RWA Conference Report 2008 - San Francisco brought to you by Shirley Hailstock

Last year, former RWA president and multi-published author , (Harlequin, Silhouette and Kimani among her publishers) Shirley Hailstock was kind enough to let me post her report on the RWA. I'm delighted to have her informative and entertaining take on the conference for this year as well. Thank you, Shirley!

The Twenty-Eighth Annual Romance Writers of America Conference (RWA) was held in the city by the bay, San Francisco, CA., July 30 - August 2, 2008. We all know that the economy affects businesses and writing is a business. The 2,059 members attending the annual conference expected to hear the doom and gloom stories of how bad the industry was doing. Surprisingly the atmosphere was calm and upbeat. Here are my comments regarding this year’s event:

The conference planners always try to add a little spice to the proceedings, doing things differently and keeping the plan from being predictable. They began even before we got to the conference by eliminating the huge book of handouts. The handouts were on the website and could be printed before you arrived. Also, everyone received a CD with the handouts on it. While there was a little discussion on this before we began arriving, I heard only a few comments about it after we arrived.

The conference kicked off with a motivational speaker, Theresa Behenna. Her high-energy presentation combined music and discussion on how to reinvent yourself. She played the piano and sang. Of course we all got to join in on I Left My Heart in San Francisco and a special song written specifically for RWA. Her presentation worked for me. First, I love to sing and once she finished, I felt like rushing back to write. And this was only the beginning.

Last year I said I thought the PAN (Published Authors Network) workshops were the best ever. And they were. Of course, this year they were the best ever. Kudos to the planners. Like the general conference opening session, PAN also began with an inspirational speaker, Gail Blanke. A former vice president at Avon Products, Inc., she is the founder and president of Lifedesigns, a company that empowers men and women to live exceptional lives. The full schedule of workshops must have answered a lot of needs since most were packed with attendees. I attended the two African American panels, one with booksellers and one with editors.

The editors panel (Glenda Howard-Kimani (Harlequin); Hilary Sares-Kensington; Monique Patterson-St. Martin’s Press; and Esi Sogah-Avon) said the African American book were thriving. Even with the dip in the economy and the enormity of gas prices, they did not see a slowdown.

Glenda Howard mentioned that 2008 marked the 15th anniversary of the Arabesque Line, which produces four books a month, and was the first African American line of romances. (Sorry guys no cake to celebrate the benchmark.) Arabesque is a line of single title romances. They are 75,000-80,000 words. Kimani Romances at 55,000 words is doing well. Kimani can include family melodramas and the level of sensuality is dictated by the book. Glenda also mentioned Kimani After Dark, a release of dark, provocative, sexy books. Rochelle Alers’ After Hours was cited as an example.

Hilary Sares was standing in for Kensington’s Dafina editors Selena James and Rikia Clark. Dafina is looking for books with imaginative hooks, drama girls, brothers, etc. Hilary said both Indian and Chinese stories are being well received in the marketplace. (Another diversity door opened, yeah!) Kensington is also branching into children’s book with the Marimba imprint.

Monique Patterson of St. Martin’s Press likes mythology and folklore. She’s looking for something that is not on her list. She likes series or connected books, romantic suspense, comedy, military romances with alpha men, and tear jerkers. St. Martin’s publishes 3-4 romances a month, yet they have no set amount. They do multiple book contracts since they work with authors, not books. They want to grow their talent.

Esi Sogah, assistant editor at Avon Books, works on women’s fiction and erotica. She’s looking for romantic suspense, romance novels, and military romances. Avon is doing them in trade size.

The booksellers (Sue Grimshaw—Borders standing in for Ernesto Martinez, the multicultural buyer for the Borders Group; Margaret Terwey—fiction buyer from Books-a-Million; and Shannon Aviles-multicultural, marketing and publcity specialist) stated some of the same things as the editors panel. There was a discussion regarding bookstores separating the African American books, regardless of type, into an African American fiction section. Margaret said when they did this sales in that section increased 47%, however, she could not distinguish between romances and other types of books.

Margaret Terwey said that Books-a-Million is expanding their number of stores. She listed the states where new stores are opening. Some of them are filtering into the north, although the majority are still in the South. When asked about sending author promotions to the stores, Margaret said authors should send their information to her and she could distribute it to the stores. Overly sexy/suggestive covers don't work for her stores. She doesn't mind receiving ARC's (Advanced Reading Copies), however.

Sue Grimshaw outlined a program called Lift Every Voice which highlights the contributions made by African American in the literary arts. Additionally, she said shelf-talkers (the small card-stock labels on the ends of the bookshelves directly below the book being showcased), increase sales by 15-20%. She gave us a sample of one for Virginia Kantra’s new book. I passed it along to Virginia who didn’t know they had done it. She nearly cried when she saw it.

Sue also had written comments from Ernesto who could not be at the conference. Questions were submitted prior to the conference. Unfortunately, we ran out of time before she read all the answers. Our moderator, Tracy Monahan, solved the problem by taking the answer sheets and e-mailing them to the attendees after the conference.

Levy’s representative was not at RWA due to a family emergency, but the African American bus tour they did last year was repeated again this year. I believe it was in August. The authors on the bus signed books at Wal-Marts in the Mid-West. (Levy and Anderson News distribute to Wal-Mart).

Like last year, all of the buyers said historicals were making a comeback. This was a message that resonated throughout the conference this year as did the fact that paranormals are still strong and publishers want more of them.

Enough of the market news. There was a full schedule of other workshops going on. Here’s some I observed: I didn’t attend the Chat With Linda Howard, but the people coming out of it were in high spirits. Many said the RWA Board member was down to earth and a hoot. From reading her wonderful books, we all knew that.

