Hey, readers! Our 2019 con season is kicking off this weekend at FantaSci in Durham, NC!
Here’s a list of our panel appearances and fellow panelists:
COLLABORATING WITH AN AUTHOR
FRIDAY, March 22nd @ 3pm – Camellia
Writing by oneself is a journey, but collaborating with an author is a whole other kind of adventure! We’ll discuss the perks and challenges that come about when two heads come together (sometimes literally).
Panelists: Jacob & H.P. Holo, David Weber
SELF-PUBLISHING FOR SHY PEOPLE
FRIDAY, March 22nd @ 4pm – Camellia
For many aspiring authors, being an introvert is almost synonymous with being a writer…but unfortunately, that doesn’t sell books. We’ll discuss how to get the word out about your writing when all you want to do is hide behind your favorite notebook.
Panelists: H.P. Holo
CARE AND FEEDING OF AUTHORS
SATURDAY, March 23rd @ 11am – Camellia
The role that wives, significant others, family and friends have in caring for the writers that we love so that they can focus on creating the stories that we love.
Panelists: H.P. Holo and other author spouses
WRITING BY THE SEAT OF YOUR PANTS
SATURDAY, March 23rd @ 1pm – Rose
Pantsers unite! Some writers like to chart their story’s course and follow it to the letter. We are not those writers. We’ll discuss tips for writers who want to wander…without getting lost.
Panelists: H.P. Holo, Christopher Woods, Rob Howell, Terry Maggert, and Jason Graves
CHAOS OF CREATION: BALANCING WORLD BUILDING WITH STORY
SATURDAY, March 23rd @ 6pm – Rose
Sometimes you create a world so vast, you can’t possibly fit it all in a readable story. How, then, do you decide what to keep? We’ll discuss how to write a fascinating world while keeping readers engaged through plot and character.
Panelists: Jacob & H.P. Holo
JUMP, JIVE, and WRITE: A DISCUSSION OF MUSIC AS CREATIVE INSPIRATION
SUNDAY, March 24th @ 9am – Rose
The great philosopher, Plato, once said that “music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, and life to everything.” Come hear a panel of authors discuss their musical influences growing up, as well as the songs, artists, and themes that drive their writing today.
Panelists: Jacob & H.P. Holo, Jason Cordova, Jason Graves, and Ian Malone
CRAFTING TIME TRAVEL RULESETS
SUNDAY, March 24th @ 11am – Magnolia (Main Room)
Time travel writing is fraught with paradoxes and endless potential for plot holes. We’ll discuss how to design a time travel system that doesn’t break your universe.
Panelists: Jacob Holo and Steve White
Schedule is subject to change so, check out the website or Facebook page for the most up-to-date info.
See you this weekend! 😀
Honorverse
SphinxCon 2018 Con Update!
Last weekend we hopped over to Atlanta, GA for the inaugural SphinxCon, a con run by The Royal Manticoran Navy, the Official Honor Harrington Fan Association. Given that said universe was created by Jacob’s esteemed co-author, David Weber, it was a perfect whirlwind of a weekend to spread the word about their upcoming collaboration, The Gordian Protocol (*more on that in a month or so, which is when we’ll officially be able to spill the beans. SO MANY BEANS).
We approached SphinxCon differently from cons we’ve attended in the past. Previously, we were tiny indie minnows in a huge author pond, swimming through Dealer’s Rooms and Artist’s Alleys just to get the word out about our books. Now that we’re slightly less tiny minnows (albeit swimming beside a whale of the sci-fi world), we moved into panels – and in doing so, met a slew of awesome new fans and fellow authors.
Being that The Gordian Protocol is a time travel adventure, Jacob naturally moderated a panel on Crafting Time Travel Rulesets, along with fellow writer William Alan Webb.
https://www.instagram.com/p/Bpz3maMF8KI/
That conversation continued even outside the panel, though. The engineer and physics nerd in Jacob had a riotous time crafting the rules for the world of The Gordian Protocol, going as far as to create a mathematical formula to predict the likelihood of certain time travel-induced changes in the world. (There are spreadsheets. LOTS of spreadsheets.)
https://www.instagram.com/p/Bpr1HY6hQVD/
H.P. moderated several panels, too, including Self-Publishing for Shy People with Jonathan Brazee and Michael J. Allen and Writing by the Seat of Your Pants with both them and Christopher Woods. Jacob joined her for Chaos of Creation: Balancing World Building With Story and then Jonathan Brazee and David Weber, of course, joined us for Collaborating with an Author.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BpvCXyulY02/
Some of the wildest panels, though, were those where we joined crowds of other authors for round table discussions of such topics as World Building (about…world building) and Science Fiction vs. Fantasy: Why not both? (about combining science fiction and fantasy in a single world). It was crazy to be able to sit on panels with such names as Chris Kennedy, Mark Wandrey, and David Gerrold (WRITER OF “THE TROUBLE WITH TRIBBLES,” YOU GUYS), in addition to those we’d already joined.
Of course, we can’t go without mentioning The Care and Feeding of Authors, wherein author spouses (H.P. here) chatted about what it takes to keep an author sane and fed, but mostly drank INCREDIBLE margaritas.
https://www.instagram.com/p/Bpz2JGGlcvn/
The panels were fun, but perhaps the best part of the convention was actually getting to hang out with fans. That’s something that doesn’t necessarily happen at larger cons or in hurried Dealer’s Rooms, but small cons like these provide the perfect opportunity to just chill in a hallway and discuss books and cats and food with people who, previously, we’d only communicated with on our Facebook fan page, if at all!
Best of all, we’re now even more pumped to continue our current writing projects – The Wizard’s Circus for H.P. and the SEQUEL to The Gordian Protocol for Jacob – until we come up for air again at the next con! 😀