Odd to think that this time last week I was in San Francisco ...  I’ve only been home four days, but already the RWA conference seems like forever ago.  The conference itself was something to have experienced, but I have to admit that Yosemite was the highlight of trip for me.  For the last few months I’ve been corresponding with Barbara Hannay  in Australia and Barbara McMahon in California as we tried to put together a workshop on writing for a global audience to present at the conference.  The plan was that we would all meet up and spend three days in Yosemite so that we could talk about it face to face at last, and I have to say that it worked brilliantly.  I know I would probably say this anyway, but both Barbaras really are lovely and so easy to get along with.  I felt better about the whole thing as soon as I met them.

With Barbara Hannay (left) and Barbara McMahon at Yosemite Falls

Yosemite is every bit as spectacular as it's cracked up to be.  The sheer scale and drama of landscape is awe-inspiring.  There were fires nearby which meant that the air wasn’t as clear as normal so my photos are a little hazy, but it was still amazing.  Much too big to capture on a camera, although I tried, of course.  I love huge, wild places like Yosemite and was really happy walking up through a forest of giant sequoias and climbing to the top of waterfall.  We were hoping to spend the evenings together working on the presentation, but there was no power in the park because of the fires, so we sat on the motel balcony in the candlelight, ate sandwiches and talked instead. 

We had a great time, but after two nights we were starting to fantasise about hot showers and hot food, and in the end we left Yosemite earlier than we’d originally planned.  We  found a motel in Sonora where we could finally switch on the laptop and read the notes we had made before we set out.  By that time we knew each other much better and we were able to make much more honest comments about the different sections we’d all done – ‘that doesn’t make sense’, ‘I think you could cut that bit’, and so on – which we might have been more hesitant about doing at first, so the lack of power had one positive effect even if it did mean we all suffered bad hair days. 

The workshop

I’ve never had a critique partner, and would rather stick pins in my eyes than let anyone read my books before my editor has given them the OK, so writing something with two others was a new experience for me.  It was really interesting to talk about writing romance with two people who know just as much (more, probably) about the process as I do and I found it very stimulating.  Often, comments one or other of the Barbaras would make me question exactly what it is that I do when I write.  I won’t readily forget the grilling they gave me about exactly where the emotion lies in Last-Minute Proposal! 

In the end, we rejigged almost everything, and changed my suggestions for group work completely.  This meant I had to rewrite my section on plotting from scratch but it worked much better for it.  The focus of the workshop was on structuring a story to give it the essential emotional drive to appeal to a global audience, so we talked about the importance of emotional tension (Barbara Hannay)  and how that was driven by character (Barbara McMahon) and plot (me).  We were all keen to get the audience to put what we’d been telling them into practice, so we gave them the opening lines of a story:

Max opened the door to his office and stopped.  And stared.
 ‘Tess, what the hell is a baby doing in here?’

Barbara McMahon on the bus

We asked them to spend a couple of minutes just writing what came into their heads about who Max and Tess were, where they were and what the baby was doing there.  Then we broke into groups, each with a Harlequin Romance author as facilitator.  In the event we had five groups of ten or so, but luckily we had Trish Wylie and Carol Grace to help us out.  Each group shared the ideas they had come up and then picked one to develop.  They had to come up with a scenario that would explain what might keep the hero and heroine together, and then decide on the emotional issues that would keep them apart.  We had 20 minutes to come up with an idea, which we then pitched to editor Lucy Gilmour, who gave each group brilliant editorial feedback, no easy task when she was having to think on her feet and when every group came up with variations on the boss/PA scenario!

The two Barbaras and I  were relieved that it went so well, as we had been a little nervous about how the breakout session would work.  We even practised brainstorming and how to develop different scenarios in the car on the way back to San Francisco, which was great fun, shouting ideas over each other.  ‘Ooh, I know!  He could be … and she could … No, no,  he’s  the father …’ etc.  I thought I had fertile imagination, but I’ve got  nothing on Barbara McMahon, who never missed a beat coming up with wacky ideas about whose baby it might be.  Barbara Hannay and I were in awe of her!  I just hope that one day she’ll write that story about the guy who had malaria in Kenya and in his delirium forgets about the nurse who … but I mustn’t spoil it for you!

With Claire Baxter on the bus after the Romance authors' tea

Anyway, the workshop seemed to get the point across, judging by the kind comments we had afterwards.  Other good bits about the conference: meeting lots of Harlequin authors from Australia, who are all so friendly, and who let me tag along with them in the evenings; getting to know Trish Wylie – what a font of information and good stories she is! A tea for Harlequin Romance authors, where we had delicate sandwiches and scones with cream, and then got the bus back to the hotel; meeting readers who quite spontaneously came up to me and told me loved my books – that was wonderful, of course! 

Blake Snyder’s talk about screenwriting and the need to “embrace the formula”, which I found so entertaining and stimulating and with so many  parallels with writing romance that I went straight out to buy his book, Save the Cat!

Golden Gate Bridge:  They told me it could be cold in San Francisco in summer - and it was!

And, of course, San Francisco itself.  It’s a lovely city to walk around, and I had no time to do more than scratch the surface … I’ll just have to go back!

So, now it’s back to work.  I’m struggling to get back to the tropical island where I left Imogen and Tom, stranded in the middle of Chapter 4 … Clearly I need to think myself back to that workshop and remember what it is I’m supposed to be doing!  

But time for just a couple more photos first...

Yosemite

Vernal Falls