Now that I’ve had a few days to catch up on sleep and deal with some of this year’s astonishingly abundant grape harvest, I can pull my thoughts together on the Rocky Mountain Chapter of SCBWI’s Fall Conference.

We had a change of locale this year, which seemed to be popular with a lot of newcomers, since the registration numbers went up and there were a lot of attendees who had never been to one of our conferences before. Personally, I found the hotel surrounded by highway and asphalt to be less appealing than the School of Mines right at the foot of the mountains, but the hotel did have a waterfall in the lobby, so we could pretend we were near Rocky Mountain spring water.

Highlights of the conference included pearls of wisdom dropped generously by Betsy James, information-packed sessions by Bethany Siegler (on website use for writers) and Elizabeth Rusch (I heard the ones on getting children to give you feedback and interviewing experts), an inspiring workshop on revision by Todd Mitchell and Laura Resau, a dynamic banquet talk by Mark Ludy, and a moving luncheon talk by Julie Anne Peters.

Aside from the formal presentations, I especially enjoyed the manuscript review session with Martha Mihalick, Associate Editor at Greenwillow Books, and not just because she liked Bone Temple. She’s smart and personable and offers feedback in a way that takes the sting out of the places where she notes what’s not working. I’ve got a great new set of questions to consider as I move into revising the manuscript again.

I also had a wonderful time talking with Laura Resau at dinner. She’s another smart and personable woman, and though I hadn’t intended to buy her second book, Red Glass, because of budget considerations, I went ahead and splurged. I’m looking forward both to enjoying the story and to studying her craft. I also added Betsy James’s trilogy and Todd Mitchell’s Traitor King to my library after hearing them speak.

Of course, it was great to see all my friends in addition to meeting new folks. Children’s writers are gracious and supportive people. They tend to be highly educated, and all of the ones I’m lucky enough to know well have enormous respect for their intended audience. When I get frustrated by the long apprenticeship this craft usually requires, and I consider walking away from it to do something–anything–else, the thought of leaving the community of writers returns me to my keyboard, ready to do more than just write stories for my own enjoyment. They show me the hurdles I still have to overcome, and then kindly bring the stepstool to help me over.

Many, many thanks to all of the hardworking volunteers who put the conference together and missed their own opportunities to network or learn in order to make sure things went well for the rest of us.