Thoughts on the #RT14 Conference

When I decided to go to RT14 in New Orleans, I was REALLY glad that I had my old post, Thoughts on the RT12 Con, to refer back to, so I'm doing it again in the event that I go to another one in the future.

I actually did spend a fair amount of time and thought deciding how I would manage my time, this time around, and I feel MUCH less ambivalent about RT14 than RT12.  Part of it was just knowing what to expect. Part was having a strategy. A big part was having more pre-existing relationships and virtual friendships I could lean on. And Twitter turned out to play a surprisingly major role for me.

RT itself did a few things differently that I really appreciated.  In 2012, and I gather, most if not all previous years, published authors were given colorful silk flowers to wear prominently on their badges.  This year, there were no silk flowers, but each attendee had a ribbon with a color code for published authors, aspiring authors, bloggers, reviewers, readers, librarians, booksellers, and "industry," which I assume was for agents, publishers, and the like. I feel like this was really helpful for me personally, in finding other blogger/reviewers and in a few cases, it afforded me some flattering attention from authors and publishers looking for review outlets.

The Goal and the Strategy
After thinking hard about what I liked and what disappointed me at the last con, I narrowed in on a few goals:

1. Meet up and talk to specific people that I either had an on-line acquaintance with, or whose work I admired.
2. Let serendipity happen.
3. Don't do things that aren't enjoyable.

To that end, I prearranged meetings with several people I particularly wanted to connect with. No interviews, no notes, no "goal" -- just getting better acquainted with women who seemed super-compatible online.

For authors that I wanted to meet, I made an effort to see them speak at panels or other venues leading up to the book fair. In general, I don't care very much about having books signed because I cycle through them fast; I'm not much of a re-reader; and I've largely converted to ebooks. The one exception though, was an anthology that Alyssa Day sent to me years ago.  It's been signed by herself, plus Meljean Brook, and at the conference, I was able to get a signature from Marjorie Liu, whose work I adore.

I didn't bring home as many free physical books as many conventioneers, because of item #3 above.  Standing in line for many hours is not enjoyable -- especially when the tradeoff is New Orleans.  So I skipped many of the long lines for publisher parties with the best swag in favor of BarCon and serendipity, or a walk to Jackson Square for beignets and a little shopping.

The Big Giant Bookfair
Let's get this out of the way. For me as a reader, there was minimal confusion over how to find an author, regardless of which room they were in. It was a non-issue. I read a few of the rant posts shortly after the fair and from what I read, the people who were the most OUTRAGED by the two rooms were not even there.

However, I knew going into it that the Bookfair was not how I wanted to spend my whole day. I speculated that I could go in later, after the initial push, see the half-dozen authors who were still on my list, and get out quickly.  My companions for a lot of the con had planned to get in line at 8 am for the 11:00 opening and I was not interested in that.  I went out and had what might have been the best meal I've ever had in my entire life, which put me in such a good mood that I hardly minded getting in line at 9:30 or so and waiting for not quite two hours. It's a good thing it turned out that way though, because I think my plan of going later when lines were shorter would not have worked that way at all-- the checkout line wait would have made up and then some for any time saved in the initial line.

I was probably in the first third or so of the line, which surprised me a little. I went to see about 6 authors, and bought two books, which is two more than I had planned. I scooted into the checkout line which was very poorly organized and difficult to see where it started and ended, as it flowed across the first table of authors and into one of the feature author lines. I was one of the first people to buy a book at the consignment register, and there was no waiting there, but the main checkout was already up to 20-30 minutes when I got there.

So anyway, next conference: if I go to the book fair at all, I will skip the on-site purchase in favor of an ebook when I get home.

About Blogging and Reviewing
I went to the Book Blogger Con on Tuesday - I arrived straight from the airport! and it was packed. I was surprised at how crowded it was. Like my experience with panels in 2012, I thought the topics all sounded interesting but didn't go very deep. I would've liked more discussion and less lecture-style--it just felt like too much crammed into the time available.

I also attended panels on the blogger/author relationship, and the blogger/publisher relationship. I can't say I learned anything mind-blowing, or that I will do anything radically different as a result, but it was fun to get some different perspectives.  However, a few things that I will be implementing or at least thinking about:

1. Keeping the publicists more in the loop. I have always thought that these people probably interacted with so many blogger/reviewers that a real individual conversation would be more of a burden than an advantage, but I'm told otherwise. I don't know if all of them feel the same, but at least one publicist that I've worked with via email for a long time, keeps an elaborate spreadsheet that tracks preferences and reviews and all kinds of things, so I will be doing a bit more outreach there.

