Sheacon 2023: Wrap Up

I’ve finally had time to upload all the Sheacon 2023 panels, so Sheacon 2023 is over but I have some extra fun for any of you who weren’t able to attend so keep reading!

First I want to give a big thank you so much to all the Champions for attending, and for being such an amazing group! All of the panels activities had great participation and you all were so much fun to hang out with, laugh, and celebrate books, which is what the original goal for Sheacon has always been. Also, a big thank you to Elisa Rae, Celeste Baxendell, Hanna Sandvig, and Charlotte Vane who were our guest authors this year.

Every year I thank the Sheacon Planners–without them none of this would have happened, and they not only started working on Sheacon 2023 months ago, they also have worked hard to make Sheacon smoother/more professional every year. Naturally, there’s a lot to thank them for! But this year I’m extra thankful, because the week before Sheacon my life fell apart with the passing of Perfect Dog, and these wonderful, kind, and caring people held down the fort while I was MIA. That week before Sheacon was probably the worst week I’ve had in these absolutely rotten last two years, and their kindness–and the kindness and cheerfulness of our community in general–was what got me through that weekend. So, from the bottom of my heart, thank you.

This year’s 2023 planners were: Anneli, Jordan, Chelsc, Rachel, Zooknar, Batattack, Bluefires, Cheybri, Cwang, Eleniel, FrogPrincess994, Gwen, Lavalectrix, Louberry, Prolly, RayJay, Wish.i.was.in.a.fairytale, Witchdoctor, and Amanda.

Additionally, we had some planners–and a few additional volunteers–who acted as hosts for panels/events/games during Sheacon! They not only donated their time to be hosts, they bravely kept up the conversation while organizing games, showing us all evening star stretches, and more. So thank you, again/also, to: Anneli, Jordan, Rachel, Zooknar, Akira, Amanda, Ayrin, Batattack, Chelsc, Cheybri, Eleniel, RayJay, RoseTen, Gwen, FrogPrincess994, and Vin.

And finally a special thankyou to our Retha and Dragons dungeon masters: Zooknar, FrogPrincess994, and Jordan! (This special event wouldn’t be possible without them! If you’re wondering what Retha & Dragons is, check out the panels down below.)

This is also the perfect chance to thank and salute our Chief Sheacon Planner, Cindy. Cindy puts in serious hours organizing the conference–the scheduling she has to figure out months in advance is intense, she’s pretty much a professional chaos wrangler–and I’m so grateful for her.

Finally, I want to thank our Director of Discord, Vin, and the Mod Squad–Mythical Cat, Smasher, Batattack, Cimorrene, and Rog–for helping all the new members in our discord server who joined so they could attend Sheacon, and our Facebook Mods–Megen, Sarah, and Jocelyn–who kept our community Facebook Group apprised of everything happening for Sheacon!

Goodie Bag/Freebies

The free books that were available for Sheacon weekend are no longer available but make sure you check out all the fun new goodies I unveiled for the event this year on the Sheacon 2023 Goodie Bag post. (There was a new Magiford Short Story, and a new Rumpelstiltskin coloring page, so make sure you grab those!)

Panel Recordings

Finally–what you’ve all been waiting for! For those of you who missed out on attending in person, I have great news! Our diligent Sheacon Planners recorded all of the main panels, so you can listen to them at your leisure! (If you enjoyed these recordings, please leave a quick comment thanking the Sheacon Planners as I physically would never be able to record all of these myself!)

1. 2023 Opening Ceremony: MP3 File

2. Author Panel: Hanna Sandvig and Charlotte Vane: MP3 File

3. Kitty Q&A #1: MP3 File

4. Author Panel: Elisa Rae and Celeste Baxendell: MP3 File

5. How to Train Your Champion: MP3 File

6. Celebrity Retha and Dragons with Hanna Sanvig, Elisa Rae, Discord team members Vin and SuperRog, and a special appearance from me!: MP3 File (Special note, there is a slight glitch in this recording, about 15 seconds of audio are missing around the 8:15 mark, but it’s a hilarious event, and one of my favorites!)

7. Kitty Writing Panel: MP3 File

8. Kitty Q&A #2: MP3 File

9. Closing Ceremony and Kitty Hot Seat: MP3 File

10. Bonus: Evening Star Stretches: YouTube Video

And that’s everything for now! Because it’s been rough, I opted not to do the transcriptions this year, but thankfully I have been able to write. It looks like I’m going to be on schedule with Jade’s series, but I won’t know for sure until I hit editing time in October. It does NOT look like I’ll get any additional time to work on Retha #4 this year, but that’s okay, I’ll just tackle it first thing next year, and I did get a pretty good chunk of it done early this summer. At least I won’t be starting 2024 months behind schedule like I did with 2023. 😑 (Yes, I’m still upset about that.) Thanks for reading, Champions. I hope you enjoy listening to the panels, and thank you again to our Sheacon team.