PAN also presented a workshop on A Day in the Life of a Sales Rep. I attended this with great anticipation. I even sat on the front row, making it hard to leave when you get bored. I work with sales people in my other identity, and the discussion centered around a 3-million book shipment that was about to drop for a young adult title. He gave very little information about romance.

I missed the Harlequin Spotlight so I went to the forum. A visual presentation was given by several of the company’s executives. Dianne Moggy has been promoted, (yeah Dianne!). She showed us some of the efforts taking place in France and England. The Sales guy had a short compilation of publicity stills that Harlequin has received in light of the sixtieth anniversary of Silhouette. Next year a specially developed logo will appear on all Silhouette books denoting the sixtieth milestone. (I bet you there’ll be a cake for that, maybe even sixty cakes.)

I can’t leave a discussion on Harlequin without mentioning the party. It was at the Four Seasons, a beautiful hotel within walking distance of the conference activities. The music was loud and awesome with the D.J. intuitively knowing what would bring the crowd to the floor and himself getting into the act. To say a good time was had by all would be an understatement. Some of the members I talked to after the party, couldn’t remember what time they finally fell into bed. Remember what happens in San Fran stays in San Fran. And I’m not talking.

Friday night is usually so packed with things to do that you have to miss something. I guess the publishers heard this and many of them scheduled events of Thursday. Guess what? Thursday was a packed day and night. Victoria Alexander was the keynote speaker at Thursday’s luncheon. When you read peoples books, you think you know a little about them. But who knew she could double for a standup comic? She kept the audience laughing during her humorous address about the travails of her career. I suppose the word for this conference was inspiring. Victoria Alexander’s speech was both inspiring and hilarious as she dropped bits of wisdom on life and writing. While she kept us laughing, she also told some home-truths about why we write and whom we write for. The fact that our stories take people away for a few hours to a private happy place where real life is held back keeps us going to the computer day after day. We work with fictitious people whom we talk to and who talk to us, sometimes even argue with us. Only our writer friends understand this, people we can call at any time who will talk us down or pump us up when we receive rejections or some other not-to-good-news about our publisher or agent. Yet writing is the best job, telling stories that inspire people makes all the trouble worth it.

Not to be outdone, the Awards Luncheon speaker was Connie Brockway, delivering an incredibly moving and inspirational speech that spoke of the real deal in publishing. Taking a slice from Christopher Volger’s The Writer’s Journey , Connie gave it her own unique twist, outlining the travels of the super-heroine’s journey. In whatever stage of writing the audience was, Connie reminded us that not only are our characters on the road, but we as authors are on our own personal journey. And the possibilities of where this could lead are endless.

The parties. I can’t call them the Friday night parties anymore, since many events span other days and times. They were again upbeat and a great place to meet and talk to old and new friends. Because it was California, there were many more Australians and New Zealanders in attendance. These were the people I kept running into. G’day mate as they say in the U.S. produced commercials. Not sure if anyone in Australia ever says this.

PASIC (Published Authors Special Interest Chapter) had a gathering in the Rotunda of Neiman Marcus. After we figured out how to get to the Rotunda after dark and the store was closed, the space was fantastic. The Rotunda overlooked the lobby of the store from several floors up. If you have vertigo or are afraid of heights, stay away from the balustrade. The conversations were lively and of course centered around books and publishing.

Saturday night, major awards night, was the highlight of the conference. RITA winner Suzanne Brockmann acted as the Mistress of Ceremonies. The opening film clips had Suzanne touring San Francisco. Her expressions said it all, laughter, frustration, tiredness, extreme joy at all there was to see and do and how you could do it.

The Golden Heart (highest award for an unpublished romance) and theRITA (highest award for a published romance) program was its normal high-caliber affair. I sat with former RWA President Harold Lowry (aka Leigh Greenwood), as we watched the excited finalist become winners in their categories. A list of all the winners is on the RWA website. Congratulations to all the nominees and winners. The ceremony was followed by enough chocolate desserts to overload our endorphins to the power of ten. But do you think that stopped us from eating them? Duh!

Finally the week was over, and we had to look toward returning to the real world and the saga of airport travel. I ran into another former RWA Board member and president of Belle Books, Deborah Dixon as I jockeyed for a place to check my book-laden luggage. (Yep, I packed my books and the airline didn’t blink an eye.) New Jersey Chapter president, Caridad Scordato (Caridad Pineiro) joined us. We spent pre-flight time looking at some of the books covers Belle Books is planning for upcoming releases. They were beautiful.

So with all this going on, and I’ve only brushed the surface of possibilities, did I see any of San Francisco while I was there? Only the part between the airport and hotel. I left the hotel to go to events that were in connection with the conference and they were all within walking distance. I’ve been to the city by the bay before. I toured Alcatraz, Fisherman’s Wharf and have seen the same tourist statues and clock towers that are shown in all the movies set there. The one thing I missed was going to a party on Knob Hill. I had a conflict with a meeting I couldn’t miss, so I’ll have to meet the rich and famous another time.

I’m back home now and waiting for the next RWA conference. Washington, DC will be the locale in 2009. I’m looking forward to this one. No air travel. I can drive to the nation’s capital and I’m familiar enough with the city to avoid being a tourist. (I used to live in D.C.) In the meantime I’m back to writing and writing and writing.... Until next time, keep reading.

Shirley Hailstock

Look for Shirley's September title, Last Night's Kiss. Her next Harlequin will be out April, 2009--look for Nine Months With Thomas. Then in June, 2009, look for The Right Wedding Gown from Kimani.

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