2. Blog backups. Many people have preached about this but I still never got around to doing it.  I started this past weekend.

3. Automation. Jane Litte talked about several available plug-ins for Wordpress. She uses them to automate post formats (handy when you have multiple contributors), review requests, and other things. She uses a spreadsheet formula to auto-populate buy links for various affiliate programs. One of the things that makes me a sporadic blogger is the amount of time I take on each post, so I am interested in things I can do to streamline that.

4. Updated look and feel. It's been about three years since I changed up my template, and I feel like it kind of shows.  One suggestion from Rachel at Parajunkee was to browse web design blogs and look at newer trends.  Unfortunately, I think I've forgotten everything I ever figured out about CSS, so that feels like a big task right now. At the same time, I'm considering a move to wordpress and/or getting my own domain. I need to do a little maintenance too -- I've noticed that my search box doesn't work very well any more. Grr.

What I learned from RT2012
Focus on the connections, not the panel subjects. This was totally true. I was still seduced by awesome-sounding panels that were mostly superficial. Some were gems, though. You just never know.

Allow for serendipity. I spent more time in the hotel bar, and honestly, that was always a good time. For the first time since possibly the 80s, I shut down a bar, with valiant companions Sara Fawkes, who made a great show of not minding when I spilled beer on her, Jonny from I Love Vampire Novels, Mel from SM Book Obsessions, who, incidentally, brought the con's most sought-after button swag (right), Jackie Uhrmacher, author of a black-widow comedic novella (yep, that's what I said) and porn-promoter Fab_Fangurl (link goes to her mostly-SFW twitter profile, where there are links to all of her content).  That, my friends, is quite a crew, and we had quite a time.

Another evening, I ran into these glamorous ladies, and we had a really interesting conversation about story arcs within series arcs, and the best way to manage them.  After my eyes adjusted to the glare of their FABULOUSNESS, that is.

Read up on favorite authors beforehand. This was a great investment of time! I did find that one way the overstimulation of the conference affected me personally was that I sometimes had trouble stringing coherent sentences together-- there were so many synapses firing about books and characters and authors and series and story elements that I seriously felt like I had con-induced aphasia or something. Every author that I talked to was extremely gracious about mistakes I made about their books or characters.  It's embarrassing to mess up the details, but hopefully my sincere admiration came through.

Twitter. Not only was Twitter instrumental in many if not most of the pre-con connections I had made, but it made logistics during a con a total breeze.  Saving a place in line for your roommate? DM her your location. Want to find an author? Check her feed. Or @ her a message.  One of my must-do activities was a visit to St. Louis Cemetery No. 1, and a hashtagged tweet two days in advance netted me a half-dozen companions to make the walk with.  In many ways, Twitter has replaced comments on blog posts as an interaction channel, and in some cases, it replaces the blog post altogether. I have mixed feelings about that, but that's a whole nother post.  At any rate, joining Twitter directly after RT12 made my RT14 experience vastly deeper.

What would I do differently?
On the whole, I think I was right about everything I decided last time. I would do pretty much the same thing again, with a couple of additions:

It became clear to me this year that there are lots of private parties going on in the background of RT. Obvious, right? Also, even though I had a fair amount of one-on-one discussion with a lot of interesting people, most of the talks were pretty superficial. I mean, not surprising, in some ways, but I would really relish the opportunity to dig in deeper on things I really love about books and stories and characters.  Both years, I've felt dissatisfaction over the panels -- because the topics were so promising, but the time allotted was small and the crowd wanting a piece of it was big.  So I would consider the idea of pre-arranging some small-ish get-togethers, perhaps with moderated topics -- or perhaps not.  Maybe 8-12 people, with a balance of authors and readers.

Skip the BookFair altogether. As discussed above.  However, the Fan-Tastic Day party seemed like it might've been worth the line.  After a tweet from Katibabs about the availability of TheWindflower, I checked my watch and hotfooted it back from dinner in the French Quarter (which was marvelous) for the last 15 minutes of the party and scored a couple of books. It's possible I went too far in my line avoidance.

