I happen to be making a brief sojourne to New York City at the moment. I'm staying in the heart (sorry) of the city, about a block away from the Empire State building, pictured to the left, above.

 Apart from the 'having a good time, wish you were here' postcard greetings, I had lunch yesterday with the inimitable Janet Reid, who will be presenting at the conference this year. We had a great time chatting about the conference, and she told me she is very excited about having the chance to work with  writers in her Master Class this year.

Janet will be talking about query letters in Query Roulette -- how to take your letters and polish them to their finest. This is a chance to learn from a high profile, New York agent EXACTLY what makes a decent query letter -- an opportunity not to be missed! You can register any time, although Janet has asked that interested folks be sure to send her a sample query in advance so she can go through them in the class, polish them to a fine shine -- and everyone attending benefits.

Already registered for the conference? No problem. You can register for Master Classes by calling the conference centre at 604-594-2000 or drop me a line and I'll help you through the process. You can find me at kcdyer@siwc.ca

 A reminder that there are only 9 writing days left before our contest closes -- get your entry in today! You can find details here: SiWC Contest Page

Good luck from the Big Apple!

~kc

Okay -- this is not really Janet. This is the image she sent me for our website -- the Great White Shark, still chomping away on her latest victim's legs.

This is the image she LIKES having out there.

Janet Reid came to SiWC for the first time last year, and was an instant hit. She fit right in -- just gets the whole vibe of what the conference is...and tries to be.

Janet is one of the stellar agents at FinePrint Literary Management in New York City, where she specializes in crime fiction. She's an incredible agent, AND I happen to know that she liked what she saw at SiWC so much last year, she's coming back to us again. We couldn't be more thrilled.

Janet is also an avid blogger, and among other places, you can find her blogging pretty regularly here.

Now that our remarkable list of presenters is available on the site, we're getting many questions about this year's content. What workshops will be on offer? Which panels will be available to choose from? Who will the keynote speakers be this year?

Fear not -- step one of the scheduling process is now complete. If you check over at the menu on the right, you'll see a new button for 'Conference Overview'. Our WebWizard has spent long hours re-working the code for this new section, and it's now up and running. The next step is to begin loading the more than 70 workshops, panels, keynotes and more that will be on offer at the conference this year.