Carousing with the Cats

Melbourne may have been freezing with lashing rain and polar blasts, but it was warm and fabulous at the 2019 RWA conference this past weekend. I had such a brilliant time catching up with the LoveCats family who all flew into Melbourne from across the country.

Highlights included:

Clare, Jennifer and Amy

• Watching the stunning and statuesque Annie West sweep into the Gala dinner in the most beautiful green dress
• Hearing about Michelle Douglas’s amazing trip to New York for the RWA America conference and her being a finalist in the US Rita Awards (the highest award for distinction in romance fiction) for her book The Million Pound Marriage Deal
• Learning more about Clare Connelly incredible ongoing success and knowing it is happening to such a beautiful person
• Laughing at Shannon Curtis’s wit. She kept me laughing all weekend. Hilarious doesn’t come close to how funny this woman is
• Listening to Rachel Bailey’s awesome ideas for making future conferences more fabulous and watching with awe as she works behind the RWA scenes to get things done
• And there were so many more...

Amy Andrew's keynote speech

The weekend’s shining star was Amy Andrews. We leapt to our feet for a standing ovation when Amy became a RWA Life Member for her incredible contribution to organisation. Such a deserved honour as Amy has worked so hard for RWA including being President (twice wasn’t it, Amy?).  But, it also recognised Amy for all the incredible gifts of kindness she shows people such as mentoring aspiring writers, helping authors network and generally being an amazing, inspiring person.

Amy received not one, but two standing ovations. Her keynote speech has us falling off our chairs laughing then quickly scrambling back up to scribble down all her words of wisdom. It was the amazing Amy Andrews (along with a few other Cats!) who gave me the confidence to take writing seriously and go for it.

I’m now flying back to work (aarrrhhh) truly inspired but also sad we won’t be doing that again for another year.  Something to look forward to.

How about you? What did you get up to over the weekend?

Count Down to Conference

By the time you see this post I’ll be in New York! That’s right, with the Romance Writers of America conference happening next week my husband and I decided to squeeze in a little sight-seeing.

This will be my second trip to New York but my first time attending the conference.

What am I most excited for?

The Harlequin Black and White Ball

This is a special event for all the Harlequin authors and it’s going to be held at the Waldorf Astoria!!! I love old school glamour, so this is right up my street. The idea of black and white events always appealed (Derby Day, anyone?) and of course I had to by a new dress. You know, it’s for work…right?

The “Readers for Life” Literacy Signing

This will be my first time signing books at an event! Seems like all those years practising my signature on my school books is about to pay off. The great thing about this event is that it’s raising money for three different literacy-based charities, so it

Exciting events mean a new dress!

’s for a good cause.

Meeting up with all my writer friends

When all the people you chat to day in and day out on Facebook are scattered across the globe, any event that brings them together is a good thing! I’m excited to catch up with my fellow LoveCats who’re making the trek over as well as meeting a ton of people who I only know online. For me, writing is never a lonely task as there’s always an email or message from a friend to respond to, and plenty of people willing to lend an ear or offer a kind word when things get rough.

Meeting my editor and agent

These people play such an important role in an author’s career and it’s easy to go years without ever meeting them in person. I’m taking advantage of everyone being in New York for the conference to put a face to the name (or should that be a face to the email address?)

Learning and growing

Conference is a hugely busy time. But I’m promising myself to make it to a few workshops on the topics I’m most interested in. I’m also playing the role of moderator in one session, which will be fun as it’s been a while since I’ve had my public speaking hat on.

Have you ever been to conference for work? Was it a good experience? I’d love to hear any funny stories of things that happened while you were there :)

A New York State of Mind

It seems I have New York on my mind a lot lately. You see I'm tossing up whether or not to go to the Romance Writers of America's national conference in July which is in New York. I really, really, really want to go. But there are financial realities and its a looong way for a few days etc so I'm in two minds....

Of course it doesn't help that my work in progress (WIP) is set in New York. I honestly think this is the universe telling me that I must go to New York, don't you think? It's certainly making it very hard to ignore, anyway!

I've been to New York before in 2011 and I freaking loved it. I expected it to big and dirty and full of graffiti and people who wanted to kill/rob/rape me on every street corner (thank you  Dick Wolfe). But it was absolutely gorgeous! I never thought any city could replace London in my heart but I tell you what - New York came damn close!

Here's some pics -

Click on it to make it larger - you can just see Lady Liberty on the left!

We stayed in a hotel right on Times Square. Man that place buzzes!

I'm very excited about the NYC story I'm working on at the moment. For a start it's a continuity with Kelly Hunter, Heidi Rice and Lucy King. Fabulous writers and absolutely top women. Secondly its New freaking York (see above). Thirdly all the stories are based loosely (very) on fairy tales. It's more the Pogues kind of Fairy Tales of New York rather than Disney princess stuff but still....fairy tales!

The stories follow 4 friends from an upstate girls catholic school ten years after an incident that saw them expelled/suspened/broken up when they were 16. Friendships are rekindled, old hurts are healed and love is fought for and won. Mine is the 4th book. It's set in Brooklyn and is based on Cinderella with a working title of A Barron on Park Avenue.

Faith Sullivan is a good girl from irish catholic stock who's grown up in her family's Irish pub. Rafe Barron (yes, with 2 r's) is a "beer baron" from Australia. She has duties and responsibilities looking after her ailing father and her 4 brothers and the pub. She doesn't have time for hapily ever afters and the one. He needs her pub to launch his new beer into the US market. He doesn't believe in happily ever afters and the one.

