For Thursday, April 1, 1999 Drummer Column, Gibbs, 735 words

Writers on the storm

I went to a writers' conference last weekend, in Fresno, at the Piccadilly Inn. It was an odd, eccentric gathering of folks. I couldn't say they were all of a kind, for that would be stereotyping. They were all of three kinds.

There were those who couldn't write well, but felt the calling, and spent their lives attending workshops hoping that somewhere somehow someone would say something or reveal a technique that would ignite their latent genius and inspire them to go home and write a bestseller. They walked amongst us and each of us was sure it was the other guy.

There were those who could write well, but didn't know how to market their ideas and were hoping to discover the methods and etiquette necessary to stand out amidst a sea of poorly written submissions that flood editors' desks daily. They walked amongst us and each of us hoped it was us. These were the people who wanted to stand on table tops during a general session and yell out, "If all you misguided people who can't write would please stop mailing your manuscripts in so that people like us could get an editor's attention once in a while and maybe get published, I'd appreciate it."

There were those who made their living by running and/or lecturing at workshops for hordes of curious, convivial, frustrated, desperate, ego-starved, idiot savant writers.

O.K. I only half mean all of that. It's also half mean to say it. The conference brought together talented, successful people with inspiring ideas and invigorating enthusiasm. In fact, if any of them ever happened to read this column, I'm sure I would receive a covey, perhaps even a bevy, of helpful emails telling me that so far three of my first five paragraphs have opened with passive-voice sentences.

WIN-WIN, the organization that ran the conference, is non-profit and designed to draw writers, agents, and publishers together into the same hotel. They did a good job of that. They were fortunate to find a pride of published authors to staff the workshops. Many of them had written books on How to Get Published.

I attended the conference with my buddy and fellow teacher, Phil Greene. We were on a mission. Phil likes to write novels. He's on his second one, and trying to get his first one published. We networked. Actually, he networked and I goofed around, attending workshops that suited my fancy.

Eva Shaw, Ph. D. taught my favorite class, "Ten Ways to Sell Magazine Articles." Eva has published over 1,000 articles. We picked a topic at random: potatoes. Eva brainstormed ten potato articles in two minutes. Her wisest words were these: "Don't look at the articles in a magazine to inspire you on what to write, look at the advertisements. If a shoe company spends $100 grand on a full page ad, you can bet the ad agency has done its research -- people who care about their feet read this magazine. Consider articles on foot massage, foot soaks, nail care."

My other favorite class was on Internet publishing taught by Marilyn, a sweet, old lady who started out by saying, "I don't know how the darn thing works, but it sure is magic." She also said, "Whenever I send an email attachment, I call ahead to see if it made it." Marilyn said she has trouble getting published because her stories are just too weird. One of her genres is Christian horror. You can read about her stories at fictionforyou.com. Phil's novel, Deadly Delay, can be found complete at home.earthlink.net/~unclephil/

We met a fellow Benician at the Piccadilly, Lisa Markman, a technical writer. The three of us talked for an hour before ever mentioning our home towns. Of course, we jumped and laughed and shook our heads at the coincidence.

Saturday night, Lisa, Phil and I met the most entertaining couple of all, August Martin and his wife without a name tag. They were old farmers from Farmington. August, a big, gentle man with thick hands and a friendly slowness, had written a book about a president who didn't know how to make love; he had never been with a woman. Ironically, August wrote it years ago, before Bill and Monica. He hoped now he could find a market for it. Before we parted, he read us a poem dedicated to his wife, his voice deep as a well.