An Upcoming Signing Event and a bit of Gratitude

The book that started it all, in Orana, anyway...

Once again, I will be at the Carolina Renaissance Festival for Time Traveler's Weekend, hanging out with a bunch of fellow SciFi/Fantasy authors to sell signed copies of our books. You may remember that in 2019 I was there for the first time, selling a book that I'd started during the 2010 Nanowrimo. It came into the world as a ginormous 350K manuscript called - because I'm clever like that - Superginormous_Manuscript.doc. Yeah. That became the Nature Walker Trilogy, then the Orana Chronicles which has just seen the launch of the 8th book set in the universe of Orana, The Temple.

But this post isn't about that. Not really. 

This is about working for so long at CRF and seeing the authors set up on that weekend and wishing I could be one of them. This is about finally sending the email and seeing my name listed on the CRF website as one of the authors. This is about remembering how scared I was that first weekend, and how others around me had to basically pull information from me about my books.

I'm not going to lie and say that it has gotten any easier - if anything with so many titles it has gotten worse. But here's where the gratitude comes in.

I'm not really a part of any writing groups, not formal ones. I belong to two writing/author groups on social media and I am a proud member of the Broadleaf Writers Association in Georgia...but only because I attend their annual writer's conference and want to support what they do. So that first weekend at CRF I didn't know how to be an author. I'd sold books before, but they were never mine. I think I came back home after the weekend with almost as many copies as I'd taken with me.

But that's not the point. I am more grateful than I can ever express to the authors that were there that first weekend for treating me like I belonged there. I listened to them talk to people that came up to look at their books. I practiced saying what they said and working on my elevator pitches for the two titles I had with me. I have used Tell me what you like to read? and What kind of books are you reading right now? at all of my signing events since then, and it gives me a not-so-scary way to start a conversation.

When I returned in 2021 (2020 was cancelled because the faire didn't happen) I thought I was ready, but I still listened and still learned. And now, in 2022, I'm ready to spend a weekend up there hanging out with people who get the writer side of me. People who live in fantasy worlds and have characters on their mind day in and out. And I'm going into this on my own, without a Sherpa or a sidekick, and I'm gong to keep listening and keep learning.

Come see us, won't you? We will be there cannon to cannon this Saturday and Sunday. Tickets for the faire are advance purchase now and there are only a limited number. 

I'd love to see you at my table and have you tell me what you like to read. 📚