Well, I'm back from the utter fun that was Conflux. Before I say anything else, let me extend my warmest thanks and congratulations to Nicole Murphy and her team, who did a wonderful job. Con running is a massive gig, and these guys were brilliant.

BTW, I still can't make the cut thingy work so I apologise in advance for a looooong journal entry.

I'll get to the con report in a moment, but first I have a little exciting news to share. The Innocent Mage is now at #2 in the US charts. No, my feet haven't touched the ground again yet. There's a chance they never will.

On a more worrying front, I came home to find my sole surviving dog McDuff, who by a miracle avoided death a few years ago when he was afflicted with a spinal embolism and temporary paralysis, is having troubles with his back legs again. He's lined up to visit the vet first thing tomorrow, but at nearly 18 I know time is running out for him. I just don't want it to be now, because of this. Apart from his neural troubles he's healthy and happy, and having lost my other 2 dogs so recently the thought of losing him so soon is tough to take. So please, spare us a good thought.

Back to a happier thought, I'm currently Guest Writer on a UK writing website called Writer's Dock. You can find the site here: http://www.writersdock.org.

This is a great writing resource and community and it's a massive compliment that I've been invited along to participate. It's free to join, with lots of forums and avenues for writing community and advice. I'll be there this week, answering questions about writing in general and my work in particular, so if you've got questions to ask or just want to see what other people are asking, and how long I can go on without taking a breath, hop on over and join in the fun.

I actually managed to get some writing done while I was at the convention, so here is the current status of Do No Harm:

37,344 / 90,000 (41.5%)

I'm getting there ...

Now, my con report.

Went down Thursday afternoon, on the train. Yes, I could've driven, but I'm not very good driving to places I don't know. Yes, I'm neurotic. Feel free to sue me. But when it comes to public transport and me and Canberra I'm cursed. The last two times I've gone down there, once by bus and once by train, I was both times trapped in a small space with hideous people who wouldn't shut up. Hours and hours and hours of blather, obscenities and tedious life stories at the tops of their lungs without a single bus or rail employee willing to take responsibility and shut them the hell up. This time was no exception. This time I was stuck in front of some old fart who said, no joke, This train is 47 seconds late in leaving the station! I'm going to complain! Who can I complain to?!?!?!

And spent the next 2 hours harangueing his wife and complaining. I was trying to write, I had my portable cd player blasting, and I could still hear him. Drove me nuts. So next time I'm driving. Especially since this time I got a lift back with my incomparable editor Stephanie and paid special attention to how she did it.

I suppose it serves me right for being neurotic ...

So. On the Thursday night I did a signing at Dymocks Belconnen with Russell Kirkpatrick and Trudi Canavan. It was a lot of fun, so many thanks to Jodi the HC rep who did the hard work with the stock and the guys at the shop who were so welcoming and did their best to help us sell more books! Then it was on to a precon dinner, which was lovely too.

On Friday I took 2 workshops, Map Stuff with Russell Kirkpatrick and German Longsword Fighting with Chris Barnes. As well as being a fantasy writer Russell is a professional cartographer, and he's a great lecturer and knows his stuff. I still hate maps, but he got me thinking. As for the sword fighting, well, I have a new hobby. It was brilliant!!!!! I loved it!!!! Chris was a great teacher, as was his teacher Andrew. I killed Emma (my sparring partner) about 40 times and it was so satisfying!!!! She said I had a scary face. I can't imagine what she means ...

Stay tuned for Karen's adventures as an apprentice German longsword fighter. There's a chance I'll be the only girl there. But who cares? Did I mention it was fun?????

On Saturday I partook of a couple of panels and led a workshop on writing fantasy novels. The first panel was mistakes beginner writers make, and I had the pleasure of sharing it with Garth Nix, YA writer extraordinaire, and the enthusiastic gungho local small press publisher Donna Hanson. They were both con guests. We decided it was important for new writers to be persistent, to cultivate objectivity, to accept editorial input, to never stop working hard developing their craft and to learn as much as they can about the business so they can always be professional.

