The Creative Writing Life

20Books Vegas just opened up again for registration, so Brian Drake joined us AGAIN to discuss the conference with Justin. Also, this year, Justin joined a Skyrim designer to discuss writing for games.  http://20booksvegas.com/ What is 20Books Vegas all about? Here’s the introduction speeches and high-powered author panel from 20Books Vegas 2022. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTrqmZBt-FWUWnxWD2x5Ucg 20Books Vegas 2022 was by far the biggest and best of the 20Books shows (we’ve had a bunch). It is the biggest show in the world focused on self-publishing although there is something for every author, traditional or indie. Why would you come to Las Vegas in November to be with up to 2500 authors, publishers, and industry professionals? Because we believe that everyone deserves a chance to succeed if they take the knowledge and experience and apply it to their author business. What if you could ask a question of someone who is where you want to be? What would that question be? Vegas gives you that opportunity. We had over 300 authors making full-time money from their writing. There will be something for everyone. Be warned, no one is going to carry you and make you an overnight sensation. You have to do that for yourself by applying what over 100 guest speakers have to offer. Are you ready to excel, reap the rewards of your good work? Then take control of your author career. There is no other conference like 20Books Vegas. This show is predicated on the principle of giving back. It is run without any profit. We run this show because philanthropy is a part of our lives. We make our money off our fiction. We don’t need to make it from other authors. So we don’t. We get our reward when we see others We have our Live Events YouTube Channel so you can see the types of presentations we have made along with our daily material. Please follow the 20Booksto50k(R) Live Events channel for a great source of information on all things publishing. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTrqmZBt-FWUWnxWD2x5Ucg

Adrienne Young and Isabel Ibañez discuss their new release for writers - The Storyteller's Workbook https://www.amazon.com/dp/0593539435 About the Author Adrienne Young is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of the Fable duology and the Sky in the Deep duology. She is a foodie with a deep love of history and travel and a shameless addiction to coffee. When she’s not writing, you can find her on her yoga mat, sipping wine over long dinners, or disappearing into her favorite art museums. She lives with her documentary filmmaker husband and their four little wildlings in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. Isabel Ibañez is an award-winning designer and the author of Woven in Moonlight, a finalist for the William C. Morris Award and Time’s 100 Best Fantasy Books of All Time, Written in Starlight, and Together We Burn. Her designs have been sold in nationwide brands such as Anthropologie, Crate & Barrel, and Paper Source in the form of greeting cards, notepads, and journals. THE BOOK: Your companion to writing a novel from start to finish, with thoughtful prompts, calendars, and checklists to guide you along the way. Wherever you are on your journey as a writer, The Storyteller’s Workbook is your one-stop shop for planning, writing, and pitching your novel. Find the space and freedom to create authentically with just enough structure and guidance to get you to the finish line.

Join us as we discuss fun lives in writing for books, film, and games!  Go Ahead and Ask! https://www.amazon.com/Go-Ahead-Ask-Interviews-Screenwriting/dp/B09WRFNMV5 Creative Writing Life - https://www.amazon.com/Creative-Writing-Life-Justin-Sloan-ebook/dp/B07YR2FMYK Creative Writing Career - https://www.amazon.com/Creative-Writing-Career-Justin-Sloan-ebook/dp/B07YR2SHJ4

What are the basics in terms of creative writing? Justin and Paul dive into all of that! Enjoy.

Hudson Phillips joined Justin and Paul to discuss screenwriting and how to develop awesome characters. Enjoy!  Writer & Producer of @thisworldalonefilm and #guacamoleyesterdays 📖 Writing Unforgettable Characters now available on Amazon! hudsonwrites.com From Hudson:  I'm a screenwriter from Atlanta, GA that writes big, breezy genre films with equal parts humor and heart. I wrote and produced the feature film This World Alone which was released on Hulu in 2021. I previously had a script optioned by Lions Gate Films and have been hired to write three indie features in the past two years. I also founded the organization ScriptBlast, which helps struggling screenwriters navigate the ups and downs of the writing journey, and host the ScriptBlast Screenwriting Podcast. Additionally, I've spoken across the U.S. on screenwriting and indie film and have been featured on numerous podcasts including Show Don't Tell, Making Movies is Hard, and the AFC Indie Filmmaking Podcast. https://www.instagram.com/hudsonphillips/?hl=en https://www.imdb.com/name/nm4107902/

Author Troy Lambert joined Justin and Paul to discuss PLOTTR and 20BooksVegas! Plottr: Plan Your Books The Way You Think Outline faster, organize smarter, and turbocharge your productivity today with the #1 visual book planning software for writers. https://plottr.com/  How Plottr Will Help You Outline Your Books Visualize Your Plot Points Plottr lets you easily arrange (and rearrange) your scenes, plots, and character arcs so you can quickly find your way to the end of your tale — no corkboard required. ABOUT TROY, FROM TROY I’m Troy Lambert. I’ve been writing full time for a little over a decade now, with a part-time job thrown in from time to time for a variety of reasons, most of which I won’t go into here. I’ve always wanted to be a writer. When I was six, I penned the as-yet-unpublished book, George and the Giant Castle. It was an uphill battle from there, until I did one thing: I gave in. Let me explain. A Series of Name Tags and Hairnets I knew this was the career for me, really the only career for me. But everyone I told laughed. “That’s great,” they told me. “But what will you do for money?” So I believed them and embarked on a journey of more than three decades that included a series of nametags, hairnets, and potential careers that ended–well, not as well as I had hoped. I finally decided I needed to give this writing thing a real shot, right around the time that self-publishing became a thing.