2022 NaNoWriMo

November is here which means means NaNoWriMo–or National Novel Writing Month–has begun!

National Novel Writing Month is an event started in 1999 as a daunting but straightforward challenge: to write 50,000 words of a novel in thirty days (the month of November). The global event is run by the official NaNoWriMo nonprofit organization–which means it is also FREE to sign up and join in the fun. If you signup you get a nifty tracker and some fun discounts if you “win” and write 50,000 words by the end of November.

Even though NaNoWriMo focuses on writing a 50,000 word novel, you can work on any project you want! In the past, some participants work on D&D campaigns, journaling, or writing/planning out a comic book, so you can put your own unique spin on the month!

Sadly this year my timing is off so I’ll be editing for the first half of the month, and I won’t truly be participating. But! If you decide to embark on the wonderful journey or writing a novel in a month I have some resources to share with you to help you!

1. Author Resources webpage

2. Blog Posts with the Writing Tips category

3. My Pinterest Board for Writing Tips (this Pinterest board has links to my blog post and other writing tips from other authors)

But thanks to our Discord Community Manager Vin you don’t have to officially sign up for NaNoWriMo to have fun!

Vin is going to be hosting writing sprints multiple times a week throughout the month of November on Discord (See link for instructions on how to sign up for our community Discord!) The dates and times of Vin’s writing sprints are listed below, and they’ll be held in the “Writing Sprints” channel of our server.

You don’t have to work on a fun writing project if you want to join in Vin’s sprints! If you are finishing homework, studying, or have a work project you really need to focus on please feel free to join. I will try to pop in for a couple of of Vin’s sprints throughout the month so I hope to see you there!

2022 NaNoWriMo Writing Sprint Schedule All times are at 2 pm Central unless indicated otherwise

1. Tue, Nov. 1st

2. Wed, Nov. 2nd

3. Fri, Nov. 4th

4. Mon, Nov. 7th

5. Wed, Nov. 9th

6. Fri, Nov. 11th at 10 am Central

7. Mon, Nov. 14th

8. Wed, Nov. 16th

9. Fri, Nov. 18th

10. Mon, Nov. 21st

11. Wed, Nov. 23rd

12. Fri, Nov. 25th Mon,

13. Nov. 28th at 10 am and 2 pm Central

14. Tue, Nov. 29th at 10 am and 2 pm Central

15. Wed, Nov. 30th at 10 am, 2 pm, 6 pm, and 9 pm Central

REPOST: NaNoWriMo Encouragement

Hey Champions, this is one of the posts I mentioned when I explained my upcoming surgeries/procedures that I wrote a year or two ago, but I’m refreshing a little and reposting.

This post is meant to be an encouragement to those who are fighting their way through NaNoWriMo, so hopefully they won’t be discouraged with their writing. Yes, I’m once again busting out the first book I ever wrote…and it’s bad. So bad. Horrible. I’m not even sure I should subject you all to this, but, hey, I don’t think it’s possible to read it and NOT be encouraged by the quality of your own writing. 😉 So let’s roll out the old post!

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I was in 7th grade–I think I was 11 or 12 at the time–when I wrote my first book. My novel was a 46,000 word, young adult sci fi story that is so horrific, so terrible, I mostly try to forget it exists, except in times like these. Either right around now–or sometime closer to the end of the month–you likely will end up questioning your skills and your ability. You might think you’re wasting your time because you’re a bad writer, or that you could never be a good storyteller.

Ha. Haha. HAHAHAHAHAHA. Ooooooh Champions. Please allow me to give you PROOF that I didn’t start out writing like I do now as I unveil the most hideous skeleton I have: The Awakening Call– Book 1 of the Star Flight Series.

CLICK HERE IF YOU THINK YOU CAN SURVIVE READING IT!

Are you alive? Did you make it? I hope you did, and now you obviously know that I was terrible when I started. And with good reason!

Writing is an art. Most musicians aren’t able to instantly pick up their first instrument and play a concert piece. Similarly, most writers won’t write J. R. R. Tolkien-esque books on their first try. ( I obviously didn’t!) So if you’re feeling discouraged because you don’t think your book is perfect or that you’re not doing a good job, please allow me to assure you that you 100% are. When it comes to writing, finishing is the real win. (That’s why NaNoWriMo pledges to write 50,000 words in 30 days–not 50,000 perfect words, just words!)

The more you write, the better you get! And as terrible as my first book was, my second book was Princess Ahira. It’s gone through some pretty deep edits, but it’s available to purchase on Amazon. A lot of Champions enjoy Ahira–and it wouldn’t have been possible if I hadn’t finished *Gag* The Awakening Call, first!

And that’s the end of this embarrassing blog post. Now, Champions, please do me a favor and go read something of mine that will restore me to your good graces–and make you forget all about The Awakening Call. UGH–even that title is just hideous!

Thanks for reading!

Ps: YES, as 7th grader I wrote myself into the story as a 45-year-old. I was weird, okay? (Or maybe I just had visions of greatness, haha)