LTU&E

Just spent the last couple days at BYU's Life the Universe and Everything fantasy/sci-fi symposium. Absolutely outstanding. While there were a lot of people there, the authors presenting did a great job of making themselves available to sign books, answer questions, give advice and just plain mingle.

It was really fun coming back to BYU. I haven't been here since I graduated in 2002. It was really neat walking the campus again, going through the bookstore, and generally just reminiscing about the time I spent here working on my English degree 8-10 years ago.

Brandon Sanderson was the guest of honor and was accompanied by many other great authors. He gave several readings, took pictures with fans and just made everyone feel welcome to be around him. My hat is off to him for his humility and willingness to take time from his extremely busy schedule to visit with everyone.

I got some great tips at the conference. I cannot wait to get back home and get back to work. On my 6 hour drive down here, I spent several hours listening to Sanderson's podcasts called Writing Excuses in which he discusses writing issues with two friends and fellow authors, Dan Wells and Howard Taylor. I'm not sure what it was, but something about listening to them while I drove as well as the anticipation for the conference and meeting them kicked the idea factory into overdrive. I have a notebook in my truck at all times for emergencies, and I pulled it out and wrote pages and pages of ideas as I drove.

Now, I know what you're thinking: not safe. But, I just had the notepad on the large armrest in the center of the front bench and wrote hugely and sloppily as I drove, never taking my eyes off the road. Because I couldn't look at what I was doing, I only got several lines of chicken scratch per page, but I got some good ideas nonetheless. I was afraid of losing any.

One of the things that Brandon Sanderson mentioned is that he doesn't always write his ideas down from day one which is something I have been trying to do so that I won't forget them. The reasoning behind his statement is that sometimes he likes to let them percolate in his head for a few days. If he forgets it, it wasn't that great of an idea to begin with. However, if it sticks around for a few days, it likely begins meshing with other thoughts and turns into an even greater idea. Sort of his process of elimination. He, as well as all the other authors there, talked about the fact that ideas are the easy part. They have so many they'll never be able to use them all. Something, they assured us, comes naturally once you really begin pouring your heart into writing and getting lots of words under your belt. They claim every writer has a million practice words they have to get through before the stuff starts getting really good. If that's the case, I've got a while to go.

Until next time...