The rain is hammering down outside and my planned work related visit has been cancelled so I have time to write up my report about this year's
writerconuk.
Friday
My journey down was fairly uneventful and straight forward via the train/tube/train route I've taken the last couple of years, and I got to the Coventry Ramada hotel at around 1pm not long after
hils who was sitting in the bar with a beer as I walked in. I ordered a very nice sandwich and french fries for lunch (plus a large glass of wine because I was on holiday!) and we sat and chatted as other people slowly wandered in over the course of the afternoon.
I really like this part of the
writerconuk weekend - it's so nice to catch up with online friends and have a good chat in a relaxed atmosphere. The staff at the Ramada are lovely and extremely welcoming (I was greeted with the bar lady saying "Gosh I can't believe it's a year since you've been here! It's so nice that you are back.") and throughout the afternoon various staff members came and said hello as we became a larger and larger group.
The official opening was 6.30pm and
hils (our Chair) welcomed us to the ninth Event (we started in 2007!) and the excellent goody bags were distributed. Some really fun things including bubbles and puzzle books and scented pens this year! I can't quite believe it's been nine years and
bogwitch can still come up with great prizes for the goody bags. Then it was on to the quiz which I have organised the last couple of years. There was much discussion during the questions and I think I got it just about right this year as the results were very close for the three groups of six people - but of course everyone 'won' a bottle of bubbly for their team, so there were no loosers (only runners up!). I think it also helped that I decided who was in each team based on their fandom preferences expressed in the sign up posts, so hopefully there was a least one person in each team who would know the answers to the majority of the questions (but of course I may be wrong about that! LOL!).
After we'd finished the quiz it was time for dinner in the refurbished restaurant of the hotel followed by cocktails and chatting in our first floor breakout area until everyone wandered off to bed.
Saturday
Despite having gone to sleep around midnight my internal body clock decided that 5.30am was the time I was getting up (grrr!), but at least I knew that as
thismaz was able to attend this year I would have company when I went down to breakfast at 6.30. We joined each other in the restaurant and spent a happy time chatting about work related stuff (she works in a similar industry to mine) and all kinds of topics until
lilachigh,
spikereader,
sparrow2000, and lots of other people wandered down to enjoy the full English breakfast, pastries, and all kinds of delicous goodies (and LOTS of coffee!). Repleat, I went up to brush my teeth and then we all convened in our conference room for the start of the programme.
First up was
ningloreth and her talk Show Don't Tell which covered various rules about writing dialogue and setting the scene when writing. There were some excellent examples of when it just doesn't work and why and also examples of how different authors view the rules. I found this very interesting and it certainly sparked some discussion amongst the audience.
We had a refreshment break after this and as our Event this year coincided with
hils' birthday
gillo had organised a cake and a card which we all signed. I was slightly worried the cake candle (which was essentially a firework!) would set off the sprinkler system...
It was super nummy and I loved the band around the cake which covered many of
hils' favourite fandoms (it was long...!).
Suitably refreshed we went back into our baseroom for the next talk, this time by
tlanti about What has Fandom done for me? - her personal journey through fandom and the support, friendship and confidence to try new things that she had found over the years because of it. I think there are a lot of stories like hers in fandom and it's good to remember how getting together with like-minded people is so supportive and enjoyable.
A break for lunch in the restaurant was followed by
hab318princess talk about Surviving Fandom and her experience what it's like to be in the middle of kerfuffles. Personally I have rarely been caught up in 'exploding' fandom (as someone called it in the discussions). Maybe I've been lucky, but the examples she used were very interesting, and I'm glad she now feels she is in a place to become more involved in fandom again. I loved her photos of Cardiff and the Torchwood/Doctor Who sets and other fandom images.
Following another refreshment break it was time for
quinara to cover Alternative Story Telling along with
bogwitch. Firstly
quinara took us through a fan video she had made which was brilliant and explained how she had chosen the clips. We then got to see
bogwitch's wonderful 'graphic novel' which was put together to illustrate one of her stories through photographs and captions. It was so much fun and I'm not surprised it took a long time to achieve as she had built the 'sets' for the dolls she used to tell the story. Amazing stuff!
