A Wrap on the Santa Barbara Writers Conference

As inevitably happens to me, I didn’t get to experience nearly as much of last week’s Santa Barbara Writers Conference as I would have liked to. However, the few events I was able to squeeze in were educational, entertaining, and inspiring. 

Here are a few of the highlights.

A moving presentation by Sojourner Kincaid Rolle opened the evening presentation on Juneteenth, a holiday that our Santa Barbara Poet Laureate 2015-2017 and author of the poem and picture book Free at Last: A Juneteenth Poem said “has come to represent freedom for people all over the world.” She wrote the poem in 2004 and described the twisting journey of how the work came to prominence all over the world, then performed a touching rendition of it for the group. 

That evening’s featured speaker was bestselling writer Elinor Lipman. Her 14 works of fiction (I’ve read at least half of them, and her most recent Ms. Demeanor is particularly fun) have a wry humor to them, which is as utterly charming as the woman herself. Her presentation was a practical amalgamation of the best advice she’s ever gotten from editors, writers, and agents, as well as some of her own trial and error tips. 

My favorite tidbits (all geared toward fiction writing) included, “Get into a scene as late as possible and get out of it as early as possible,” “Prepare to write badly,” and “Sometimes the best way to revise is to start something new.” In other words, “It’s not you — it’s the work.” Also, paraphrasing the late, great Elmore Leonard, who famously said, “If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it,” she added,  “I want to believe it’s a life I am living rather than a story I am reading.” 

I popped into an interesting seminar with Holly Kammier on “Demystifying Publishing Options,” which reviewed the pros and cons of publishing options today, which range from traditional publishing to small publishers, self-publishing, vanity presses, and hybrid publishing. She owns a boutique publishing imprint, Acorn Publishing (considered a hybrid publisher),  and it was fascinating to hear her take on how the industry has evolved, as well as her assessment of the various ways to get into publication these days. 

Santa Barbara–based writer Dale Zurawski, who recently worked with Acorn Publishing on her memoir Bipolar: A Gift of Thorns, offered some valuable insights on her own experience working with a hybrid publisher, including how customer-service-oriented she found them to be. 

The other seminar I attended was on “Podcasts & Audiobooks,” which featured Lois Phillips, Yvette Keller, Claudia Dunn, and Matthew J. Pallamary. Phillips kicked off with an excellent presentation on how to be a great podcast guest. Some of the takeaways included how important it is to really be prepared: “This is not just any conversation [when you appear on a podcast]; you really want to think about it in advance.” This includes preparing at least three stories or anecdotes that you can unfurl at any time, and, as Phillips said, “these should be stories that would be interesting — not just to your mother, but to a stranger as well.” 

Pallamary, a frequent podcast guest who also has his own show, talked about the wonderful thing about podcasts being that they go on and on, meaning that people can discover and binge them at any time, not just the week they come out. He also had a lot of technical tips for people to create their own audio and video presentations to support their books. 

Keller and Dunn were the primary presenters on the fascinating subject of audiobooks, how they’re made, and how they’ve evolved, with Pallamary also weighing in on his experiences. 

Keller, who is a writer as well as a voiceover artist, advised, “If you can roll your audiobook creation into your final book proofreading process, it will help you catch mistakes.” 

Pallamary added, “I always find typos, and I find the best typos when I’m narrating.” 

“My heart is in thrillers and mysteries,” shared Dunn, a veteran actor and comedian who splits her time between Santa Barbara and Los Angeles, and whose years of serving in the White House West Wing Press Office make her the perfect fit for political thrillers and intrigue. “Audiobooks are a great way to increase your sales,” said Dunn. “Just speaking from the performance aspect, reading your book aloud will help you a lot.” 

For more information about next year’s conference, see sbwriters.com.