Orlando Signing Info
Jul 18 2010
Sherri will be at the RWA literacy event in Orlando, FL.
The fi
Sherri will be at the RWA literacy event in Orlando, FL.
The first 50 in her line will receive a FREE Dark-Hunter manga t-shirt
and a FREE book bag (the ones we're giving out in San Diego). The next
100 people in line will get a FREE Dark-Hunter manga t-shirt.
Admission to the event is free. Here are the details:
The "Readers for Life" Literacy Autographing has become
one of the most popular events at RWA's annual conference. More than 500 romance
authors participate in this two-hour autographing event, and each year we
raise thousands of dollars, which are donated to ProLiteracy Worldwide. Since
1990, RWA has donated more than $600,000 to literacy charities.
The 2010 "Readers for Life" Literacy Autographing takes
place:
Wednesday, July 28, from 5:30-7:30 p.m.
Walt Disney World® Dolphin Resort
Pacific Exhibit Hall, in Orlando, Florida.
This event is open to the public; there is no
admittance charge. Since the proceeds from this event are donated to
charity, RWA asks that you purchase books at the event instead of
bringing your own books. (RWA accepts cash, check, or credit/debit cards for
book purchases at the event.) If you do bring books, RWA asks that you please
limit yourself to one or two books and consider making a cash donation to their
cause.
**Please note that publishers donate the books for the
event so Sherri will most likely only have two or three titles there. They
usually send her latest releases (published prior to July). Sherri is more than
happy to take pictures with her fans and readers.
Comic Con Info for Sherri
Jul 18 2010
I know this is long, but please read it as it contains everythin
I know this is long, but please read it as it contains everything you need to
know and you might want to print is just as a reference.
For those who don't have passes, they are now offering a few returned ones on
their site, but it is limited.
http://www.comic-con.org/cci/
Our booth # is 1700-1702 and is listed as either Mighty Barnacle, LLC or
Sherrilyn Kenyon
We will have giveaways there all 5 days of the event (while supplies last).
Acheron will be there from time to time in all his 6' 8" glory (along with
Simi). We'll have times posted in the booth. We will also have the Dark-Hunter
dolls on display and merchandise and books, comics and manga to purchase.
Signing info
Sherrilyn Kenyon
Author: The Dark-Hunter, League, Chronicles of Nick
Friday—Drawing for Line Tickets expected to begin at 9:15 am Friday in the
Autograph Area
Sherri will sign:
Friday AA20 12:00 pm - 2:00 pm
Saturday-Drawing for Line Tickets expected to begin at 9:15 am Saturday in the
Autograph
Sherri will sign:
Saturday AA19 1:00 pm - 3:00 pm
Sherri will also be tweeting live updates and photos from the show floor.
Please follow her on
http://twitter.com/kenyonsherrilyn for the latest info. She'll also be
posting more photos on Facebook
http://www.facebook.com/AuthorSherrilynKenyon
ABOUT AUTOGRAPHS
Located upstairs in the Sails Pavilion, the Autograph Area is the place to go
for a special memento from a variety of artists, authors, and actors from every
era of popular culture. Some are signing right after their spotlight panel, so
check the program grid daily.
The Autograph Area is open from 10:00 am to 7:00 pm Thursday through Saturday,
and from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm Sunday. No autograph sessions will be held before
or after these times.
Because of high demand and the limited time available from notables appearing to
sign autographs, the Autograph Area coordinator may at any time shut down a
line, even if people are still waiting for an autograph. If shutting down
becomes necessary, we apologize for any inconvenience or disappointment.
Changes and surprise additions will occur throughout the week, so be sure to
check the daily newsletter and the information boards located throughout the
center. Schedules will be posted at the Autograph Area Information Desk, staffed
from 9:00 am to 7:00 pm Thursday through Saturday, and from 9:00 am to 5:00 pm
Sunday.
Sherri does not charge for autographs or pictures. If you want a photo,
please have your camera ready. Because of the size of Sherri's crowds, they have
asked us to limit the number of items to 2 plus the souvenir book or 3 items
total. Sorry about that, but it's to make sure everyone who has a line number
gets a chance to meet Sherri.
