There were 3 keynote speakers at conference this year, Janet Evanovich, Linda Howard and Eloisa James.  All three ladies gave excellent speeches and I brought back 1 main piece of advice ( pearl of wisdom) from each of their talks.

Janet Evanovich:
Janet opened the conference with a  witty and inspirational Q & A session.  She spoke about her road to publication (it took her 10 years), the importance of writing daily (because being an author is a real job and must be treated as such), and how as an author, you are responsible for your career.

From Janet I got pearl of wisdom #1:  Never save anything.  She stressed the importance of not saving ideas for scenes, story lines, or dialogues for “the next book”, because frankly, they may never be a “next book”.

Linda Howard
Linda delivered a hilarious talk during the luncheon on Thursday.  She regaled us with “laugh out loud” stories ranging from how she ended up being the keynote speaker (she committed while still under the effects of local anesthesia-lol), to tales about her family.  From Linda came pearl of wisdom #2:  If she can write while being Keeper of the Nuts ( i.e. her family), then so can I.    Linda shared her stories to encourage us to not give up on our dreams and to persevere in the face of challenge, regardless of the number of distractions you may have going on.  And let me tell you, she had tons  to deal with- LOL.

Eloise James
Elosie spoke at the luncheon on Friday.  While she had her humorous moments, her talk was a bit more serious in nature.  She spoke of  how she got into writing Regency Romance with degrees from Harvard, Oxford, and Yale; and parents who are well know authors in their own right (Robert Bly–poet and National Book Award winner, and Carol Bly–and award winning author of short stories and essays).  She shared some touching anecdotes, one of which leads me to pearl of wisdom #3: Use all of your emotions, (fear, pain, humor, etc.), and pour them on the page.

Eloise shared with us that she had some complications while pregnant, and she feared she would miscarry.  So she took all of that fear and poured it on the page while she wrote scenes in which her heroine miscarried.  She was emotional spent afterwards, but she said the effort was well worth it as she was able to produce a very heart wrenching scene that conveyed the emotion she was going for.

Yes, each speaker made many salient points and dispense several pieces of sage advice; however, these 3 pearls were the most important points for me, and keep them with me in my writing going forth.