The Australian Writer’s Marketplace is pleased to announce the launch of the first annual GenreCon, a convention for professional and aspiring writers of romance, mystery, science fiction, crime, fantasy, horror, thrillers, and more. One part party, one part professional development: GenreCon is the place to be if you’re an aspiring or established writer with a penchant for the types of fiction that get relegated to their own corner of the bookstore. Featuring international guests Joe Abercrombie (Author, The First Law Trilogy, Best Served Cold, The Heroes), Sarah Wendell (co-founder, Smart Bitches, Trashy Books), and Ginger Clark (Literary Agent, Curtis Brown), with more guests being announced in the coming weeks. GenreCon is the place to be if you want to:

• Educate yourself about the publishing industry
• Learn what it takes to become a successful genre author
• Network with other writers who are passionate about genre fiction
• Meet editors, agents, publishers, and other genre publishing professionals
• Celebrate the rich contribution genre fiction has made to Australia’s literary landscape

The 2012 GenreCon will be held November 2-4, 2012 at the Rydges Hotel, Parramatta, NSW. Registrations are open now, with the special Early Bird ticket price of $190 available to the first 50 registrations. To register, visit us online at genrecon.com.au

Special Guests

We’re pleased to introduce you to this years international guests: Joe Abercrombie, Sarah Wendell, and Ginger Clark.

Joe Abercrombie

Joe Abercrombie was born in Lancaster, studied psychology at the University of Manchester, and spent ten years working as a film editor before his first book, The Blade Itself, was published in 2006. The First Law trilogy, a modern take on epic fantasy, is now available in more than twenty languages.  His latest book, The Heroes, made no. 3 on the Times Hardcover Bestseller list.  He lives in Bath with his wife and children and writes full time. Find him online at www.joeabercrombie.com.

Sarah Wendell

By day Sarah Wendell is mild mannered and heavily caffeinated.  By evening she dons her cranky costume, consumes yet more caffeine, and becomes Smart Bitch Sarah of Smart Bitches, Trashy Books. The site specializes in reviewing romance novels, examining the history and future of the genre, and bemoaning the enormous prevalence of bodacious pectorals adorning male cover models. Sarah is the co-founder of Smart Bitches, and the author of the book Everything I Know About Love, I Learned from Romance Novels and the  co-author of Beyond Heaving Bosoms: the Smart Bitches’ Guide to Romance Novels, published in April 2009 by Touchstone Fireside.

Ginger Clark

Ginger Clark has been a literary agent with Curtis Brown LTD (New York) since 2005.  She represents science fiction, fantasy, horror, and young adult and middle grade fiction.  In addition to representing her own clients, she also represents British Commonwealth rights for the agency’s children’s list.  She attends the Bologna and Frankfurt Book Fairs every year.  She sits on the Rights Committee of the Book Industry Study Group, and is a member of the Contracts Committee of the AAR.  She is a graduate of Bryn Mawr College and lives in Brooklyn with her husband.

I’d apologise for the big wall ‘o text, but that would be disengenious since I’m really pleased to have news of the con out in the public and registrations coming in. It means the convention has ceased being theoretical and now become a reality, that the focus shifts from I wonder if this could work to holy shit, people are actually coming, it’s time to work twice as hard to make it awesome and worthwhile.

The frustrating part about announcing this yesterday is that today is my regularly scheduled day off.

In truth, I should have known better. There is no such thing as a day off the day after you announce a convention and open up registration, and I’m pretty sure that I’m going to spend my day habitually checking my work email to see how registrations are going and whether there’s any queries to answer. I’m going to be putting together a rough plan for rolling out the next round of guests, since we’ve got a slew of Aussies coming along who are pretty fricken’ awesome in their own right. I’m going to be pondering how we can use the fact that the first three people to register for the Con are three of the most talented spec fic writers in Australia, especially since they’ve expressed their interest in being part of the program.

I’m going to wonder at the pace with which people are hitting the site, and the pace at which the early bird registrations are going (which is way, way faster than I expected).

And I’m going to spend the day thinking about how strange, and how delightful, it is to be involved in running a convention again, especially since this time around it’s almost entirely focused on the things that I really enjoyed working on the last time I had con-based day-job gig. That I keep ending up with dayjobs as unassailable cool as this one still freaks me out a little.

Now I’m going to go and try to write something, since that’s what the day off is meant to be for, although I may check my email just once more before I start…