Autograph Area Participants must sign one copy of the Souvenir Program Book for
any fan at no charge. If the fan and the Autograph Area Participant come to an
agreement, an item may be substituted for the Souvenir Program Book that the
Autograph Area Participant agrees to sign for free.
Autograph Area Participants may not require a purchase to sign the Souvenir
Program Book. They are not expected to sign anything they deem offensive or that
violates any contractual agreements they may have.
***Please note that even though we were only able to get 2 slots in the
Autograph Area, Sherri will be in and around the show floor every day Comic Con
is open (but not at any set time). Please try to get to the autograph area at
her designated signing times. Should you miss her there or be unable to attend
those days, we will do our best to get her to the booth for you (but she might
be in or on a panel). If you see her in the crowd, don't hesitate to say hi and
ask for an autograph there or photo. Sherri's more than happy to accommodate her
fans and readers. We are trying to get more signing times, so please check the
booth #1700-1702 for the latest info (we will also have giveaways there all
weekend, as well as having giveaways at the signings - while supplies last). Ash
and Simi's appearance times will also be noted there. But again, we can't
guarantee when and if Sherri will be in the booth. So if you can make the
signing times, please do so.
Rules for Line Drawings
Because of the popularity of many signings, some of which are limited by time,
those signings may be ticketed. Tickets for limited signings are distributed by
drawings. To participate in the drawing, please go to the indicated line and
pick a ticket out of a container. The winning tickets will have a distinct stamp
on the back. Once a winning ticket has been drawn, either:
* the ticket will be kept by the winner to be exchanged for access into the
designated autograph line at the specified location and time,
OR
* the ticket will be exchanged for a wristband that will admit the wearer into
the designated autograph line at the specified location and time.
If you do not draw a winning ticket, you may return to the end of the line to
try again until all winning tickets have been drawn. One winning ticket per
person, per signing.
Prior to the start of the ticket drawings, an area will be designated for those
who wish to wait for the drawings to begin. You may line up for that day's
drawings each morning as soon as you enter the building. No other lines will be
recognized other than those in this officially designated area. When space
becomes available, each line will be escorted to the proper queue for the
drawings to be done that morning. The start time for each day's limited signing
line ticket drawings will be listed in the Events Guide and/or Daily Newsletter.
Winning the drawing for a line ticket grants you, with your winning ticket or
wristband, the opportunity to stand in line to get an autograph at the location
and time designated when you drew the winning ticket.
The duration of the autograph session is taken into account when determining the
number of winning tickets.
The Fire Marshall may shut down any line they feel is a hazard at any time.
Your badge does not guarantee autographs at any event.
Carl
MB Staff
The road to publication...
Jun 25 2010
Since the question comes up over and over again, thought I’d ans
Since the question comes up over and over again, thought I’d answer in a blog post. I always tell people there are two things you don’t want to ask me about. Publishing and childbirth... I’ll scare you off both. It seems my karmic lesson in this life is that I have to fight for everything I want and that nothing I want will come to me easily.
I am a case study in if you want it bad enough... if you’re willing to fight and believe, you can do it. Believe me. If I can be here, so can you. You just have to steer that ship through the storms and no matter how foggy the day, believe that there is a safe harbor somewhere out there and that you will find it.
I was six years old (no lie) when I told my mother that I wanted to be a New York Times best selling author. I can still remember her face. She was putting mascara on in the bathroom mirror. She paused, wand in hand, to stare at me like I had three heads. “Do you even know what that is?”
“No. But it’s on all the books you read so I think it’s important and since I want to be a writer when I grow up, that’s the kind I want to be.” In fact, my Brownie manual from kindergarten has on the front page: When I Grow Up, I Want To Be: and scribbled in my unsteady handwriting are the words: A writer and a mother.
If you count comic books, I wrote my first book at five. If you count only prose, I had to wait until I was seven and could actually spell more than my name- well, spelling being a subjective thing. By the time I was eight, everywhere I went, I carried a handmade bag with five different spiral notebooks where I wrote on different stories every spare chance I had.
My first publication came in third grade when I wrote an essay about my mother for Mother’s Day that was published in a local paper. My next came at age 14 when I won a contest for Seventeen magazine. At 15, I saved up my babysitting money to buy a subscription to Writer’s Digest magazine. By 16, I was writing every day and on breaks at work and school. I was determined.
