I was gone for almost a week to a writing conference at Mount Hermon (near Santa Cruz, California). I’m home now and almost caught up on all the email, bills, and other untidy parts of Real Life.

I had hoped to blog before I left about my latest Sam The Plumber column. Sam has decided to become an agent, and naturally, he thinks that I should be his client, despite the fact that I already have one. You can read about Sam’s antics here.

The April issue of my Advanced Fiction Writing E-zine was due on Tuesday, April 7, which was the night I got back. It quickly became clear to me that I was going to miss that deadline. It’s just too much fun at a writing conference to be working on actual writing. The April issue will therefore come out one week later, on April 14. That should be just in time for you to enjoy as you wrap up those pesky taxes (if you live in a place where taxes are due April 15.)

I really enjoyed the conference. Here is a shot of my buddy John Olson and me at the autograph party on Monday night. I am the cool and sensible guy on the left. I don’t know what John is grinning about. Probably he’s just happy that he has four books to sign and I have none. Thanks to Tosca Lee for shooting us on her iPhone.

I had thought I was done blogging about writing conferences, but had a conversation last week with one of my loyal blog readers, Camille Eide, who happens to be in my local critique group.

Camille is one of three finalists in a really great contest being run jointly by the Mount Hermon Christian Writers Conference and a large publisher, Zondervan. The winner of this contest for unpublished writers will get a $10,000 contract from Zondervan. Pretty cool!

Anyway, Mount Hermon is running a very special deal now, and Camille told me all the details, and I thought it would be fun to do an interview with her about it. Here ’tis:

Randy: What do you write and how long have you been writing?

Camille: As far as fiction, I’m writing inspirational contemporary romance, or romantic drama. Think of a Nicholas Sparks love story with a strong faith inspiring theme. And maybe a happier ending. Love Worth Fire is the story of a bitter young widower whose second chance at love means marrying a dying woman. I’ve been writing all my life, but I began writing a novel and seeking publication two years ago.

Randy: You went to Mount Hermon last year after writing for about a year. Was that a good decision? What happened there?

Camille: It was a life-changing decision, one that confirmed my suspicions about being a writer. I blogged about it when I returned, including how I got to sit beside the sleeping Snowflake Guy on the plane ride home.

[Randy interrupts: Yes, on the plane home, I was Xtremely thrashed after too many nights staying up late talking to writers. I have never gone to bed before midnight at a conference, and it’s not unusual to see the clock strike 2. So after I read Camille’s chapters on the plane, I told her, “Get an agent,” and then promptly conked out.]

Camille bravely continues after Randy’s interruption: So I went to my first large scale writer’s conference hoping to sponge up all I could about the craft and connect with people in the industry. I did learn and connect, much more than I had hoped. And I got a huge boost to my writing career. My novel was not finished, so like a good newbie, I had no delusions about pitching it. But after getting back surprisingly good critiques, this burning knot formed in my gut (which I knew couldn’t have come from the excellent food they serve) and I knew I had to pray down some nerve, take advantage of the opportunity and talk to an editor, which I did.

The editor asked me to send the entire manuscript when it was finished. Which was cool. So I got a little cocky and approached a couple of others and they asked for it too. If not for those requests, I probably wouldn’t have had a conversation with Randy on the flight home that convinced me I needed to get my act together and get an agent. I would probably still be debating whether I should shred or flush the novel. Or both. But, as it turns out, I finished the thing and entered it in a publishing contest sponsored by Mount Hermon and Zondervan. My novel made it to the final three (winner of the publishing contract to be announced at 2009 Mt Hermon). And it landed me an agent. I’ve decided not to flush it.

Randy: Mount Hermon is giving a great deal right now. Tell us about it.

Camille: Mount Hermon Christian Writer’s Conference, coming up April 3-7 2009, has made a tremendous offer. If you have never been to this conference, and if you register to attend by April 1, and if you mention on your registration form that someone already registered (like me or someone else you know) invited you, you will receive $200 off the price of the conference!

The regular cost varies according to your room choice, it ranges from $845 and up, so minus $200 if you take them up on this offer and attend this 5-day conference for $645. This includes EVERYTHING: tuition, materials, accommodations, excellent food, snacks between sessions, and all the editor/agent appointments and high quality workshops, morning tracks and keynote evening sessions you would expect from a professional writer’s conference. The morning mentoring tracks are awesome too (10 students-to-1 teacher, intense daily critique sessions) but you need to sign up for those ahead and pay a little extra.

