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Mondays Are Hell – The Demons I Met at the 2012 RT Book Lovers Convention

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Demons were everywhere at the 2012 RT Book Lover Convention, no really, the place was full of them, smoking, dripping hellfire, eating Chicago-deep dish, and at the bar, oh lord, at the bar, drinking cranberry juice before heading out onto the dance floor to wiggle it with LMFAO…

“I’m a demon and I know it!”

Here are just some of the demons and devils I met at RT.

 

Embrace the Blond

Of course, I have to start with the blonde demon that captured my heart, the blonde demon that is Elizabeth Cheryl.  Actually, she was a demon, but then a Wiccan priestess cast a spell and transformed her into an angel.  She’s my BFF at RT until the end of the world and beyond.  I heart her so much.

 

And then, this one time, at RT, I was in the big Saturday Book Fair, and demons were everywhere, but then Kathryn Falk walked in, the woman who started RT, and the demons took one look at her and fled because she is the personification of power, poise, grace and has been in the book business a long time.  And once you’ve wrestled with authors, reviewers, agents, editors, readers, and aspiring writers, well, demons are easy after all that.

Being a writer is sometimes like walking through hell.  Lucky I have friends.  Jeanne C. Stein and Jodi Thomas were at RT.  They help me with the demons.  And they’re bestselling authors.

Kendaaron. Oui.

Hey!  Is that Kendall Gray?  It is Kendall Gray!. SHE WRITES BOOKS ABOUT WHALES!  Whales, elementals, brave battles to save the world.  With her brassy humor and her hard-girl bravado, well, I thought she was possessed by a demon at first because her hair was green, and green-haired demons are common in Chicago.  But then, when she talked about her book, and how passionate she is about whales and life, well, I knew, she was another angel, and green-haired angels are common in my books.

 

We’re Kendaaron when we’re together.  Kind of a big deal.

Welcome!

Ciara Knight had a hard time with a demon for a minute, but then she pulled through.  Writers conferences are all about laughing, crying, and the bar, oh lord, the bar.

 

 

 

Lynn Rush, Kendall Grey, Jordan K. Rose, Cole Gibson

And Cole Gibson, who is awesome, also had a run-in with a demon, and it was hard, but this world can get hard, and  we’re just writers trying to make it through another day to string words together on a page.  Which Cole does so well.

And then Liz Pelletier, who is cool and calm, stared down a demon at the bar.  Liz is one of the co-founders of Entangled Press, and we chatted.  All the while, she stared down that demon until it slithered off.  She is a warrior.

Liz In The Middle

Mark Johnson, who has a CD out, and who was a cover model, well, we talked God, Jesus, demons and he bore witness to his beliefs and I haven’t heard a good testimony in awhile, and it felt good.  Like walking in a clean, spring rain, warm with summer.  I hope he reads my book.  I’d like to talk to that guy about it.

 Lori Witt.  Lori, Lori, Lori.  Lori doesn’t believe in demons.  She believes in working hard, writing books, and living in Omaha.  Believe me, it takes faith to live in Omaha.  We talked and she turned out to be incredibly quotable.  “I don’t like flesh people”.  Ha!  And, “Writers are expected to be rock stars, but they’re designed to be roadies.”  Except for me.  I am the rock star writer of the 21st century.  Hmm, the balding rock star writer of the 21st century.

Karina Cooper, well, she and I found a dirigible built for two, and we rocketed around the convention center, killing demons with ether pistols, and she drove and worked the gun, and I kept her and the furnace loaded, and we both killed tons of demons until we ran out of coal and crashed.  And when we walked from the wreckage, we pulled off our smoke-blackened goggles, sang heroic Abney Park songs until the hotel staff shushed us.  It was epic.  Epically steampunk!

And do you know who brought us tea after the crash and shushing?  Suzanne Lazear.  It was Earl Grey.  Hot.

You’d think my conversation with Lori Perkins, High Priestess of Ravenous Romance, would be fraught with demons.   Sexy demons who sparkle.  Nope.  Our conversation was spicy, but very real, and demons don’t like reality.  They prefer illusion and deception, and our conversation was anything but that.  She’s another warrior of the industry who understands a thing or two about life and love.

I got possessed by a demon.  I stole Hildie McQueen’s awesome green clickable sharpie.  I owe her one.  I am going to buy a box of them.  But keep the green one.  Because I got possessed by a demon.  Hildie had the brightest smile and best laugh at RT.

Hildie McQueen

Heather Savage, who is the editor-in-chief at Staccato Press, came up to me and told me she was a rogue demon hunter.  I asked her, “What’s a rogue demon?”  She slapped me.  Then returned to slaying demons.  Which is prolly a lot like editing.

Heather Savage and Two Rogue Demons

 

 

Jordan K. Rose

Jordan K. Rose tolerated my demoness, which I’m grateful for.  I needed kindness and Jordan was kind.

 

 

 

For the most part, it’s too cold in Canada for demons, but Joanne Brothwell proves that all Canadians have a little evil in them.  She fought to sign books, and she sold books, and she wooed everyone and she walked around RT red hot.  She has a nice smile as well, but if you look closely, you’ll see a little demon when she smiles.