Now you would think with my course so clearly set, it would have been an easy victory. By the time I was in high school, I was an editor for my HS paper, writing for the yearbook and selling odd short stories a couple of times a year to different magazines and journals. By college, I was editor for the school paper and selling to several magazines a month and working as an editor for a small press SF magazine. And while I had several novels completed, I still hadn’t sent them out. Mostly because my best friend had told me that I was too young to sell a book. I don’t know why I listened to her. I love her. She’s still one of my best friends, but I took her words to heart.
Until I was 20. It had been a really hard year for me. I’d broken up with my boyfriend (who is now my husband) and one of my best friends had died in a car accident on my birthday coming to see me. She was the second of my best friends to die and all I kept thinking was that life could end tomorrow. I didn’t want to die without a book being in print. So I took my handwritten books and started typing one up with the goal of sending it to New York.
It took almost a year to finish the typed version of what would become Born of Night. I’d actually written the original draft when I was 12 and red Kim still has that copy (I’d given it to her in fear my house would burn down and I didn’t want to lose it). Since I didn’t have a typewriter (I’d sold mine to buy books for school), my older brother had borrowed one from his roommate so that I could finish my book during Christmas break. I still remember when he came to get the typewriter from me. “I know this one’s a winner, baby. I can’t wait to see it in print.”
My brother died four weeks later. I fell into utter darkness and honestly, I felt cursed. It was bad enough to lose friends, but my brother had been my sanity through much of a very crazy life and without him, I didn’t want to carry on. I wrote a note to him that I tucked into his casket and then I didn’t write anything for me again. I wrote what I had to for work and school, but creative writing was gone. And as soon as I didn’t have to write for school and work, I quit entirely. I had no heart and no soul. I was lost.
Then a stroke of fortune returned my hubby to me and we married very quickly after that. As I was packing to move my things, he found those old spiral notebooks and asked why I didn’t write anymore. “You used to always be scribbling something and talking about your latest book.”
I tucked the books away. “I don’t like doing it anymore.” I couldn’t bring myself to tell him that my heart was still broken. But we were in the middle of a recession. In a new state with a new hubby, money was tight and I couldn’t find work no matter how hard I tried. Another of my childhood friends who was an editor for a magazine called and I was telling her my plight. Diana told me that she had some articles she could throw my way. They didn’t pay much, but... it was money and I didn’t have to take my clothes off to earn it! Bonus time for me :)_
Dragging my hubby’s typewriter out of the closet and some yellowed paper I found in the bottom of a box, I sat down in the floor of our apartment (we couldn’t afford furniture yet) and started to work. The moment my hands touched those keys the dam inside me broke wide open. All those emotions and people I’d buried came rushing back with a fury and they all had a story to tell- I felt like Whoopie Goldberg in Ghost. Back Manatu- back! By the time my hubby had come home, I was surrounded by papers and had twenty pages of a new book. Crumpled up scraps were all around me and I was weeping.
My hubby was baffled. He’d left a perfectly sane wife that morning when he’d gone to work and he’d come home to a stark raving lunatic. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m writing!” I sobbed- yeah, I really had lost my mind.
I can still see the look on his face as he smiled. Then my extremely OCD hubby who can’t bear a mess for anything, took me out that night and bought a word processor (a cheaper alternative to a computer) and a card table and $10 steno chair so that I could work on my books without making a fire hazard in our two room apartment. It was there my first six books were written and I started many more while working two jobs (a full time secretary and part time teacher).
Two years after I sat down at that card table (thank God I was young with a good back and no carpal tunnel yet), I sold my first book. By that time, I’d collected a huge stack of rejections from everyone for my historicals, paranormals (Night Play, Night Pleasures and others) and SF books (Born of Night, Born of Fire and Born of Shadows). You really should see the collection. It’s quite impressive and if anything ever happens, we have toilet paper and enough fire fodder to last at least a year. Maybe more.
It would be the SF that sold first- that same book that I’d typed over Christmas break on brother’s roommate’s typewriter (say that three times fast). How did it happen? I had received a tip from one of my best selling friends who is sadly no longer publishing- she lost her contract when the paranormal market crashed a mere two years later and she never recovered from it- that a new editor had been hired and would start work the following Monday. I made sure I had Born of Night sitting on her desk with her name on it. My evil ploy worked. She was thrilled to have a project there and bought it a week later. Within that year, I sold five more SF and paranormal books and thought my career was set- like most writers would.
