Internet Librarian: J. A. Jance
One of the things I learned early as a writer is to always go to talks by writers whenever possible. An advantage of going to librarians’ conferences is that there are often writers speaking. Internet Librarian kicked off with a talk by J. A. Jance. It won’t surprise some of you to know I have not read any of her work (yet) because I just don’t read as often as some people think librarians should. Listening to her talk about her writing career, how she got started, and from where she gets some inspiration was quite nice. She wrote her first book after getting divorced. She said when she began writing, it was like someone had wrapped her in a cozy down comforter. It was terrific and felt like something she was supposed to have been doing all along. She hasn’t stopped yet.
A few days ago, I was talking with someone about whether or not I’m more artistic than a sibling. I listed all of these arts in which I participate and in which my sibling does not. The next day, I realized I did not identify myself as a writer. I have always identified myself as a writer. How could I forget that? I think I began writing when I was in the first or second grade with those spelling class assignments. Everyone else just wrote brief tales or sentences. I had a serial. My stories were so popular among my classmates, several of them insisted that I read my story each time the teacher wanted some students to share their work outloud. I had forgotten those memories until recently.
Anyway, back to J. A. Jance. She said one of the values she gets out of the Internet comes from the fans and readers who contact her through that medium. E-mail has really opened up communication channels. I feel like that’s true: I probably get more e-mail at my job than I would get letters. She shared some of her fan mail with us.
J. A. Jance has several series: a detective in Seattle, an accidental sherriff in Arizona, horror books, and a new series with a female protagonist. Joanna Brady.
“You can write whatever you want because no one will ever recognize themselves,” she relates after talking about a character based on her mother.
Side notes: Internet Librarian has free wifi. This conference gets it. W00t! I forgot who is sponsoring it, but I will remember to write down the name later to thank them publicly. It’s Blue something.
I was having problems getting on the network, so I wandered around until I found another Mac user and asked if she wouldn’t mind giving me a hand. Leave it to a very helpful librarian to point out my silly mistake that was preventing me from getting online. I had even opened up the back door of my machine earlier to make sure my wireless card was seated properly, since it often slides out of the slot. ha ha ha to user errors. No wonder I couldn’t get on the wifi at the hotel last night.
I was able to pick up a complimentary copy of the October 2006 Searcher magazine where my friend and former Boston colleague Helen Keil Losch and her colleague Daphne Chang have an article about some cool stuff the Stanford Graduate School of Business. I look forward to reading it!
Tag: il2006
