RT Booklovers Convention

admin / / Appearances

RT Booklovers Convention in Dallas, May 12-17 2015, held at the Hyatt Regency Dallas by the Convention Center

Want to meet Jeffe?
Here is a list of events she’ll be attending at RT:

Tuesday, May 12, 2015 – 4:00pm to 5:00pm:

Scrapbooking Mania

Join Jennifer L. Armentrout, Rachel Caine, Celeste Easton, Darynda Jones, Jeffe Kennedy, Ciara Knight, and Kim Meyer for a fun and interactive scrapbooking event! No experience necessary. Authors and fellow readers will be on hand to help decorate. Bling it out, go crazy and have fun creating your little piece of RT 2015 history. We’ll have all the supplies you need, even a camera and printer so you can create a page from the workshop with your favorite attending author — or better yet, a picture with the entire group. Best of all, you leave the workshop with your ready to autograph, original RT 2015 scrapbook!

RT Dallas Scrapbooking mania 2

Wednesday, May 13, 2015 – 5:00pm to 6:00pm:

Mad Hatter Fantasy Tea Party

Come join the fun and mayhem at our Mad Hatter Tea Party with some of fantasy romance’s bestselling writers. Full of games, goodies and giveaways. The first 100 people will get a goody bag — and books!

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Thursday, May 14, 2015 – 2:40pm to 3:10pm:

Kensington Books Spotlight

Publisher Spotlights are where representatives from a publisher speak to a group of aspiring and published authors to let them know which type of book, genres, word length, and any other acquisition information an author may need to know to determine if their book is right for the company. They will also discuss how they work with and support their authors, including but not limited to marketing/promotion.

 

Thursday, May 14, 2015 – 5:15pm to 6:45pm:

Kensington’s Sweet Heat

Warm your heart with a celebration of Kensington authors and books. Indulge in delicious snacks and refreshments as you chat with your favorite authors, meet the Kensington team and score special prizes. We’ll be giving a special surprise to the first 100 people who line up for love, but all who attend will get fun treats, sneak peeks and their choice of two autographed books!

 

Friday, May 15, 2015 – 1:30pm to 2:30pm:

Kensington’s Hearts & Kisses

Join the Kensington family for our Hearts & Kisses event, where you can star in your own romance cover and pose with your favorite muscled hero! Write love notes to your favorite authors, which will be delivered after the event.

 

Saturday, May 16, 2015 – 11:00am to 2:00pm:

Giant Book Fair

Meet more than 500 authors who will autograph books, posters and bookmarks. Bring your “keepers” and have them signed! This year we will have all authors (traditional, e-book only, and indie/print on consignment) all in one room and fully intermingled! 
The Saturday Giant Book Fair ticket is included in the full general convention registration fee. This event is also open to the public, and tickets can be purchased for just the Giant Book Fair. You can purchase a ticket at the door the day of the event. Pre-ordered tickets will be picked up at the hotel on the day of the Giant Book Fair.
You may bring in your books from home to get them autographed. However, they must be checked in and stamped (with invisible ink, so there’s no damage to your books) before you enter the book fair. Only two books from home per author are allowed.

Virtual Appearances

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Every Sunday blog post: Word Whores

Rogue’s Paradise Release Day!

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog

Rogue's ParadiseToday marks the end of an odyssey for me – the release of Rogue’s Paradise – the third (and final?) book in my Covenant of Thorns series. So many feels about this. I’ll be in lots of places talking about it. For today, you can find an excerpt at the Contemporary Romance Cafe and join in a discussion about Fantasy Romance at Jill Archer’s blog. We’re looking for other recommendations, too!

Why I’m Running for the RWA National Board

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog

 IMG_4764 smallSo, the ballots have gone out for elections for the RWA Board of Directors.

And I’m running for one of the Director at Large positions.

Surprise!