A mere year and a half later, even though my books had hit bestseller lists and won major awards, I couldn’t sell Alpo to a dog kennel. My career was over before it’d really began. The market had fallen out of the paranormal and no publishing house was interested in keeping us or publishing our books anymore. All of the friends I had who were writing the first wave of paranormals/futuristics were in the same boat. One by one, the ax fell, our contracts dried up and we scattered to the wind. Most of them to never publish again. Some went on to other genres.
I tried. It was not lack of effort on my part. If sheer will could get a contract, I would have never been without. But even though my critique partners were New York Times best selling authors and in spite of an impeccable spree with my early books and damn good sales on them, no one would touch me. I continued to write my paranormals and historicals which I’d always written. I wrote my SF and horror which I’d always written. I wrote contemporaries and chased every trend that hit NY. If someone opened a line, buddy, I was there with a submission. In one year alone, after I’d published six best selling books, I received over 150 rejections. In one year alone. After I’d sold...
Sobering, ain’t it?
Even worse, my personal life was also falling apart. My father died of cancer. My mother was diagnosed with it. My oldest son came seven weeks early and had horrifying medical problems, and I died giving birth (obviously they brought me back- or else the doctor needs to tell me something...). Because of the medical bills, we lost everything we had and there for a time, hubby, Bug and I were living out of a car in a Day’s Inn parking lot. It was horrifying. But we hung together since all we had was each other and slowly, we clawed our way out of poverty. Let me emphasize the word slowly. It took years to recover.
But I kept faith. I believed that someday someone would want my Dark-Hunters and my League books. One day... No it wasn’t easy. There was nothing easy about those years. And I hope to God none of you ever know the degradations and heartbreaks we suffered. I don’t know why some people like to kick others when they’re down, but they do and we were kicked hard.
Once we were able to get into an apartment again (it was an utter dive), I was able to get an agent. I couldn’t afford to send my books out, but my agent did. Not so much as a nibble came in. In fact, I received what was the worst rejection imaginable. “No one at this publishing house will ever be interested in this author. Do not submit her work to us again.” I still have that rejection and it still hurts. Honestly. When I look at it, I can still remember all the pain of that kick.
Because of it, I lost my agent. But you know what? That rejection really is truly the best thing that ever happened to me. And I needed it. That slap in the face brought out my fighting Apache blood I inherited from my great-grandfather’s people. I decided that if I was going to fail, it would be on my terms, writing the books I wanted to write. Not trying to fit into someone else’s mold. I vowed to myself that I’d never chase another trend or write to any market. I would listen to my characters and them alone and do what they told me to do. It forever changed my writing and it made me fearless.
But we were still broke. And my hubby told me it was time to stop chasing rainbows and wasting money on something that just wasn’t meant to be. I agreed. I was tired of being kicked. Without an agent, I couldn’t afford the paper and cost of mail. My mother who was still battling cancer and my brother had gone in together at Christmas to pay my RWA fees so that I could stay in my writer’s organization but that was money I could buy groceries with. So I told my hubby that once it lapsed, I’d never do it again.
A few weeks later the RWA magazine came and in it was the market update for the NY publishers. I saw a familiar name: Laura Cifelli. She was looking for submissions. Laura had been my agent back in the day when I’d actually been selling. I had no idea if she’d remember me or even want to look at anything I’d written. It’d been four years since I last sold a book and Laura had handed me that contract in person. Not to mention she’d kept another proposal of mine for two years at another publishing house before finally rejecting it and it’d been more than a year since that had happened. And then there was the small matter that I’d sworn to my hubby that I’d never, ever waste our money again on something so stupid.
Yet the little optimist in me wouldn’t let it go. I figured my dream was worth one more shot and if it didn’t work this time, then I really would give it up forever. So I stole a single stamp out of my husband’s wallet (I just couldn’t bring myself to tell him what I was doing) and typed out what had to be the worst query letter of all time. It actually began with, “You probably don’t remember me.” I was her first client and had been with her for two years. But I didn’t know what else to say really. On that day in 1997, I pitched Laura two books. One was about a pirate and the other about a Greek general cursed into a book...