Clearly, they're perfect for each other, right?  :-)

Here's my Pinterest page if you want to have a sticky beak at my inspirations for the book. And this is Heidi's. And this is Lucy's. We haven't managed to seduce Kelly to the dark side that is Pinterest yet but she's doing the Ugly Duckling and we all know Kel can write the hell out of anything.

So, you can see why I'm having a hard time trying to get New York off my mind, right?

Is there a place like that for you? One place (town, city, mountain, beach, whatever.... ) that you've been to that you loved so much you'd like to go back to again some day? Or is there a place that you do go back to time and time again precisely because you love it so much?

Books, Laughter and Learning

by Jennifer St George

The last two weeks have been huge for me.  I was part of the team (the Communication Manager) that put on the Byron Bay Writers Festival, 1-3 August. It was the most successful Festival in the event’s 18-year history.  Ticket sales were up 20% on last year as were sales from the onsite bookshop.  I’d spent the preceding six months talking to journalists from all forms of media about the event and the resulting coverage has been fantastic.

Jennifer St George and Amy Andrews signing books
at the Byron Bay Writes Festival

The Festival was also my first foray into being a Festival participant. Fellow LoveCat Amy Andrews and I featured on the panel, Be Still My Beating Heart: Writing Romance chaired by the hilarious Mandy Nolan. As we were scheduled at the same time as Jeanette Winterson OBE, I was worried about audience numbers, but by the end of the session our marquee was almost full. 

The panel was fantastic fun and we tackled a number of the myths about romance writing and generally had a fabulous time.

So I wrapped up that Festival and spent the next two days preparing for the Romance Writers of Australia conference, Romance Rocks being held in Sydney.  I ran two workshops with Sarah Wendell from Smart Bitches, Trashy Books and romantic suspense author, Helene Young; participated in a debate at the Literacy High Tea; was an interviewee on a panel about début authors and had fun with my fellow LoveCats in a session on writing category romance.

Michelle Douglas, Rachel Bailey, Jennifer
St George and Annie West at RWA
conference

The debate was brilliant. The topic was Alpha Heroes are Better than Beta Heroes.  I was on the affirmative team with Cherry Adair and Christina Brooke. The opposing team consisted of Amy Andrews, Sarah Wendell and Anne Gracie. Yes, quite formidable opponents.  Our team sang, knitted, role played and argued with passion.  But sadly, we lost. 

The Australian Romance Readers Association held an amazing book signing event. It was lovely to meet readers and sign a few books.

Amidst the mayhem of the leather and lace cocktail party, the Gala Dinner and catching up with friends, I attended lots of highly informative workshops and will focus on bringing those lessons learned to my current manuscript.

I arrived home last night inspired and invigorated and exhausted. It's such an incredible privilege to have been immersed in literature and books for the past two weeks. Books!  How could you live without them?

I’d love to hear about an event you’ve attended recently that inspired you. 

Jennifer St George's sexy stories feature courageous, career-minded heroines, strong heroes in glamorous international settings. The Billionaire’s Pursuit of Love is available now at Amazon, iTunes, Destiny Romance and Google.

Cats In The Wild: Huge Freo Booksigning!

In just under two weeks, five LoveCats will join lots of other romance authors at a giant booksigning in Fremantle, Western Australia.

The signing is being organised by ARRA, the Australian Romance Readers Association, and will be held in conjunction with the Romance Writers of Australia annual conference. 

If you're going, keep an eye out for the Cats:

• Amy Andrews 
• Annie West
• Jennifer St George
• Michelle Douglas
• Rachel Bailey

Do you live in WA, or are you attending the RWA conference? Why not come along? We can't wait to meet the readers who make it!

Along with the five Cats attending, there are some fabulous authors signing - 56 in total! Here's the full list:

Amy Andrews
Angela Verdenius
Anne Gracie
Anne Oliver
Annie West
Bronwyn Jameson
Bronwyn Parry
Carole Mortimer (UK)
Cathryn Hein
Christina Brooke
Denise Rossetti
Ebony McKenna
Eden Summers
Eleni Konstantine
Elisabeth Rose
Elise K Ackers
Emmie Dark
Fiona McArthur
Fiona Palmer
Helene Young
Isolde Martyn
Jackie Ashenden (NZ)
Jennifer Brassel
Jennifer Kloester
Jennifer Scoullar
Jennifer St George
Jenny Schwartz
Juanita Kees
Julia Quinn (US)
Kate Belle
Kathryn Ledson
Kaz Delaney
Kylie Griffin
Leah Ashton
Lisa Swallow
Loretta Hill
Maggie Gilbert
Maggie Nash
Maisey Yates (US)
Margareta Osborn
Megan Crane/Caitlin Crews (US)
Melanie Milburne
Michelle Diener
Michelle Douglas
Nicole Flockton (US)
Nikki Logan
Nina Bruhns (US)
Paula Roe
Rachael Johns
Rachel Bailey
Sandra Antonelli
Sarah Wendell (US)
SE Gilchrist
Shannon Curtis
Shona Husk
Susan Stephens (US)

So, will you be attending? Make sure you come and say hi to us! If not, have you been to an author book signing in the past? Which author would be at your dream book signing?