Yeah, it probably seems out of the blue to some of you (hi Mom!), but it’s something I’ve been pondering for a long time. Really, I’ve had in mind that I would do this someday since I joined RWA lo these six years ago. Back then I’d been working as a nonfiction writer for a long time and knew those circles well. I’d been part of a crit group that did mainly literary fiction and creative nonfiction, was on my state’s Arts Council roster and participated in book festivals, etc. However, as I branched into fiction and tried to shop my (what turned out to be) fantasy romance novel, I discovered I knew very little about the romance genres and had no connections in that community. And shopping my novel turned out to be much harder than I’d thought. I clearly needed help.

True Confession: I joined RWA entirely for mercenary purposes to begin with. I became a member, immediately applied for PRO status so I could have higher priority in picking appointments to meet with editors and agents at the 2008 National Conference. I’d been on a day job trip in Ohio, flew from there to San Francisco, wandered the conference all day Thursday, pitched on Friday and flew home that afternoon. I knew no one, talked to only a few people (I scorned my First Timer ribbon, alas) and didn’t expect much more than my very targeted goals.

Except I was totally blown away.

Every panel, workshop and speaker luncheon I attended was amazing. The people I did talk to were lovely. I saw Nora Roberts in the bar and rode in an elevator with Linda Howard. For the first time, I saw Jayne Ann Krentz and Susan Elizabeth Phillips give their Secrets of the Bestselling Sisterhood. (Something I try to see every year.) I couldn’t believe these mega-selling authors were mixing in with a wannabe like me. More, the friendships astounded me. The lit fiction world tends to be fraught with competition and cold shoulders rule. I loved seeing these authors who’d been friends for 20 or 30 years, telling their stories with affection. After my successful pitches (I thought then – believing having requested pages meant I was in), I sat at the bar and had a celebratory glass of champagne – by myself – looked around at all the hugs, laughter and intense conversations and thought, “I want to be part of this.”

I mean, some random woman took a picture of my shoes! I had clearly found my tribe.

I haven’t missed a National Conference since.

Even then, listening to the luncheon speakers – Victoria Alexander and Connie Brockway that year – I was moved, inspired and knew that I wanted to come back for this conference every year that I could. I’d been on Boards before – sorority, Zonta, Association for Women in Science – and I believe in giving back to the organizations I belong to in that way. All along I figured one day I’d put my time in on the RWA Board.

And now feels like the right time.

My day job is less demanding. My fiction-writing career more steady. There are good incumbents for me to learn from and several people I admire and respect encouraged me to run.

Most important to me, the last year has seen several of my friends – stellar writers and amazing women – waver in their commitment to RWA. A lot of it comes from miscommunication and misunderstanding. Other pieces from policies that have led to them feeling alienated. Though it happened sooner than I thought, I realized that I needed to step up to do what I could to help preserve this organization that has meant so much to me.

So, that’s the long version of the short blurbs I put on the RWA Election ballot.

I’m happy to answer questions!

On Not Writing in Pretty Journals

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog

2014-08-27 08.34.39Last night, as I was getting ready for bed, I had a rush of ideas for a new story.

It’s partly Carolyn Crane‘s fault, because we were IMing and we started riffing on story ideas. Actually, to back up, she’d watched two episodes of Game of Thrones, hated that the dog died and wanted me to promise her nothing else bad would happen.

HA!

She’s so adorable. So I explained who was still alive of my last watching, we started talking about our favorite – female, naturally – characters and what made them heroic. And then we segued, as you do, into my heroines in The Twelve Kingdoms books and what would be a really awesome plotline for Dafne. My brain was still buzzing with it as I brushed my teeth and the opening scene for book 4 crystallized in my head. Now, I always think I’ll remember these things the next day, but sometimes the intervention of sleep and other dreams will muddle them. So I went back to my desk to write down some notes.

Any of you who follow me regularly are snickering, because you know my issues with the cryptic notes I leave myself

NEVERTHELESS.

