Parisian Phoenix Publishing

This one will be short. Or so I hope. Because the dog just ate half my pot pie and if anything’s a sign that I’m done for the day, it’s somehow letting the dog eat half my dinner when I’m not even sure when I took my eyes off my dinner long enough for the dog to eat it.

Many moons ago, I was a much younger writer and president of the Greater Lehigh Valley Writers Group… and this is a story that follows the theme of all roads lead to Jonathan Maberry.

I met lawyer and writer Mike Ventrella at the writers group around the same time we all were introduced to Maberry, or maybe Ventrella met him first and helped introduce him to GLVWG, I really don’t know the exact chronology.

Mike was an active part of Maberry’s Writer’s Coffeehouse (where writers from the Philadelphia area would get together, drink coffee, talk craft and, importantly, write) and Maberry’s Philadelphia Liars Club, because what are writers if not good liars…

Mike started a writers group in Stroudsburg, Pa., modeled after Maberry’s principles and even received permission to name it the Pocono Liars Club. Today was their annual conference and since I probably haven’t seen Mike in 15 years and the mix of presenters for the event looked really good, I thought it would be nice to head up to the Hughes Building of the Eastern Monroe Public Library over by the Stroud Mall.

Today’s presenters included Mike, Joshua Palmatier of Zombies Need Brains, Lori Perkins of Riverdale Avenue Books, journalist and author Randee Dawn, and fantasy author Leslye Penelope. Everyone of them had good things to share. (More on that tomorrow, via Substack.)

The Pocono Liars Club offers its basic conference for free. The library pays the speakers. The club pays for incidentals and asks for donations. The speakers also give personalized workshops that run concurrently with the main event, and those cost $20 per session. Those fees go directly to the speaker.

The result, in my humble opinion, is a truly personalized experience– both in content and financial impact, as writers can plan their day based on what they wish to gain and how much they have to spend.

My Substack newsletter that I compose and release tomorrow will summarize “lessons of self-promotion” that I compiled from this and other events this week (the Greater Lehigh Valley Writers Group The Write Stuff Conference and the Writing, Reading and Retailing Symposium at DeSales University) because I am just wiped out.

But let me say that ALL THREE events surpassed my expectations and allowed me to expand my marketing brain. And in some cases reassure my marketing brain, because this stuff is not consistent. It all changes regularly.

So check out my Substack here to subscribe and/or find that summary.