Jackie from Literary Escapism noted in comments on my 2012 post that she thought that it would be better to only register for a couple of days of the conference and enhance that experience with interviews and BarCon, and I believe that's what she did this time.  I think that's well worth considering. On the other hand, I have weakness for the panels that I may not overcome. Heh. And again, I think the location plays a big factor there, and whether the con hotel is in a walkable area - that would be NOPE for Chicago (because it was really out in Rosemont, far from downtown Chicago), and NOPE for Kansas City, and NOPE for Dallas.  So we'll see what happens in 2016. Or I might try a different con, like RomantiCon, or maybe Coastal Magic, or Casey's new brainstorm, Reading Until Dawn Con.

All in all, I do feel re-energized about the blog, although actual results are going to be a bit delayed due to a couple of real-life things that are consuming my spare time for the next couple of weeks.  Still, I'm going to try to knock out some posts a bit more regularly, and figure out if there's a way I can put out content I'm proud of, with a bit less procrastination and dragging-out of things.

It's Almost #RT14 !

Well, it's been quiet here around Alpha Heroes, hasn't it? Sorry about that. Some of the things that have been keeping me occupied include recovering from a cold (yay! it's gone now!), planning a couple of Girl Scout events (I'm an Encamporee Director this year, are you impressed?), working through some org changes at work, the usual mom & wife things, and of course, getting ready for the bookish highlight of my year, the RT convention in New Orleans.

I leave tomorrow at midnight to arrive in NOLA just in time to jump into the Tuesday Book Blogger Con.  I'll be the one mainlining coffee and/or face down in my red beans and rice. I'm an experienced enough traveler at this point in my life that the packing and traveling doesn't stress me out too much (I used to cry almost every time I got to an airport from the stress build-up... I think I'm over that now!).  And RT is going to be my vacation this year, so I've been wholly enjoying myself in the lead-up.  Way back in March, I posted a list of to-dos, and while I didn't get to all 700 authors, I did manage to work in a handful of new-to-me authors who will be at RT:

1. Jaye Wells
2. Jaime Rush
3. Kevin Hearne
4. Nico Rosso
5. Laura Florand
6. Sarah Castille
7. Jade Lee

Not all were home runs for me, but I will say that I might've gotten to a couple of additional authors if it weren't for a small binge on Kevin Hearne's Iron Druid series. I stopped myself after three titles but I plan to finish up that series in the next couple of weeks or months (I want to pace myself a bit -- more than 2 or 3 in a row of a series and I can get a little burned out.)

I got through the rest of my list in a rather leisurely and pleasant way.  Yesterday I picked up a pair of shoes from the repair place and got my toes done, which is a rare luxury for me.  My husband and I agreed that we were due for a new camera, so that arrived on Friday via Amazon Prime. I hope I can figure it out well enough to take good pictures! (I wanted to bring both that one and the old one which still works and I'm very familiar with, but it has gone AWOL, grr.)  The new one has wifi built in, so keep an eye on Alpha Heroes' Facebook feed. That has admittedly been nearly defunct, but I think it will be the easiest place for me to post pics over the next week.

On that note, I am not going to try to blog during the conference.  I have a hard enough time writing up posts on a normal week, much less one as jam-packed as this one is going to be.  I've decided to leave the laptop at home.  I won't be completely unplugged -- I'll have my phone and Twitter and FB-- but without a keyboard (or TIME), I be much more about the face-to-face experience.  Which, after all, is really why I'm going! {/ramble}

Everyone on Twitter is talking about the outfits and costumes and shoes they are bringing and planning.  I picked up a fancy sparkly dress that I'm thinking about wearing to this event, but otherwise I will be fairly casual, in jeans or shorts and tee-shirts (including a Broken Circle one from Kit Rocha) or slightly upscaled tops. I did take advantage of the excuse to beef up my summer wardrobe slightly, which was definitely in need. So, no guilt there. Even so, I am bringing 5 pairs of shoes? that is really not like me at all.

The programming for the conference looks AMAZING, but I really want to tear myself away and enjoy a little bit of New Orleans as well. I was there in 1998 on my honeymoon and have not been back since, even though we totally loved the city. On my must-do list is a photo-shoot visit to the Saint Louis cemetery. I'd like to catch it at the "golden hour" but there is so much going on at the con in this timeframe!  Maybe early-early morning, but the downside there is you know, getting up early.  We shall see.