One of my many issues along these lines is that I tend to grab a sticky note – which has the dual complication of being small enough to encourage even more crypticness (cryptnicity? crypniticism?) and can be easily lost. I have a bad habit of using what’s at hand. For example, the page of notes above are on the back side of the title page of my galley proofs of The Tears of the Rose, book 2 in the series. When I reviewed those galleys, I’d finished book 3, The Talon of the Hawk. As I was reading, all sorts of tweaks occurred to me that I needed to work in during edits. Thus the mess above.

You’ll also note the pretty notebook with my name on it.

Followed by three exclamation points.

This was a gift from Carolyn, meant to poke at me because I’m forever excising exclamation points from her manuscripts when I critique them. Every once in a while I let her keep one. NEVER multiples.

I have a number of adorable little notebooks like this – with pretty covers and enticingly blank pages within. Some have been gifts like this one. Some I’ve bought for myself. I keep them around and have for many years. When I first decided to become a writer, friends gave notebooks like this to me with encouraging messages in the front pages. I treasure them all. Many of them I never marked a word in, feeling like I needed to be worthy of those blank pages. Or I saved them only for the “good” stuff – carefully penned sentences and transcribed poems. Things I never look at.

So, last night, instead of grabbing a sticky note – let’s be honest, I couldn’t find one under the stacks of books – I opened the journal and used that to jot down the basics of that opening scene. And now I’ll have those in a place I can find them. Something to go back to someday, maybe even long after the book is on the shelf. Not careful or pretty or perfect.

But useful and real.

Which is what our notebooks should contain.

Birthdays and Bluebirds

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog

Third BirthdayIn honor of my birthday today, I dug out this photo of my third birthday. Possible first hat sighting. 🙂

One of these years, I totally want to have another swimsuit-clad birthday party. Maybe in the Caribbean. Everyone can come! (We may need a bigger cake, however.)

rainbow over Sandia - Marlita Reddy HemfeltToday feels very blessed and special to me. When I blinked my eyes open, David rolled over and wished me happy birthday. I’m so lucky to   have him in my life. It’s raining today, always a welcome blessing in the desert – and Sandia was lit up bright pink, complete with rainbow. We went and ran at the gym. I’m in bSialia_mexicana_07094etter cardiovascular condition than I’ve maybe ever been in my life, thanks to the running and my treadmill desk. I rotate through a number of playlists and today’s happened to be a hit list of longtime favorites – Every Rose Has Its Thorn, Tonight Is the Night I Fell Asleep at the Wheel, Dar Williams’ Alleluia, Running Down a Dream, and the Waltz for Eva and Che. Interestingly, they all follow the theme of reviewing the past and taking in both the regrets and joys. At the end of Waltz, Eva wishes for a hundred years – something I wish for, too.

A flock of bluebirds dashed past the windows as we ran.

Migas with chorizoDavid took me out to breakfast, my mom sent me beautiful flowers and since then I’ve been catching up with all the warm and wonderful 10599556_10151969113019364_9074084243050980582_ngood wishes from my online community – longtime friends, new friends, authors, readers and everyone in between.

A few readers and reviewers are celebrating the occasion by posting favorite reviews of my books, or quotes from them. That’s a first for me – and it’s just staggering. It feels like the most amazing way to give me a virtual hug. One of them, that I particularly loved seeing, partly because I don’t remember reading it before, says this of The Mark of the Tala:

I felt different after reading this book. The lines of my imagination were tested, and I LOVED IT. Jeffe writes with a paintbrush of a talented artist. Her words are filled with beauty and pain all at the same time. I found that this story was so well written, that even the simplest line, “And there was Rayfe. Waiting for me,” overflowed with emotion. You could feel what she was feeling as she wrote the words. It was an amazing feeling to be so tuned into the author just by reading her words.

Amazing for me, to read THAT.

Lucky for me I have presents to give back! I just happen to have a box of hot-off-the-press ARCs of The Tears of the Rose. I’ll be mailing out a bunch tomorrow, so let me know if you want one!

~passes cake, too~

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