people whom I meant to get signatures from, because the room was huge and I failed to plan ahead. So I dashed downstairs again and got books from Tessa Dare (adore - she actually ran out of books, but signed a nameplate for me), Sabrina Darby (have been meaning to read her book for ages, and she was at the Beau Monde retreat this morning), Sarah MacLean (loved her “Nine Rules to Break When Romancing a Rake”), and Addison Fox (one of my Ruby Slipper sisters, who writes paranormal). I failed to track down the other Ruby Slippered Sister who was signing, but at that point, I was loaded down and late for dinner, so I ran upstairs…

…and then as it turns out, dinner ended up being much, much later than anticipated. We left the hotel on time, got to the restaurant fifteen minutes early for our 8:15pm reservation — and then weren’t seated until almost 9pm. The food was outstanding (we ate at Kouzzina, owned by Cat Cora, whom I adore from ‘Iron Chef America’), and I had a Greek lasagna that smelled strongly of cinnamon and tasted divine. I also had two glasses of wine, which made me quite chatty, particularly on an almost empty stomach. But, my table had a v. good time, even if we didn’t eat until 10pm.

And now, I really, really must go to bed — I’m not going to be foolish enough to get up at seven tomorrow morning, but I should get out of bed sometime. More to come tomorrow!

Beyond that, I have very little of interest to report — I’m still slogging through Madeleine and Ferguson’s story (ONE NIGHT TO SCANDAL), while my agent slogs through the submission process for ONE NIGHT TO SEDUCTION. As soon as I have any news about either of them, you’ll hear it here!

For the latest list of names and our great cyberparty, check out the ‘09 Golden Heart finalists’ blog: http://www.rubyslipperedsisterhood.com. I’ll also post congrats to the Regency/historical finalists when the names come out.

Congratulations again (especially to my fellow Regency writers!) and enjoy the ride!

P.S. To my loyal readers (hello Mom) — I’ve shamefully neglected the blog, but I have plans to resurrect it. Stay tuned next week!

UPDATE as of 11:10am PDT: The Historical finalists (not sure if it’s all of them yet?) are up on the RWA website. Still no sign of the Regency list - I’m glad I didn’t enter this year, the suspense would be killing me!

• Good-Timin’ Man by Alsion Atwater
• The Serpent’s Tooth by Jessice Ann Darago
• In Longfellow’s Keep by Mary Lawrence
• Rafe’s Redemption by Jennifer Jakes
• Overlander by Gail Zerrade
• Wild Flower by Linda Bailey

UPDATE: The Regency Historical finalists:

• Her Husband’s Harlot by Grace Chow
• A Whiff of Scandal by Robyn Enlund
• To Seduce a Proper Rogue by Gillian Layne
• A Most Improper Gentleman by Elisa Beatty
• Sweet Enemy by Heather Snow
• My Dearest Rogue by Elizabeth Stock

In general, my writing is going really well right now; I’m feeling inspired and excited by Madeleine and Ferguson’s story, and I’m looking forward to just getting on with it already. Unfortunately, I went through a bit of a slump in September and October; part of it is my natural despair over another birthday + the shortening days + the cooler weather, but most of it was because I didn’t see the way forward with my second book. Now I do, and even if November is generally a bleak month until the saving grace of Thanksgiving, I’m in a much better mood.

What you won’t see, however, is completely regular blogging here. There are only so many hours in the day, and given that I’m not published and only my mother reads this, there seems to be little point. Once the book sells, I’ll blog more frequently; until then, please check back and get excited when something new appears

But, the biggest focus has been on getting back into my writing. I adore the characters that I am currently working with (Madeleine and Ferguson, tentatively titled ONE NIGHT TO SCANDAL). But perhaps because I adore them so much, I feel honor-bound to write them the best book possible; and so while my first book was much more of a seat-of-the-pants ordeal, I’m attempting to be more of a plotter with this book. I started out without a strong roadmap and wrote around 40,000 words, but over the past couple of weeks I’ve taken a step back, outlined what I had, and brainstormed virtually every angle of what will come in the last half of the book. This will of course necessitate rewrites of what I already have, but since it was a first draft, that’s to be expected.

Allow me to embrace my inner technology dork (while I may be a Regency writer, I have a fascination with shiny electronics) and recommend Scrivener if you are a writer using a Mac. I downloaded it a week or two ago, and it has revolutionized my writing process. It has this cool corkboard feature that you can use to essentially write out brief synopses of every scene, categorize them by whether they’re done, partially drafted, or not written, and then move the ‘index cards’ around if you want to reshuffle the order of scenes. Best of all, moving the index card on the corkboard automatically moves the actual written scene to the right place in the manuscript. Score! For me, this is huge — since I can visualize the progress I’ve made, the balance of scenes in the female POV vs. the male POV, and what’s left to accomplish, I have a much clearer understanding of where I will take this work.

Okay, technology dork moment over. The gist of this post is that I’m back in the game, looking forward to finishing the first draft of Madeleine and Ferguson by the end of November, and hoping to get back into the blogosphere just a bit more than I have been. If you are anyone other than my mother and you’re still reading, thank you! (and Mom, you’re of course always welcome

[also, for the purposes of those ridiculous FTC regulations around recommendations on blogs - I bought and paid for Scrivener myself, so this is an unbiased review]

…but in the meantime, my fellow 2009 Golden Heart finalists and winners have started a group blog! We call ourselves the Ruby-Slippered Sisterhood; if you want to know why, you’ll just have to visit the blog Check it out: http://www.rubyslipperedsisterhood.com/rss/index.php/. I’ll be posting there occasionally, and will link to my posts when it’s my turn! And if you’re an aspiring Golden Heart entrant yourself, definitely check out the Sisterhood’s blog — we’re giving away critiques of partial manuscripts this month.

Now, back to the day job; more later!

However, I’m incredibly lucky that my coworkers and bosses (all the way up to my VPs) know about my writing, support it, ask about it, etc. without wanting to fire me for it. Many writers keep their aspirations hidden from their coworkers for fear of retribution, but my workplace is incredibly tolerant of this type of pursuit. That means that I could wear my Golden Heart necklace to work and get a hug from my director instead of a pink slip — and that means I can keep eating while I write, which is quite fortunate.

A writer only needs a few tools — a computer, a dictionary/thesaurus, a printer, and a red pen for edits. But, she can greatly improve her likelihood of success if she has a supportive network of family and friends — and the chances that she will fail increase tremendously if she’s hearing poisonous whispers that destroy her faith in her dreams. I have the supportive network of family and friends, and that’s really all I need. Of course, it would be nice to expand that “support” to include someone to pay all my bills and make my bed while I write, but I won’t get too greedy

If you’re a writer, or even if you’re just pursuing a non-standard career, I would love to hear your thoughts — how vital is others’ support to your work? How do you deal with the inevitable insensitive remarks that make you want to pull your hair out?