I'm over at BTS eMag Blog talking about inspiration and where to find it. Especially the most common place for me, submission calls.

For those of you who have read about my inspirations know how much love/hate a submission call. They always call to me, even when I'm in the middle of something else. My brain also loves to make the connections and come up with the story with barely enough time to write it before the call (maybe I subconciously love working under a strick deadline).

Stop on by the blog to find out what works were inspired by a submission call, and how this inspiration has pushed me tell bigger stories then I ever intended.

http://btsemag.com/inspiration-by-willa-edwards/

I'm over at my friend Tina Donahue's blog talking about the trouble my characters cause, and particularly what they do that I have no interest in.

If you get a chance, please stop by. There's also a chance to win a prize, your choice from my back list, if you leave a comment. Hope to see you there.

http://www.tinadonahue.com/contest-and-guest-blog-with-willa-edwards-3/

This past weekend I attended Siren’s first conference in Dallas, TX. As some of you may know I’ve been having some craziness in my working life, and debated for some time whether I should go to this event, if I could afford it, or if I should save the money for the future when I might be unemployed. After having attended, I am so grateful I choose to go.

Starting on Friday with an awesome writers event that could have continued for hours past closing time, we learned about what’s hot in the genre and what’s not, how to market and promote your writing, and we got to pick the
brains of the top bestselling authors with Siren for how they got where they
are. David and Diana, the publishers, discussed the future of Siren-Bookstrand, and I have to say, I’m thrilled to see the expansions they plan to make. Siren will most definitely be keeping up with the times, and quite possibly surpassing them.

But the most exciting part of the conference was getting to meet so many authors that I have conversed with online or emailed with, and to finally put faces to names. One of the most exciting for me was meeting Berengaria Brown, who was the author that encourage me to submit to Siren, which I couldn’t be happier about. I also met Tymber Dalton, Sophie Oaks, and Dixie Lynn Dwyer, who was my table mate at the book signing and just awesome to talk to about her experience.  The funniest part of all, turns out
Dixie and I live about an hour away from each other. Who knew I’d fly all the way to Dallas to find a neighbor. I also got to meet a ton of great readers, including attending a reader’s panel where they got to tell us why they wanted.

Over all it was an awesome event, and really revitalized my energy and passion for writing. Writing can be such a solitary activity, on the rare occasions when we actually get to meet and talk it’s truly a blessing. It was fantastic to be in a room filled with others that I could talk to about my craft and have understand me, not just understand the terminology (when we say mfmm we all know what we’re talking about, but I did wonder on a few occasions what the hotel staff thought of us) but also about the issues of trying to fit writing into life, or how to deal with characters that just won’t
talk.

All and all I came back from the weekend inspired to do more. During our author session, Diana asked all the authors who wrote full time to raise their hands, and I was in awe of how many hands went up. Many of my siren sisters are living their dreams, to write full time, and I’m newly inspired to think one day that could be me.  I came home, arms full of swag, determined to put their words and advice into action, and I’ve already started to. Maybe sometime in the next few years, I can be one of those with my hand in the air saying, yes I live my dream, every day.

I want to say a big thank you to Diana and David, and all their staff for their work on this event. It was truly amazing.  Siren really is one of the best publishers out there, and I am so thankful to be a part of their team.

Next year San Antonio! I can't wait!