Joanne, A Fairy Demon, A Blonde Demon

I talked with Kayla Perrin, Naomi James, and Mimi Tremont and we talked about how the demons of history can haunt us.  I had a lovely conversation with them all and I’m a better man for it.  If you haven’t gotten out of your zip code in a while, it’s time to go across town and shop at a different store for a change.  Demons look for people who hide in their homes.  Demons love the stagnant and close-minded.

Clay and Susan Griffith, who write steampunk vampire books, talked to me and encouraged me.  I needed it.  I go despairing sometimes.

For a long time, people thought women were demons.  I know, weird, huh?  They even burned some.  I talked with Delilah Marvelle and Maure Clairmont about the 19th century, sexual oppression, dark gothic romance, and lesbian prostitution in post-apocalyptic America.  We agreed.  People can get a little kooky about sex.

For a long time I thought all book bloggers were possessed by the Devil.  I mean, reviewing books and crucifying writers?  Sounds like demon work to me.  But talking with Jackie Morgan and Rayna Scherer, I realized book bloggers love books.  Simple as that.  Can’t be too evil if you love books.  I mean, you can, but it takes work.

Two Women.  Cropped.  I feel snark coming on.

Cecily White and I have a love/hate relationship.  I love her.  She hates me.  The demon who made me steal Hildie McQueen’s pen makes me tell that joke over and over and over at the conference.  Cecily just smiled, snarked it up, which made me love her even more.  Which made her hate me even more.  It’s a good setup.  I think I took a picture with her and Noelle Pierce, but I’m not 100% sure.

 

Jenna Barton sold a book at the conference.  Which proves that even though there were some demons at RT, there were also the angels of God blessing us all.  Especially erotica writers because God loves sex.  Why do you think He/She/It/They give it to us in the first place?

Jenna? Yes. Sold!

So yes, lots of demons, angels, drama, tears and laughter.  RT was the most satisfying writers conference I have ever been to as a published author and I will keep going back there until I die.  And then I want my ashes scattered there.  I know I missed a ton of people I talked to, and I feel bad for that, so if you feel slighted, next year in Kansas City, you get a free punch.

Thanks for the camaraderie, friendship, support, and love.  Hugs, cuddles, and kisses to you all.

Or was that too girly?  Okay, gotta butch it up.  Beer, football, and grunting to all, and to all a good night.

 

 

You Are Too Busy To Read This – The Case of the Postponed Interview

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Hello, all you happy people.  Normally, as many of you know, Thursdays I post interviews.  I had to miss this week because of a technological mix-up.  And real life got in the way.

However, I wanted to post because I have been thinking about how hard it is to juggle writing, marketing your writing, and real life.  I think those writers, like Poe Ballantine, who I adore and would love to interview, who live monkish lives, have it right.  You write, sleep, work a dull day job, and that’s all you do.  No family, no stressful job, few distractions.  Other than bills and food.  But most of the time, you are reading, writing, working, or sleeping.  Food and pooping fit in there somewhere.

And yet, other writers, with families, have made it work.  Stephen King.  He wrote in the laundry room of his trailer park at night.  While working crappy jobs and dealing with his family during the day.

It can be done.  But it is hard.  If you have a writer or artist in your family, be kind to them, because art is a burden –on the artists, on the artist’s family, on everyone.

And the art doesn’t care.  It is a needy child, and it needs to be created.  And it won’t let you sleep (I was up at 4 a.m. today) and it doesn’t care if you eat, or if you neglect your family, or if you are constipated.  The art needs to be created, and if you are blessed or damned, you will be the conduit for the art.

Sometimes, to your detriment.  But what is a broken body and a shattered soul compared the glory of immortality, and the joy of the moment, when the fire of life drips from your pen?

Ugh, let me sleep.  I’ll storm the castle later.

You Will Never Write Your Novel, Ever

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Recently, I spent a weekend at a writer’s retreat, and the whole thing is to go away and write. It’s like The Dick Van Dyke Show episode where Rob Petrie goes away to the cabin to write his book because he couldn’t focus at home. It’s a common writer’s idea. I won’t write today, because someday, I’ll have a ton of time to write and boy, won’t it be great. Like Harry Chapin Carpenter’s “Cat’s In The Cradle”, we’re gonna have a good time then.

The thing is, I don’t buy it. Writing is a daily habit because if you wait for the perfect time to write, it will never, ever come. There’s never going to be a good time.

A friend at work, whom I love to hate, and hate to love, gave us a book which has the secret to life. Seriously. It’s by Jeff Olson, and it’s called The Slight Edge. The idea of the book is simple, people are successful by the little choices they make, every day, just itty, bitty little choices that by themselves don’t mean much, but over time, add up and make all the difference in the world. Writing is like that. If you wrote 43 minutes a day, which is the length of a Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode, you would have a novel faster than if you waited for eight hour chunks. Because how often do you have eight hour chunks? If you have my life, you never have them. You long for them. You hunt for them. They are an endangered animal, elusive, yet beautiful. Come here, little eight hours, come to Daddy.

So I’m enjoying the writers retreat because I’m using it to sneak in projects I won’t have time to tackle once I return to normal life. So in the end, maybe that’s the best way to use the time I got, sneak in the impossible books I’ll never have the time to write.

And Rob Petrie never did write his novel. He got distracted. It’s not about the time you don’t have, it’s about using the time you do have, and realizing how lucky you are in this moment and being grateful.

And that pistachio episode of The Dick Van Dyke Show always unnerved me. Pistachios, everywhere, weird.