I had a really nice lunch in White Marsh yesterday with my fiction cronies! In the photo, you’ll see Chandra, Tiff, and Dani, the Baltimore subgroup of the Midatlantic chapter of American Christian Fiction Writers (ACFW).

We chatted about lots of things, but the most exciting is that Tiff is getting married!!! I’m sure she’ll be doing lots of planning within the next few months for her upcoming wedding!

Writing-wise, we talked about the submissions we currently have out at various publishing houses. We also chatted about agents and writers conferences. I told of how I sold my book to Barbour, and Tiff also told of her sale. Her book is entitled Promises Promises and it will be released as part of the Heartsong Presents line in January 2008.

I told of my experiences at the Philadelphia Christian Writers Conference last August, and Tiff told us about the Delaware Christian Writers Conference. I also reminisced about the good times I’d had at the now-extinct Mid-Atlantic Christian Writers Conference.

I pointed out that I usually choose the conferences that I plan on attending based upon the editors and agents attending. All three of my lunch buddies pointed out to me that I need to also look at the workshops being offered. They said that sometimes you can glean a wealth of information from the fiction workshops. I catalogued that information in the back of my mind for future reference.

I spoke a little about my agent search and we also talked about the fact that most Christian publishers require that you have an agent in order to submit. The exceptions are Steeple Hill and Barbour. I also recall reading something similiar on agent Chip MacGregor’s blog, about publishing houses closing the doors to unagented submissions. The only way around that is to meet with an editor at a writers conference!

Cecelia Dowdy
www.ceceliadowdy.com