Check out the conference here: mounthermon.org

But even though it’s a professional conference, the atmosphere is casual, serene and inviting. Mt Hermon is a sprawling, secluded campground nestled into a gorgeous redwood forest and includes scenic hiking/running trails. The evening sessions are awesome, beginning with a sweet time of worship (I love it when hundreds of people from various places and backgrounds worship the Lord together . . . makes me think of what it will be like in heaven). The setting is beautiful, peaceful and inspiring! Of course, the company isn’t bad either. You’ll meet editors, agents and writers from every facet of the media. I made some great friends with whom I still keep in contact. It really is an awesome conference. I came away from it last year full, excited, changed and inspired.

If you sign up, I or the person you mention will get to share in the savings too. If you have never been to Mt Hermon and you register by APRIL 1 and give the name of the person who invited you, that person will also get $200 off our conference cost. I think this is a huge offer on their part, and certainly makes going to a high quality Christian writer’s conference more affordable for us all.

Are you up for it? I had the most amazing time last year. I hope you will consider going with such a huge discount being offered. It is well worth the price! Let me know if you decide to go on my invitation. I would love to see you there.

Randy sez: Thanks, Camille! I am already reviewing the manuscripts of the folks I’ll be mentoring at Mount Hermon and starting to get that “this is gonna be great, I can hardly wait” feeling in the pit of my stomach.

Folks, if any of you decide to take Mount Hermon up on this offer, remember to mention that Camille Eide sent you. Don’t tell them I sent you, because I’ll be a faculty member, so I am not paying any fees that Mount Hermon could refund. Whereas Camille is paying her way, and if you get a $200 discount through her referral, she’ll get one too. If you are already going to Mount Hermon and if you influence one of your friends to go who’s never been before, BOTH you AND your friend will get a $200 discount. This is a terrific deal.

Also, Mount Hermon, like many writing conferences, has a scholarship fund that can provide partial help to those in financial need.

You may be wondering if it isn’t too late to sign up. Nope. Every year at Mount Hermon, there’s at least one person who signed up for the conference THE DAY BEFORE IT STARTED, and I’ve seen it happen once or twice that somebody decided to go THE DAY OF THE CONFERENCE. At that late date, things are usually all full, but right now there are some openings. I hope to see some of my loyal blog readers there!

This year is an anniversary year for Mount Hermon, so they are planning to show some photos of events from years past. I have a gnawing suspicion that some photos from the infamous “Shaving Babbitt” scam which I ran six years ago may surface. However, if I can get my hush money payments in on time, maybe they won’t show those shots.

I forgot to mention in my last post that my latest “Sam the Plumber” column is now officially online. You can read “That Blocked Up Feeling” where Sam tries his best to solve my writer’s block, in a way that only Sam would ever think of.

I have now officially read an entire book on a Kindle! This was a Word document of a novel by my editor friend, and I think it was at least as nice to read it on a Kindle as it would be to read it on paper. For one thing, I didn’t have to print it out. For another, I didn’t need a bookmark, because that pesky Kindle remembers where you quit reading and starts you up at that place when you reopen it. The Kindle has one advantage over a book–you don’t have to hold it open. That’s always an issue with books that have tight margins (most paperbacks)–the book has to be held open or it wants to close. I generally am quite careful with my paperbacks to not apply too much force so the binding doesn’t crack. With my Kindle, I don’t have to be careful. The thing lies flat without being held open.

Chris asked about the Kindle:

1) Can you make annotations that are tied to specific text on a page?

2) Can you export annotations? Or do you have to manually get those annotations back to the author?

For Question 1, the answer is yes. You can insert annotations at any point in a document. You can later delete them if you want.

For Question 2, I don’t know. Since typing on that teeny weeny keyboard is pretty slow, I wouldn’t care to do a lot of annotations, so I haven’t done much with this feature.

Ivye noted that Kindles don’t have service outside the US. Yes, if you mean that you can’t tie into the Sprint network. But of course you can get most of the Kindle functionality using the hookup to the USB port on your computer. There are a few things you can’t do, and it’s a little more work to do them on the computer, but since Sprint doesn’t work in my neighborhood, I’m living with those limitations quite fine.

Daniel noted that Chip MacGregor has recently posted some comments on the Kindle and Sony e-book reader on his blog. This is true, and I read those comments and forgot to put a link to them in my last post. Thanks, Daniel. Chip notes that the Sony is cheaper and he predicts that the Sony will win unless Amazon opens up the Kindle a bit. Just a day after Chip’s post, Amazon announced that it would be making available a free application for iPhones and iPod Touch users so they can read Kindle books. The iPhone can also access the Kindle store wirelessly. (For the iPod Touch, you have to use your computer to get to the Kindle store.) Chip is once again seen to be prophetic in his insights. If you’re not reading Chip’s blog, you’re missing out on some great insights from a guy who’s been around the block in publishing circles many times.