Amanda Innes joins Justin and Paul to discuss writing, theater, publishing novels, and PA work.  ABOUT AMANDA Amanda Innes has been a production assistant on film sets, a dogsbody for community theaters, a performer of Shakespeare, an instructor for summer camps, and worked for major publishing houses before turning her attention to her own writing. She grew up in Texas, went to graduate school in Massachusetts, and now lives in Northern California. Grab her books on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Amanda-Innes/e/B096LDB8DL And especially THE GHOSTS OF MARSHLEY PARK: https://www.amazon.com/Ghosts-Marshley-Park-Amanda-Innes/dp/0578894866

Ashley Poprick joined Justin and Paul to chat about the Austin Film Festival, game writing, and the new game writing panels the #AFF is putting on.  From Ashley I’m Ashley “Ash” Poprik and I’m a game writer with 4+ years of game writing and 7+ years of screenwriting experience working in highly-collaborative studios. I have a knack for crafting memorable characters, snappy text, and whimsical stories. I have written for a variety of companies including Insomniac Games, Hasbro, and BonusXP. Here you can find my portfolio of professional works as well as some writing samples. Please, take a look around! I’ve recently redecorated the place :) https://ashleypoprik.com/

James Ridgley joined Justin and Paul to discuss filmmaking. He also shared his information on performing standup as well as on cruise ships, sketches, and going from juggling to microbudget films.  His IMDb - https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0725927 About James James Ridgley grew up as a latch-key kid in West Los Angeles attending IPS, a program within University High School; an highly experimental learning environment which involved Landmark training and other "therapy" type instruction. Also where he attended a Metaphysics class which lead to an actual one time telepathic communication from his teacher from across the city. This would later affect his current screenwriting efforts in the Spiritual Drama/Dramedy genre (Perhaps a just made up genre.) That same year in High School he started his career performing a Comedy-Juggling act around the world, working as an Opening Act for Ray Charles; Marilyn McCoo; worked with Penn and Teller, Pee Wee Herman, the late great Bill Hicks, Bob Saget and others. He performed Stand-Up in the 80's and 90's and dabbled in screenwriting. While the screenplay "DC DOG" got him noticed, along with a 2nd Place standing in Kodak's Short Script Film Awards for his original script "Where Life Begins" it didn't lead to production so he went to film school to learn the art himself. From this naive position he ended up with jobs in editorial and then mostly as a Production Sound Mixer, working with his favorite directors: Mark Pellington, Mike Mills, and Victor Salva. In between he writes and directs his own projects and has a slew of Screenplays ready to market.

PJ McIlvaine joins Justin and Paul to chat about writing picture books, screenplays and so much more.  https://pjmacwriter.com for her website! ABOUT: PJ McIlvaine is a prolific kid lit writer/author/screenwriter/writer/journalist. PJ’s debut middle-grade supernatural historical mystery from Darkstroke Books (April 2022) VIOLET YORKE, GILDED GIRL: GHOSTS IN THE CLOSET about the misadventures of a poor little rich girl who can see ghosts in NYC 1912 is now available on Amazon Kindle and paperback. PJ’s second picture book DRAGON ROAR about a sick, lonely dragon who has lost his fierce roar and the brave village girl who helps him find it again through acts of kindness (October 2021) from MacLaren-Cochrane Publishing with artwork by Logan Rogers.  PJ’s debut picture book LITTLE LENA AND THE BIG TABLE  (May 2019) with  illustrations by  Leila Nabih is about a little girl who discovers that sitting at the big table isn’t all it’s cracked up to be from Big Belly Book Co. In September 2023, PJ’s debut Young Adult Alternate History Adventure THE CONUNDRUM OF CHARLEMAGNE CROSSE set in Victorian London featuring an evil Queen Victoria, a determined heiress, a psycho cat, lobotomies, corsets, solar eclipses, and doomed romance from Orange Blossom Books  https://www.orangeblossombooks.com/ Coming in 2024-2027: a Creature Feature series and a standalone about a cookie thief for Young Dragons Press, an imprint of Oghma Creative Media. PJ is also a co-host of #PBPitch, the premiere Twitter pitch party for picture book creators. PJ has been published in numerous outlets including The New York Times and Newsday. PJ is also a regular contributor for the Children’s Book Insider newsletter, writing about the path to publication and featuring interviews with established and debut kid lit authors. In addition, PJ’s critically acclaimed Showtime original family movie MY HORRIBLE YEAR with Mimi Rogers, Karen Allen and Eric Stoltz, was nominated for a Daytime Emmy.  It’s still in the ether at You Tube. PJ is a born and bred New Yorker and is proud to call Eastern Long Island her home.  When she’s not writing or running after her four rambunctious grandchildren or tending to the capricious needs of Luna, a feisty French Bulldog who has a thing about feet, power tools, and following commands. PJ loves all kinds of international noir thrillers, period pieces, pizza, CSNY, John Hiatt, Steve Earle, Bruce Springsteen, horror movies, Stephen King, vanilla ice cream, and pretty much anything with Ted Levine.