Rebecca and I were guests of honor at two conventions in the past three weeks, SheVaCon in Roanoke, VA, and MidSouthCon in Memphis, TN.

We had never been to Roanoke, and as we flew into the valley with the beautiful and snow-covered Blue Ridge Mountains, I was immediately impressed, made me thinking about hiking some sections of the Appalachian Trail.

We traveled with our assistant Diane, all our suitcases loaded with books; Diane would help us watch the table in the dealer’s room when we were on panels.  We met a lot of fans at our table, and we also gave writers’ workshops on Things I Wish a Pro Had Told Me When I Was Starting out as well as How to Increase Your Writing Productivity, and we also gave an hour of Q&A, during which the Tyrannus Garrison of the 501st marched in wearing full stormtrooper regalia and presented each of us with plaques and inducted us as honorary members of the Garrison.  Our fellow guest of honor was Peter Mayhew (the actor who played Chewbacca), and we all had a delicious dinner at a local steakhouse with the Mandalorian Mercs, then the following night we had dinner with some friends from the dealer’s room and other convention committees.  SheVaCon was a very enjoyable convention, slanted heavily toward Star Wars.

Last weekend we were in Memphis for MidSouthCon with fellow guests of honor Gail Simone (comics writer of Wonder Woman and many others), artist Billy Tackett, editor Lou Anders (Pyr), Toastmistress Lee Martindale, and special guest writer Sherrilyn Kenyon.  This time we shared a table with CS Brown (our guitarist on the first Terra Incognita CD) in the dealer’s room.  We again gave our panel on Things I Wish A Pro Had Told Me, a panel on worldbuilding, one on writing in an established universe, and Rebecca gave a panel on Young Adult fiction.  The Memphis Fan Force also had a brief ceremony to induct us into their group, with many photos.  We were kept busy, nonstop, so we had no time to do any sightseeing around the Memphis area, but we did have some great Memphis barbecue food at the Dead Dog Party (where a local homebrewer fan had brought in some samples of his brew).

I highly recommend both cons, great staff, efficiently run, good programming tracks, and a fun group of fans.  Thanks for inviting us.  Next weekend is our Superstars Writing Seminar, and in April we’ll be going to Buffalo, NY for Eeriecon.  In the meantime, I need to finish the last main edit of HELLHOLE and complete the draft of THE KEY TO CREATION.