Smashwords at Upcoming Conferences and Events

This weekend kicks off a busy speaking schedule covering eight conferences, seminars and workshops and at least a dozen panels and presentations.

If you're attending any of these events, please say hello. It's always great to meet Smashwords authors, agents and publishers.

Each event is hyperlinked so you can learn more. For most events, some or all of the event is open to the public but please pre-register in advance to confirm attendance.

September 16-18 (San Luis Obispo, CA): 27th Annual Central Coast Writers' Conference. The keynoter is NY Times best-selling author Jonathan Maberry, who, btw, ran an in-depth interview with me on his blog yesterday. I'm participating in four sessions. On Friday, I'm participating the Tech, Toys and Digital Tools pre-conference workshop, and then on Saturday I'm on a fun panel that will do an American Idol-style evaluation of writers in the audience who request critiques (this should be interesting, at Smashwords I deliberately avoid judging author works). On Sunday I'll do a workshop on ebook publishing best-practices, and then at the end of the day I present a wrap-up keynote where I'll talk about the biggest trends impacting the future of publishing. My thanks to Laurie McLean, an agent at Larson-Pomada Literary Agents for introducing me to Judy Salamacha, the organizer of this conference who assembled such great speakers and workshops.

September 20 (Los Angeles, CA): Writers Guild of America. I'm speaking at a WGA workshop alongside authors Lee Goldberg (on Smashwords) and Alexandra Sokoloff (also on Smashwords). Topic: "E-Publishing: Self-Help for WGA Members."

September 21 (Los Angeles, CA): Northwestern University Entertainment Alliance. Topic: E-publishing Seminar. I'll provide a primer on ebook publishing, talk about big trends in publishing and how indie authors can exploit these trends, and then I'll wrap with my latest Seven Secrets talk where I review the best practices of the most successful Smashwords authors.

September 26 (New York, NY): PublishersLaunch Ebooks for Everyone Else, a conference produced by Michael Cader of Publisher's Lunch and Mike Shatzkin of IdeaLogical. It's full day seminar covering a bunch of cool topics of interest to authors, small publishers and literary agents. I'll talk a few minutes about how authors, agents and publishers can leverage automated conversion services such as Smashwords or those offered by some retailers to produce high-quality, low-cost ebooks. Also appearing at the conference: Jane Dystel of Dystel & Goderich Literary Management, Robert Gottlieb of Trident Media Group, Michael Tamblyn of Kobo, Scott Waxman of Diversion Books and the Waxman Literary Agency, David Wilk of Booktrix, Joshua Tallent of eBook Architects and other smart cookies you'll find here.

October 10 (San Francisco, CA): LitQuake. This conference looks so super cool I'm sorry I'm missing it. Adding to the coolness factor is Bill Kendrick, our CTO. He'll appear the evening of October 10 in a session titled, Want That Book Published? How to Navigate the New World of Publishing. Bill's fellow panelists include literary agent Ted Weinstein (Ted's on Smashwords!), Laura Mazer of Soft Skull Press and Penny Nelson of Manus and Associates Literary Agents.

October 19-23 (St. Pete Beach, Florida): Novelists, Inc. 23rd Annual Conference. Theme: New Rules, New Tools: Writers in Charge. I'll participate in multiple sessions. One session will explore the new publishing landscape, and will feature fellow panelists Don Weisberg of Penguin, Linda Quinton from Tor, Carolyn Pittis from Harper Collins, and Lou Aronica, a New York Times bestselling co-author, novelist, and former Publisher of Avon Books and Berkley Books. In another session, we'll explore how professional authors can maintain reader excitement between big book projects. This second panel features Don Weisberg, Linda Quinton and also includes the awesome David Wilk of Booktrix. Looking forward to meeting several Smashwords authors at the conference! Full speakers list here.

October 29 (Sunnyvale, CA): E-publishing workshop sponsored by the South Bay Writers chapter of the California Writers Club. I'm presenting an intensive 1/2 day seminar covering virtually everything you need to know to produce, publish, promote and sell an ebook. Click here for the workshop brochure (opens a PDF). I'll start with an introductory primer on ebook self-publishing, present the Seven Secrets of Ebook Publishing Success, and then will wrap with some advanced topics exploring issues like ebook pricing and retailer sales rank.

November 2 (San Francisco, CA): Ebooks for Everyone Else comes to San Francisco. The one-day information-packed seminar will feature several fresh faces not at the first event in New York City from September 26, including yours truly. I'll talk again about how authors, agents and publishers can leverage automated conversion systems such as Smashwords to produce high-quality, low-cost ebooks. Several agents will be on hand to discuss their indie ebook initiatives, including Deidre Knight of The Knight Agency, Laura Rennert of Andrea Brown Literary Agency, Scott Waxman of Waxman Literary Agency and Diversion Books, and Ted Weinstein of Ted Weinstein Literary Management. As I blogged earlier, I'm so excited about the opportunity for literary agents to help their clients do indie ebooks I created The Literary Agent's Indie Ebook Roadmap to assist their planning and strategy. Find the full list of speakers here.