Thursday, October 9, 2008

ECWC Conference

I'm off to the Emerald City Writer's Conference in the morning. An entire weekend, devoted to writing! I get to stow my other hats in the closet and just be a writer. Wow!

This week, I've been working on my pitch for Err Apparent. Had I known the pitch would be so difficult to write, I'd have started a month ago! I think some writers find the pitch or query very easy to do, but for most of us, it's agony.

to be blunt, it's been a learning process for me. I've had to think about what is at the core of my story, and what makes my story unique. I'm a panster, not a plotter, so I don't have a detailed outline or long synopsis. I have...well, I have the story. What else do I need? LOL!

With the help of my WIP group (Writers in Progress), my one-sentence blurb has gone from "an urban romantic mystery about a woman who works at an art gallery who is framed for the murder of a wealthy gallery client" (blech) to "Framed as a murderer, gallery assistant Rebecca Allyn needs to redraw the lines between herself and her politician father, and paint the cop she dare not love out of the picture."

You see what I mean about the learning experience ;)


I'll try to post my two-minute elevator pitch, but I keep changing it - again, with the help of the WIPpettes.

Off to pack and tweak my pitch and then try to get some sleep. Conferences are so exciting! But I will miss my dear friends Madison Leigh and Viansa Blake. They were so much fun at the NECRWA conference.

2 comments:

Melanie R. Meadors said...

Just one thing--an elevator pitch is usually a couple lines long, one even. Two minutes is too long for an elevator ride, unless you hit the stop button and trap Donald Maass in there until he agrees to hear you ;). OR unless it is a VERY tall building. Seriously though, the one liner would be your elevator pitch. Two minutes would be just a variant of a regular pitch. Usually normal scheduled pitches at conferences are anywhere between 2-8 minutes. The elevator is something you can just spew off the top of your head very quickly at any available time.

CJ said...

Have a great time!

cjh