At Book­Expo Amer­ica (BEA) | Photo: Porter Anderson

By Porter Ander­son | @Porter_Anderson

Con­tact me with details of your con­fer­ence and/or trade show and I’ll be glad to con­sider adding it to the list here.

June 27–29 Jack­son Hole, Wyoming: Jack­son Hole Writ­ers Con­fer­ence:  “Each year dis­tin­guished speakers, editors and agents join our res­i­dent fac­ulty to deliver a week­end of active and engag­ing dia­logue, col­lab­o­ra­tion and the oppor­tu­nity for all of us to raise the stakes on our work.Manuscript cri­tiques are an impor­tant part of our con­fer­ence, pro­vid­ing a way for you to dis­cuss your work one-on-one with expe­ri­enced writ­ers, edi­tors and agents.” The pro­gram also fea­tures a pre-conference writ­ing work­shop.

June 29 San Fran­cisco: digi.lit: Litquake’s Dig­i­tal Pub­lish­ing Con­fer­ence: “Litquake’s digi.lit is a full-day con­fer­ence that will explain and demys­tify the new dig­i­tal pub­lish­ing landscape.digi.lit will put you in the same room with authors, pub­lish­ers, edi­tors, mar­keters, agents, and book­sellers who are defin­ing the future of read­ing and pub­lish­ing.” Note speak­ers include April Eber­hardt, Jon Fine, Laura Miller, Neal Pol­lack, John Tay­man.

July 8 Lon­don South­bank: The Book­seller Design Con­fer­ence: “Great design is a col­lab­o­ra­tive effort. The con­fer­ence will focus on effec­tive use of design across every ele­ment of the book busi­ness. We’ll explore ways in which we can all be braver, have more fun and escape the trap of the copy­cat cover into which we are all forced far too reg­u­larly.” List of speak­ers.

July 9 Lon­don South­bank: The Book­seller Mar­ket­ing & Pub­lic­ity Con­fer­ence: “The Book­seller Mar­ket­ing & Pub­lic­ity Con­fer­ence launches as a full-day event (Tues­day 9th July 2013 at the Pur­cell Room, South­bank Cen­tre), for the first time. The pro­gramme will reflect that the lines between pub­lic­ity and mar­ket­ing are blur­ring. The aim of the con­fer­ence is to pro­vide inspi­ra­tion and prac­ti­cal tips to drive sales and reader engage­ment. We’ll be bring­ing mar­ket­ing, pub­lic­ity and brand lead­ers from out­side the indus­try to give us some time to look up from our books and under­stand the wider trends.” List of speak­ers.

July 25–28 Seat­tle: Pacific North­west Writ­ers Asso­ci­a­tion: “This annual sum­mer con­fer­ence is an oppor­tu­nity for writ­ers of all lev­els to meet other writ­ers, attend ses­sions focused on dif­fer­ent aspects of the craft, and pitch your ideas to agents and edi­tors. Ses­sions led by indus­try experts are crafted to address many aspects of the pub­lish­ing indus­try. From keep­ing track of your expenses to craft­ing the per­fect pitch, ses­sions give you a chance to inter­act with experts and ask ques­tions in a friendly and open envi­ron­ment.” Speak­ers include Don­ald Maass, Deb­bie Macomber.

Sep­tem­ber 26 New York City (Met­ro­pol­i­tan Pavil­ion): Mar­ket­ing + Pub­lish­ing Ser­vices Con­fer­ence & Expo: “This inno­v­a­tive con­fer­ence & expo is really two related shows, held together. The Mar­ket­ing Con­fer­ence is a full-day ded­i­cated event that presents a com­pre­hen­sive strat­egy for mar­ket­ing in the dig­i­tal age. ThePub­lish­ing Ser­vices Expo offers three finely-targeted “mini-conferences” for impor­tant and often-overlooked pub­lish­ing con­stituen­cies. Each track is an afford­ably priced, effi­ciently pro­grammed two-and-half-hour ses­sion that pairs con­cise edu­ca­tional ses­sions with ven­dor speed dat­ing to learn about new solu­tions.” Pro­duced by Dig­i­tal Book World and Pub­lish­ers Launch (Pub­lish­ers Lunch’s Michael Cader and Mike Shatzkin

Sep­tem­ber  27–29 Los Ange­les: Writ­ers Digest Con­fer­ence West: “You’ll make real con­nec­tions with fel­low writ­ers, expe­ri­ence the thrill of pitch­ing your work to lit­er­ary agents and edi­tors, and get prac­ti­cal publishing-industry advice and writ­ing inspi­ra­tion from suc­cess­ful authors at Writer’s Digest Con­fer­ence West.”

Octo­ber 12 San Fran­cisco: Writ­ing for Change Con­fer­ence: “The Fifth San Fran­cisco Writ­ing for Change Con­fer­ence is the place to dis­cover whether your book can change the world. The theme of the con­fer­ence is “Chang­ing the World One Book at a Time,” and the goal is to encom­pass busi­ness, pol­i­tics, tech­nol­ogy, social issues, the envi­ron­ment, cul­ture, the law, and much more.” The event will be held at the Uni­tar­ian Uni­ver­sal­ist Cen­ter at the cor­ner of Geary and Franklin in San Francisco.

Novem­ber 21, Lon­don: The Book­seller Future­Book Con­fer­ence: Once again at the Queen Eliz­a­beth II Cen­tre in West­min­ster, the con­fer­ence is industry-focused and usu­ally includes both ple­nary and break­out ses­sions dur­ing the course of the day. Details as they become available.

Feb­ru­ary 13–16, 2014: San Fran­cisco Writ­ers Con­fer­ence: “Atten­dees have access to more than fifty “how to” ses­sions, pan­els, and work­shops.  An Inde­pen­dent Edi­tor con­sul­ta­tion and Ask a Pro are included in the reg­is­tra­tion fee. Our famously pop­u­lar Speed Dat­ing for Agents is still only $50 to pitch to a room full of agents.  And you will find there are plenty of one-on-one oppor­tu­ni­ties to pitch your work to well-known pub­lish­ing pro­fes­sion­als dur­ing the week­end. The Con­fer­ence fea­tures large and small tra­di­tional pub­lish­ing houses, but also gives atten­dees the lat­est e-publishing, social media, and self-publishing information.”

Con­tinue to watch this page for updates on con­fer­ences through­out the season.

About Porter Ander­son

Porter Ander­son, BA, MA, MFA, is a Fel­low with the National Crit­ics Insti­tute and has done spe­cial read­ings in the psy­chol­ogy of the arts at the Uni­ver­sity of Bath, UK. As a jour­nal­ist, he has worked with three net­works of CNN (CNN USA, CNN Inter­na­tional, CNN.com) and was on the lead devel­op­ment team for CNN.com Live. He also has worked on The Vil­lage Voice, Dal­las Times Her­ald, D Mag­a­zine, Sara­sota Herald-Tribune and other out­lets. He writes the weekly (Thurs­days) WRITING ON THE ETHER col­umn at JaneFriedman.com and (Mon­days) ETHER FOR AUTHORS col­umn at PublishingPerspectives.com. Ander­son also is a reg­u­lar con­trib­u­tor to WriterUnboxed.com and to Dig­i­tal Book World’s (DigiBookWorld.com) Expert Pub­lish­ing Blog. He has been posted by the United Nations to Rome (P-5, laissez-passer) for the World Food Pro­gramme, and served as Exec­u­tive Pro­ducer to INDEX: Design to Improve Life in Copen­hagen. He is based in Tampa and his pri­mary medium is Twit­ter. Fol­low him @Porter_Anderson

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