The run-up to RT has been so much fun this year. When I went in 2012, I was not on Twitter, and my bloglist was a lot smaller (I'm using Feedly now, and wow, what a difference).  I've become addicted to Parajunkee's blog, with the best NOLA insider info ever, and I've been faithfully stalking the Look Who's Going to RT feature at Literary Escapism. I've been reading all of the "how to survive" articles, which are mostly common sense but a fun way to build the anticipation. If you stalk the #RT14 hashtag, most all of them are linked in there somewhere, and if you follow the con account on Twitter, they do a great job of re-tweeting the best articles.

My only to-do's left are to figure out what tote/backpack/bag I'm going to take as my under-the-seat carryon, and load it up. I have a couple other things I'd like to take care of so my return week isn't too hectic, but that's all gravy.

Looking forward to seeing MANY of you in a few days!

Thursday Thirteen, Edition 32: The #RT14 Countdown!

You guys, I'm getting so excited about the RT Booklovers' Convention!  It's in New Orleans, which is one of the absolute best US cities to have a party in.  I've been counting days since October when I registered (47 to go) -- I have plane tickets, my seats reserved, my room reservation... what else do I need to do?

1. Get new Moo cards made
2. Hem up the sparkly dress for Mardi Gras World Carnivale party
3. Figure out shoes for same
4. Buy an O'Kane For Life tee-shirt
5. Book a discounted shuttle trip from/to the airport
6. Follow up on a blogger swag idea
7. Get a haircut
8. Make up my list of authors to stalk, er, um, I mean, authors I'd like to try to meet (I'm harmless, honest.) Schedule some meetups.
9. Follow Jackie's "Look Who's Going to RT" feature religiously
10. Start following the bloggers who are headed to the book blogger con one day ahead
11. Break in the new shoes I bought
12. Remember to pack the anthology that I want to have signed
13. Read something from each of the 700 authors that are attending.... uh oh.

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Find more Thirteeners at Thursday-13. Participants are welcome and encouraged to leave links in comments.

Sunday Soup - February 22

Sunday Soup is... a little of this, a little of that, not too much work, and hopefully a tasty result.

Soup Dish:  book people are talking about...
✽I'm getting all revved about RT14! I confess, I've been stalking the hashtag a bit.  Are you a Karina Cooper fan? I thought I had reviewed her ... but I guess that's another one that never made it out of the "thinking about" stage and onto the actual blog.  Anyway, if you're going to RT, check out the plan Ms. Cooper is hatching, if for no other reason than that she always has the most FABULOUS boots.  And either way, if you haven't sampled her St. Croix series, you really should. Creepy and dark; it really brings the horror element.

✽A friend posted this article about women's voices and it's kind of amazing.  [Ironically] I can't really articulate my response to it, but it has me thinking thinking thinking.

✽Adventures in Reading! I had lunch at Panera the other day, with my book of course, and I kept sort of eavesdropping on these two women sitting near me.  I can hardly be blamed though, because they kept dropping tantalizing words like "genre" and "literary" and "urban fantasy" and I couldn't quite catch what they were actually talking about, but it was clearly a business conversation.  Finally I couldn't stand it any more and butted in. We talked books and genre and social media for at least half an hour before I had to run and tend to the rest of my real life schedule. In the process, I learned about Curiosity Quills, a very cool new(ish) publishing house. It's always a great day when I can nerd out with someone new!


What I'm reading
✽I finished the Alexa Egan title I mentioned last week.  I think I liked the second one a little bit better, but it's definitely a series I'll stick with.

✽Blazed through Thea Harrison's Lord's Fall.  I know, I'm way behind.  I've already started Kinked.  I love this stuff.  I'm probably due for a contemporary pretty soon though; I'm thinking probably something from Victoria Dahl.

Outlander Watch... Och. I canna wait for Jamie and Claire onscreen.

✽Interview with Ron Moore; nice chunk of discussion about adapting the book to film.

One of the very first notes that [Starz CEO] Chris Albrecht told me was to trust the book. He said, "We love the book. Make the show for the fans of the book and believe that anyone who doesn't know this material, when they see it, they'll be swept into the story like everyone else is.

What a great thing to hear!

✽Ron Moore and Sam Heughan in kilts.  Although I searched diligently, out of the generosity of my heart for you, my readers, all for you... the photographic evidence is sadly minimal AND owned by Getty Images, so you'll need to click through for a look.