I is for ... Interesting People

I had an idea all lined up for I-themed post for A to Z, but I got Writer's Regret before ever actually writing it and I decided to talk about something else instead! Luckily, I was inspired to do so by a workshop I attended tonight.

My little rural county is full of writers. Monday nights, my local library has been hosting writing workshops with different published writers from the area, which they also did last year. I went to all of them last year, but the first few this year were repeats of the year before, so I'm only attending the last two.

Kay Stockham

Tonight, Kay Stockham and Serena Miller teamed up to presenting. Kay writes small town series for Superromance, and Serena writes inspirational romance, both historical and Amish suspense.

Kay spoke about writing in series, Scrivner(ProTip: she's a huge fan), RWA membership advantages, and answered some questions about submissions(Sekrits about unagented subs to publishers--shhh).

Serena Miller

Serena spoke about her methods for historical research, differences between the language in old books versus modern historicals, the value of interviews in research(ProTip: She went to make friends with Amish folks in order to get setting and culture right for her Amish stories), importance of writing conferences, tips about pitching to editors and agents.

I've read some of Kay's books(if you want to read emotional punch, Kay's a master), but was unfamiliar with Serena's(I don't tend to read Inspirational) before tonight. Now I've written her name into my TBR list... something about Amish and suspense... I kind of have to check that out.

And since I've gone entirely off the rails with my theme for this post, I am closing with something ridiculous so it's not a total wash:

“I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells. Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living. It's a way of looking at life through the wrong end of a telescope. Which is what I do, And that enables you to laugh at life's realities.”
Dr. Seuss