Scarlet Bloggs from GRW's Moonlight & Magnolias Conference

Hi, there pink fuzzy ladies and guests! Scarlet is coming to you from the Hilton Hotel in northeast Atlanta where Georgia Romance Writers Moonlight & Magnolias Conference is in full swing. What a blast it is, you should be here.

MM and Scarlet arrived about 8pm last night and immediately began to renew friendships with attendees of the conference. Sitting in the hotel lobby we were joined the fabulous Jennifer St. Giles.

Getting an early start this morning, we were up and at it by eight. The first session was a cold read panel with Raylene Gorlinski, Becca Stumpf, and Monique Patterson. Brave souls had emailed the first pages of their novels to the coordinator ahead of time and sat breathless while their work was read aloud, then given the treatment by these editors and agents. It was interesting to hear how far into the first page they would have read before making a decision to pass or to request more.

Next was the editor/agent panel which focused on what they were looking for and how they required submissions to be made. I’ll report more later on what they were looking for and where they thought the market is headed.

There was a pitch workshop to sharpen a writer's skills in putting their best effort forth for their editor or agent interviews. I skipped this session, but having participated in it in the past know how valuable it can be.

We had a working lunch, which was a great idea! There were two sessions and both were great.

After lunch came an intense workshop on archetypical character types as the basis for characters in our novels. This was another great workshop and I took a ton of notes, which I’ll try to add to the blog at a later date.

We wined and dined at the welcome reception tonight, shared great fellowship, renewed old friendships and made new ones. The food was good, the conversation was inspiring, and the total atmosphere has been great.

Tomorrow there will be more great workshops, editor/agent appointments, and more great networking opportunities. Will keep you posted on how it goes. Scarlet is working diligently to keep MM out of trouble!