After this they went through a challenge which they designed for
sb_fag_ends. For those who don't know, they both (together with
shapinglight who also came to the Event this year) are the creators and moderators of
sb_fag_ends. This is a community I have joined, but much to my shame I have not really actively taken part or read very many posts, so the Easter challenge they designed was completely new to me and incredibly impressive - a kind of online scavenger hunt with community members having to produce artwork etc in order to move through the challenge following the prompts. It was so clever!
Next came
hils and What's My Fandom with contricutions from
sparrow2000 (the Buffy fandom),
enchantersnight (Hannibal), me for Sherlock and
hils for Dragon Age (the computer games). I'm not sure if any of us convinced anyone else to investigate the fandoms further, but it was fun to hear about everyone else's 'take' on their fandoms.
Then it was time for cocktails! I had a guiness as I didn't really fancy another cocktail, and I ended up having a long chat to
hesadevil who unfortunately had missed most of the day as she was feeling really poorly (such a shame!).
The majority of attendees then took part in the Bad!Fic challenge which
gillo led, but as I don't write fic
quinara,
bogwitch and I stayed in the break out area and they showed me their beta version of their Spuffy text game which looked great fun (
spikereader joined us a little bit later as she doesn't write either).
From about 7pm we all sat around chatting in the break out area and as the hotel had forgotten to give us any refreshments during our afternoon break they put together some popcorn and sweeties which we all dived into (!). There were jelly beans, and lollies, and sherbert 'flying saucers' and all manner of goodies! I loved the popcorn 'cart':
The committee had arranged for us to sit in the break out area and have a live viewing of the new series of Doctor Who which was great fun and I think the majority enjoyed it. The only downside was that the TV sound was very quiet and we had to watch with the subtitles switch on (although that wasn't a bad thing with us all chuckling at the jokes - we might have missed something!).
Of course the disadvantage of the sweeties was that straight after Doctor Who we had our
writerconuk banquet and as I have no will power I had rather ruined my appetite (oops). However, having said that the food was absolutely delicious as usual with soup, pate oe haloumi with cous cous to start, three choices of main course (vegetarian moussaka, spinach and ricotta tortollini or a chicken casserole and lots of lovely vegetables), and either cheesecake, fresh fruit salad or apple crumble and custard. YUMMY! I was so stuffed with food afterwards!
Then it was more chatting and drinking cocktails and stuff until we all wandered off to to our respective room to sleep again.
Sunday
Unfortunately I did not sleep very well as there were some noisy people at 3.30 in the morning who woke me up, however once again my stupid body clock woke me at 5.55am, and so I joined
thismaz at the 6.30 breakfast call again. I think we must have had several breakfasts by the time the others all wandered down ;) Still, that was my plan as it was travelling day and it's a lot easier to eat a large breakfast and then forget about food until I got home
At 10 we had the AGM and the raffle. There were some lovely prizes contributed by the attendees this year including some sent over by
desdemonaspace as she is moving and downsizing (I coveted the Spike dolly, but I was beaten to it in the raffle draw *sad!face*).
We will definitely be having the 10th year event next year as
ningloreth has volunteered as Chair,
tlanti will continue as Secretary and
hab318princess will be looking after the finances as Treasurer. Yay! I shall also be doing the quiz again, and
gillo has stayed on as the venue liaison as the Ramada Coventry is so perfect for us.
After that it was time for farewells and slowly people drifted off to catch trains and drive down motorways. I shall miss everyone :(
If you didn't make it this year, and you would like to come next year it will be around the same time of year again (I think that's around the 9th September). But why come?
- Is it all about fandom? NO! But that's a great start as you already have LOADS in common with everyone else, and you'll find yourself talking about EVERYTHING under the sun (if you want to - and if you don't you can listen to everyone else).
- Is it friendly? YES!! Including the staff at the hotel (who note things like "There's not much in the raffle this year from Supernatural is there?")
- It is expensive? Well that's up to you - it's a very nominal cost to register, and you can opt out of any of the hotel meals if you'd prefer. Coffee and tea breaks are paid for as part of the registration fee and include biscuits and pastries (and sweeties this year!), breakfast is included in the special conference rate (and honestly if you are sensible, you really won't want lunch after all the breakfast options! Unfortunately I am never sensible and ate far.too.much this year)
- Do you have to attend everything? Of course not! Attend what you want, and enjoy yourself - no obligation!
So maybe next year will be the year you (yes, I'm looking at YOU!) will join us.... after all 10 years is something to celebrate!