The inaugural San Diego Festival of Books was held yesterday, August 26th, at Liberty Station in Point Loma. Gary Robbins, of the San Diego Union Tribune, informed those of us who were at a panel he moderated, that before the festival of books started, the U-T anticipated that attendance would be around 1,200 people. However, he was pleased to report that the actual attendance turned out to be approximately 10,000 - much more than they thought it would be!
One of the main features of the Festival of Books were the panel discussions. The first panel SDLS attended was called "Love in the age of Tinder", and the author guests were Renée Carlino, Kristin Rockaway, and Megan Westfield. The discussion was moderated by Dean Nelson.
Renée Carlino is a screenwriter and bestselling author of romantic women's novels, and new adult fiction. She has written 8 novels. She is a California native, currently living in San Diego. Kristin Rockaway is a native New Yorker, now living in San Diego. She writes women's fiction/romance. Her debut novel, The Wild Woman’s Guide to Traveling the World, was released in June 2017.
Megan Westfield is originally from Washington, and now lives in San Diego. Her debut novel is entitled, Lessons in Gravity. Her second novel is due out in the fall.
The conversation covered multiple areas, but was primarily centered around writing Romance novels, and the differences, if any, between Romance novels, Women's fiction, & General fiction. When the panelists were asked if they think about what genre their book might fall into when they sit down to write, here are some of the responses:
Carlino said: I don't write a book to fit into a particular genre. I write to tell a story.
Westfield said: Lessons In Gravity falls into the genre of "New Adult". You have "Young Adult", which is generally under age 18, and then "New Adult" is 18 to 20's. "Adult" is 30 and up. April, my protagonist, is 21 years old, so the book is considered "New Adult". A bit of "New Adult" is Romance. My publisher publishes mostly Romance, so I definitely had to up the sex scenes to fit into that genre.
Rockaway said: I like happy things. I like happy endings. I choose to write Romance because I like romance. I'm part of the RWA (Romance Writers of America). My book, technically, falls between Women's fiction & Contemporary Romance, but I cut some of the sex scenes to fit Women's Fiction.
Other topics covered were about conflicts within a character in the book, or how a character deals with conflicts, writing process, and the importance of having a good writing support group.
Additional info here:
http://meganwestfield.com/Labels: Author Appearances