The second panel was on author blogging, chaired by the wonderful Fiona McLennan (Ph8 on livejournal) and also included the lovely and talented Deb Biancotti. We came to the conclusion that blogging only works if you're consistent, don't whinge about personal stuff and somehow keep readers entertained. I'm still working on that ...

Then I held my fantasy writing workshop. It was full and it was fun. My lord. I opened my mouth and started talking and 3 1/2 hours later I shut up. We had a lot of laughs and I think the folk who trusted me to help them a bit felt they knew a bit more about the process by the end.

Saturday night I went to dinner with Russell and Stephanie and Ross Temple from New Zealand, and learned the hard way not to eat Ethiopian food. It's great food, but whatever they put in it seasoning/spice-wise gives me the same allergic reaction I now get from Indian food. Ewwwww. So I woke up at 1 am and never really got back to sleep. When I did doze off I dreamed my throat was swelling shut and I was asphyxiating. Gee, that was fun!

Saturday afternoon was the Big Book Signing, and that was fun too. I even signed some books!

Sunday saw me on three more panels: I chaired the one about writing media tie-ins, and managed (just) not to be over-awed by Kevin J Anderson, Rebecca Moesta and Sean Williams. What a delightful panel, and what wonderful people to share it with. Sometimes panels can be a nightmare, to watch, to participate on, to chair, but these guys are so professional, so generous, so interested in other people, they made it easy peasy. Really great stuff, and the audience had fun too. We decided media tie ins are fun and the folk who sneer at them are snotty pretentious arty farty wankers. Works for me!

Then it was the Booksellers talk about what readers want panel, and that was fun too. Me and my harem. Trevor Stafford, Leigh Blackmore and a lovely lovely guy whose name has just flown right out of my head. Mea culpa. We came to the conclusion that readers want bang for their buck and a bloody good read and that there's a serious disconnect between what most fans consider great stories and what's annointed as such by some of the literarti crowd.

Last but not least, Trudi Canavan donned copious amounts of black leather to lead the A Dark Lord's Guide to Hiring Henchman panel, which was very silly and a lot of fun. On that panel were also Sharyn Lilley (eneit on livejournal, who launched her wonderful new horror anthology In Bad Dreams with co-editor Mark Deniz) and new Orbit fantasy author Pamela Freeman. Did I mention this panel was very very silly?

A lot of the panels were recorded for podcasting. I believe you can find them at http://www.conflux.org.

A bunch of us went to dinner at a restaurant called Cream on Sunday night, and it was great. I had a long conversation with Jack Dann, for the first time ever, and he was a lot of fun. I was opposite Kim Westwood, a superb writer being published by Voyager next year, and the three of us swapped dog stories. Jack used to be a cat man, but now he has a beagle so he's been converted.

Finally, as we walked home from the reastuarant, I had my first ever proper chat with renowned editor Jonathan Strahan, who's part of the big push for Australian spec fic authors in the US next month.

And on Monday morning Stephanie and I drove home. Note to anyone who's interested: there is no petrol station in Berrima. Do not leave the freeway to fill up on petrol in Berrima, because you can't. Okay? Also? If you want to get off the M7 onto Sunnyholt Road, don't take the exit signposted to Blacktown because that puts you onto Reservoir Road. I'm still trying to work that one out ...

It was a great weekend. I caught up with many lovely people (hi Cora!), failed to track down everyone to say good bye to them (Mark! Eneit! Arrgghh) I also got to meet Keri Arthur, a massively successful Australian urban fantasy/paranormal romance writer who's a New York Times bestseller. And so lovely! So down to earth. Why aren't we celebrating people like Keri loudly enough to blow the roof off????? Her achievements are massive. Go Keri!

And that was the con. Now I'm exhausted and as I said, worried about Duff. I've got heaps of catching up to do, so will accept I'm knackered now and look to punching through the rest of the Stargate novel starting tomorrow.

Did you hang in all the way through this mammoth post? Good for you!!!!