More random thoughts on writing conferences: Since I just returned from one writing conference and will be going to another in early April, they’re much on my mind. It strikes me that this might be a particularly good year to go to a major conference. The reason is that the downturn in the economy is likely to discourage some people from going. So there’ll be fewer students at any given conference to compete for the attention of the agents and editors. I expect that my mentoring group at Mount Hermon this year will likely have fewer students in it, so I’ll have more time to devote to each one.

A lot depends on your personal economic situation, of course. I regard a conference as a medium to long-term investment for a writer. If your short-term financial situation is bleak, then now is a bad time to go. But if things are stable (i.e., if you still have your job or your spouse still has his or her job and if your income is no worse than at this time last year), then this might very well be a great year to go to a good conference. (Many of us have investments that are half what they were last year. That’s actually irrelevant to how well we’re doing financially. What matters to most of us right now is our income stream, not our savings. The main exception is those who are retired who live off their investments.)

The world economy is doing horribly right now, but publishers are still buying books. (I’m negotiating a deal for a book right now. More on that when I get it signed.) Publishers are tightening their belts, and cutting staff. But they’re all in business for the long haul, and many of the contracts they’re creating right now are for 2011 or later, a point at which the economy will be in a different place. I think we all hope that 2011 will be a better year than 2009, although nobody can predict that.

If I were a publisher making deals right now, I think I’d be looking hard at new writers who can be contracted inexpensively. (It’s a rare thing for a new writer to get a huge deal or even a medium size deal. Most new writers get small contracts.) I’m not a publisher, and I don’t know their strategies, but I suspect that they’re not eager to tie up a lot of capital right now when liquidity is tight. So my guess is that they’re going to be more cautious about the megadeals than the small fry. Bottom line: This may well be a good time for new writers to break in. It’s hard to know for sure, but we’ll see.

I’ve heard that an old Chinese curse says, “May you live in interesting times.”

We do. My hope is that we all get through it soon.

Today I’d like to wrap up my discussion of writing conferences by responding to a couple of comments that my loyal blog readers posted.

Ben asked:

My current novel is still in the early stages (I have almost 100 pages of a rough draft and a skeletal outline of the rest of the story). What should I focus on getting done if I do end up going to the conference? Should I try to polish the first twenty pages for critique? Pull a proposal/summary sentences together (not to pitch to editors, but as a way of having the elements of the story in a concise, easily discussable form)?

Any recommendations? I have limited time to work on it due to a full-time college schedule, but I set aside a little time each day to write.

Randy sez: I think your best bet is to try to polish the first ten pages. Make it as good as you’re capable of making it, and then stop. DO NOT obsess on it for the next three months. After a few rounds of editing, most writers hit their peak and then they start disimproving their work.

When it’s as good as it’s going to get, take it to the conference of your choice and sign up for a critique with a published writer. Most conferences allow you to do this instead of showing it to an editor or agent (who is likely to give you a yes or a no, and maybe a few comments. Editors and agents are overworked, so they basically triage the manuscripts they see, sorting them into the very few that are really good, the larger number that have potential, and the majority that are not close.)

I have seen editors at conferences get 60 manuscripts. Let’s face it — an editor who gets that many has to fly through them.

Whereas real authors generally get far fewer. I think I’ve never gotten more than 9 at any conference. So authors have a bit more time to do a decent critique, and they may even have time to meet with you in person. At some conferences, you can get a paid critique of 15 minutes for $25. This may be the best $25 you ever spent. At other conferences, you can get a critique for free.

One of the most valuable critiques I ever had was a paid critique of my public speaking skills at a writing conference in Colorado where I was teaching. I spent half an hour with a speaking coach who gave me some tremendous insights and also reassured me that I’m not nearly as bad as I had feared.

At the Mount Hermon conference, there is a walk-by critique table that is free. I’ve often seen as many as 10 authors there simultaneously, some of them best-selling authors, others winners of major awards, all working over manuscripts with a red pen. This is, in my view, the biggest bargain in all of publishing.

Morgan wrote quite a long comment on going to a couple of conferences where I taught. I’ll quote just a bit of her comments here:

After listening to Randy, I went to his site afterward and learned loads more about writing. At that point, I had been writing for 3 years and wanted to see just how far I had come in my writing, along with wanting to learn more about the publishing world.

So with added encouragement from my husband, I signed up for Mt Hermon last year and specifically for Randy’s mentoring track. And my writing life has changed ever since.

Randy sez: Wow, I didn’t realize, Morgan, that you’d heard me speak before signing up for my mentoring track. I have to say that running a mentoring track is one of the most delightful things I’ve done at any conference. Last year, the group I worked with had tremendous chemistry. I could have sat there and said nothing, and the group would have critiqued each other very effectively.

I had 10 writers in my group, with a wide range of experience. Morgan brought her fantasy novel and we had a wonderful time working through her first chapter. I expect to see several of the novels we worked on last year get published in coming years. One of the guys in the group was working on his Master of Fine Arts in writing and brought the novel that will be his thesis project.

