I have to say that this years Midwest Writers Workshop was amazing! Of course this is my first writing workshop, but I at least hear from the other writers that this one is a good one and I again have to agree.
My first conference experience, though, was probably a bit different than most of the people there. Only because I stayed at the near by Summit Lake State Park camp ground near Muncie. Most, if not all the people there either commuted from home or had a hotel room. This is only because I had went up to Michigan earlier that week to Mackinaw Island for a short vacation and we took the camper for the mainland. So when we went back down we decided to just keep using the camper so we didn’t have to rearranged everything.
Anyways though, the workshop had a lot of friendly writers that I got to meet and the sessions were very informative. The only thing bad about it is that there were so many good sessions you could go to that you couldn’t just choose just one for each hour! There were also other things like “Buttomhole the Expert” that allowed you to get a lot of information in a short amount of time. I also enjoyed the Agents Panel where we could question agents about what they were looking for and some advice.
Which then brings me to what I learned that was the probably the most important. Which is I learned from the agents that I couldn’t get a agent for my book because I was already self published, but thankfully I also got good news. I learned that I could take my book totally off the market and rework it so I can submit it so I could possibly get an agent. Which I am glad, because I lately came to the realization that self publishing isn’t really for me. I mean I did try my best to get my book out there, but I just can’t advertise my book enough to make a profit or really the reward I was looking for. I mean I do admit that I defiantly thought it was really rewarding when I first self published, but now I see it wasn’t as rewarding as I originally thought it was.
There is a silver lining to this though! I learned! And I can also fix this, it might take a while, but I know I can do this. Especially when I also learned about this writing program called “Scrivener”. Which I would recommend to any writer! It really helps with organization and there is no subscription! Which I think is the best part.
Finally to any writers that haven’t been to this workshop I would really recommend it. It doesn’t cost as much as other workshops, and if you are a Ball State student you could even win a chance to go for free with the Midwest Writers Workshop Scholarship.