Laura passed on what would become the first book of the Dark-Hunter series (no one at that time would touch anything paranormal and vampire was a four letter word), but she was interested in my pirate book. Saying the hail Mary, I printed it out, borrowed money from my neighbor Carrie and sent it off. Two days later, Laura offered me a three book deal on a book everyone had told me would never, ever sell (and I paid Carrie back with the advance) . It was set in 1791- no one wanted books set then and no one had bought a pirate novel in years at that point. 11 years later, that book is still in print. Even though my critique partners and everyone else, including my agent, had told me no one would ever buy a pirate novel (this was years before Pirates of the Carribean).
Not long after Laura bought that pirate novel, I sold one of the first ebooks published to one of the original 3 ebook publishers Dreams-Unlimited. I was the first New York published author to do so and that book was finally put into print last year as Born of Fire and became an instant #1 New York Times bestseller- thank you fans!
A year later, after Laura had convinced me to try another agent, I sweet-talked that agent into submitting my Dark-Hunters even though no one in New York wanted a vampire novel and she didn’t represent paranormals. The publishers kept saying there was no author on the bestseller lists with them. No readership for them. Nobody wanted a vampire series. Why was I bothering?
The answer was simple. I believed in Acheron and Kyrian and all the others and I wouldn’t give up on them.
Finally my agent was able to find an editor who was intrigued by the idea and after all the years of trying (the first Dark-Hunter novel, Night Play, was submitted to New York in 1990), the Dark-Hunters had found a home. But it still wasn’t easy. It’s been a whole lot of work and remains so to this day. I don’t anyone would believe me if I told them the honest truth of how hard it is.
I think one of the reasons why I have profound humor and tragedy side by side in my books is because that’s the life I’ve lived. One of the reasons my hubby married me is because I can find some irony to laugh about in the darkest storm and no matter what I keep my faith. Yeah, sometimes it wobbles and leans over even more than the Tower of Pisa, but I always manage to straighten it out and go forward. Not the Tower of Pisa, but my faith :)
My motto in life is simple: Over, under, around or through. There’s always a way. I tell everyone my whole life was changed by one postage stamp. And since 2004, I’ve put over 50 books on the NYT bestseller list under multiple categories, including manga, with 10 of them landing at #1. And if you use other lists, I’ve actually had 14 of them land at #1.
That dream I told my mom about when I was six did come true after a long, hard battle. The saddest part though is that she died just a few days before she got to see it.
It’s really ironic that the books everyone told me would never sell- books that while they were unpublished never finaled in any contest have now gone on to win many awards, critical acclaim and readers the world over. I can’t tell y’all how much it means to me to see a fan with a tattoo from one of my series or to see one of those dog-eared, much loved books in your hands. I never get tired of seeing them on the shelves or hearing how much you guys loved something I wrote. That’s all I’ve ever wanted.
When I was growing up and as an adult, books were my lifeline and my sanity in a world that seldom was kind or made sense. All I wanted as a child was to give to other people what those precious writers had given to me. Comfort on a lonely night. Laughter when I was sad. And most of all, hope that no matter how fierce that battle that if I fought hard enough, I’d make it through. God bless those writers who saved me then. And God bless all of you, my readers, for keeping me sane now. I love y’all more than you will ever know and believe me, I never take any of you for granted. Thank you for being there.
And for all of you who want to be writers, I hope you have an easy rise to the top. That you take off with that first book. But if you’re like me and it’s a lot of stops and starts along the way, keep your chin up. Believe in your work and in your characters. You can do it. Please don’t give up. I have faith in you. You deserve your dream and I hope from the bottom of my heart that it comes to you.
And if you’re a young writer, don’t listen to those who tell you to wait. S.E. Hinton was 14 when she wrote The Outsiders and Christopher Paolini was in his late teens when he wrote Eragon. You follow your dream and you fight for it. I have complete faith in you.
Nothing in life is easy, and there is only one guarantee in publishing that I can give you. If you don’t submit that book, they can’t buy it. So whatever you do, submit. It’s the only time I’ll ever tell anyone to submit to something cause when it comes to rules... smash those suckers to the ground :) Especially when those rules apply to writing books. Follow your instincts. Always.
Hugs!