I always make individual appointments with each of my mentees for about half an hour outside the main class. The reason is that some of the writers need career guidance, and in some cases I want to talk about things that we missed in the group session or say things that need to be said without an audience. And sometimes it’s good just to brainstorm new ideas.

One of the things that made me happy with last year’s group was that they asked me to set up a Yahoo group after the conference, and they continue to keep in touch with each other and give advice and critiques to each other.

This is part of the magic of a conference — forming those connections with other writers that you click with. You will meet many writers, editors, and agents in your career, but the ones who will be most important to you are those writers in your “cohort.” These are the writers you’ll “grow up” with. These are the writers you’ll cheer on when they get published. You’ll fight to stifle your envy when they break in ahead of you. And they’ll be there to cheer you on and stifle their own envy when you break in.

My own “cohort” includes people like John Olson, Rene Gutteridge, Marlo Schalesky, Cindy Martinusen, Brandilyn Collins, and many others. Our career paths have varied widely, but we keep in touch. When you have survived years of uncertainty and self-doubt together, there is a special closeness that can’t be faked and can’t be destroyed, ever.

I hope all my loyal blog readers find a “cohort” of like-minded writers to break in with.

In my next blog entry, I’d like to return to our ongoing analysis of STAR WARS to see what more we learn about the structure of this story.

I enjoyed reading through all the comments today by my loyal blog readers about their experiences at writing conferences. Kim’s tale of going to a writing conference in a small town in the middle of Australia was fascinating. You just never know when you’re going to meet somebody you’ll “click” with and gain a friend, a mentor, a writing buddy, or whatever.

Sean asked whether it’s worth going to a conference if you’re not yet writing at a good enough level. This is a good question, and deserves a sane and balanced answer from a sane and balanced person. When I find someone like that, I’ll see if they can give an answer. In the meantime, here’s mine:

There are several good reasons to go to a writing conference:

1. To learn more about the publishing industry
2. To learn more about the craft of writing
3. To meet other writers and make friends to help you along the journey
4. To get your work critiqued by an industry professional (editor, agent, or writer, but writers are often the best for this because they will critique your work, rather than just tell you whether it’s of interest to them as a business opportunity)
5. To see editors and agents and learn that they are just regular people whom you can approach
6. To begin building relationships with editors and agents
7. To make appointments with agents who might be willing to represent you
8. To make appointments with editors who might be interested in buying your work

For novice writers, #1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 are the most appropriate sorts of goals. For intermediate writers, #1 through 6 are quite appropriate. For advanced writers with a book that is ready to sell, #1 through 8 are all appropriate.

The problem comes when you try to jump the gun and go straight to #8 as a novice. This doesn’t work, any more than jumping straight to calculus as a high-school freshman. If you’re a freshman, work on algebra or geometry first, then move up to trignometry, then go to calculus. It’ll be a smooth and easy journey (if you have the talent for math) and the only disadvantage is that it takes a few years. But if you try to go straight to calculus, then it’ll take forever.

I actually began going to small conferences in 1989, 7 years before my first adventure to Mount Hermon. So I spent about 7 years going to a small regional conference in San Diego, which was a fine conference and radically moved me along the path toward success. But after a few years of that, I needed to move up to a bigger conference with more editors and agents. I never abandoned the San Diego conference, which was an excellent regional one-day conference which was inexpensive and always was well-run. I kept going to it along with the Mount Hermon conference.

But the fact is that a large conference is really necessary when you get to the stage where you’re ready to sell a book. Selling is a numbers game. The odds of selling to any given editor is small. You improve your odds by talking to more editors. You get those at a large conference. At a small conference, you often get excellent instruction in a nice and intimate setting and you get a great chance to build friendships.

So there is no one best strategy to choosing a conference that works for every writer. Many writers prefer to get their feet wet first at a small regional conference and then move up to a larger conference. Others jump right into a huge conference. A lot depends on your goals and expectations going into the conference, and on how well you know your own level as a writer.

This reminds me, I highly recommend Meredith Efken’s e-book on writing conferences, the Writer’s Conference Survival Guide, which is conveniently available here on my web site at an outrageously low cost. Meredith is my own freelance editor (she’s worked on all my books since RETRIBUTION) and is currently on the home stretch of writing the first draft of her own novel #4.

One last thing, Mary DeMuth posted a comment yesterday with a link to a YouTube video she made on “23 Reasons You Should Go To Mount Hermon.” It’s pretty good, and while I have never taken time from the conference to go to the beach or go swimming, the other 21 reasons are all part of my experience. (And I have been to the beach near Mount Hermon many times, because my high school was right on the beach of the Monterey Bay.)