Taking Advantage of Chapter Conferences
Now that you've heard Darcy's glowing report on the Georgia Romance Writers' Midnight and Magnolias conference, I bet you're all dying to attend a similar conference yourselves. I know I am!
But while it's pretty hard to miss when and where the RWA National Conference will be held in any given year, finding a good chapter conference that's located near you isn't always so easy. I discovered this because I started looking myself and discovered, to my horror, that there apparently isn't one easy-to-locate calendar of chapter conferences on the web. Oh, I'm sure there is one. Possibly even more than one. But Google searches for variations on the words "RWA," "chapter," and "conference" didn't net me what I was looking for.
So, my public service for today will be to provide you with the dates of and links to upcoming chapter conferences. This is by no means a comprehensive list, I'm sure, and some of these conferences may already be fully booked. I've covered everything I could find from this week through July of 2008, when of course, we'll all be busy in San Francisco! And I would absolutely love it if you let me know of anything I missed. Since it's apparently quite difficult to find this information in one place on the Web, I think it would be fabulous if the Mavens could be the source. So if I missed anything, post in the comments and I'll update accordingly!
October 5-6, 2007
New Jersey Romance Writers: Put Your Heart in a Book Conference
October 12-14, 2007
Romance Writers Ink: Cimarron Dreamin' Conference (Tulsa, Oklahoma)
October 19-21, 2007
Surrey International Writers' Conference (Surrey, British Columbia)
This one isn't RWA-related, but it is romance friendly and agents who represent romance (Lauren Abramo, Kristin Nelson) will be there.
October 26-28, 2007
Greater Seattle Romance Writers: Emerald City Writers' Conference
November 10, 2007
Calgary Romance Writers: Brenda Novak Workshop
February 9-10, 2008
Lowcountry Romance Wrtiers: Blake Snyder Beat Sheet Weekend Seminar (Charleston, South Carolina)
February 29-March 2, 2008
Celebrate Romance Conference (Columbia, South Carolina)
March 28-30, 2008
First Coast Romance Writers: Southern Lights Writers Conference (Pensacola, Florida)
March 28-29, 2008
Central New York Romance Writers: Maggie Lawson's Empowering Characters' Emotions (Syracuse, New York)
April 4-5, 2008
Dallas Area Romance Authors: Dreamin' in Dallas Conference
April 4-6, 2008
Desert Rose RWA: Desert Dreams Conference (Phoenix, Arizona)
April 11-12, 2008
New England Chapter: Let Your Imagination Take Flight (Boston, Massachussetts)
April 11-13, 2008
Gulf Coast Romance Writers: Silken Sands (Pensacola Beach, Florida)
April 25-26, 2008
Chicago-North RWA: Spring Fling 2008 (Deerfield, Illinois)
May 16-18, 2008
Wisconsin Romance Writers of America: Write Touch Conference (Green Bay, Wisconsin)
June 14, 2008
Capital Region RWA: CR-RWA Annual Conference (Albany, New York)
YOUR TURN: Okay, clue us in. Do you know of any other chapter conferences coming up between now and July of 2008? If you do, dish!
P.S. I almost forgot. Okay, okay, I DID forget! The horror! Today is Maven Erica's birthday. I'm pretty sure she's turning 21 or something like that. Pop over to her blog and wish her a happy day!
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9 comments:
Great idea, Jacq!
Erica <-- who keeps thinking about adding a Maven Calendar to the web site...
Fab list, Jacq, this rocks!!! I'll be at the Emerald City conference with Lacey, of course. I'm thinking we should crash India for the Desert Rose conference next April!
I totally agree on the Desert Rose, Darcy. They only run that conference bi-annually, too, so it's either 2008 or not until 2010 (and I don't want to think about how old I'll be by then).
Look out, India, we're measuring up your floor for an air mattress.
There's also the Chicago Spring Fling in April--Chicago is like a second home to me, so I may go to that one.
This was very heroic and generous of you :)
I'll probably go to the New England conference if I can get away. It's wicked awesome!
Is there a firm date for that Chicago one yet, CM? I found quite a number of chapters that offer local conferences in the spring, but the information on a lot of their websites was still for the 2007 conference and the 2008 versions were as-yet uncalendared.
As I find firm dates for those (like Heart of the Rockies, which is usually in May), I'll be sure to add them to the list in an addendum of some kind.
Yeah, Jacq--the chicago spring fling is April 25-26 in 2008.
Thanks, CM. I added it to the list (though I wonder how I missed it--I swear I hit all the Chicago chapters' websites during my research).
I have to admit, I'd like to go to that one. I, too, have Chicago ties (I did my Masters at the University of Chicago), but I think I'll have to choose between that one and Phoenix and, well, Phoenix is closer :)!
This list IS rockin'. Way to pimp us and the local dives at the same time!
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