I just got back from the AWP conference in Washington DC, and while I had a lot of fun, I’m utterly exhausted—there was just so much to do and so many people to see. I did a book signing for Peter Never Came at the Autumn House Press table; I went to tons of awesome, interesting panels (and a few flub panels, but that’s just the way it goes, isn’t it?); and I got to spend a lot of quality time hanging out with people I don’t normally get to see.

The sheer volume of people in the industry was a bit overwhelming at times, and many people at the conference seemed to have one of two opposing viewpoints about how it felt to be surrounded by thousands of other writers for four continuous days. Some people talked about the sense of community, how nice it was to get so many people with similar interests and career goals together in the same place. Several people, though, said that they knew they should feel that way . . . but they didn’t. Instead, they found it kind of depressing, having such a tangible, concrete reminder of just how many people are submitting to the same places, how unique we each absolutely are not. 

I lean more towards the former opinion, and there are a few reasons why:

1. Even though a huge conference like this is a cold reminder of how much competition you have, it’s also a reminder that people do make it in this field. Many of the writers in the sea of people had books out, had published in a variety of journals, had won awards, had landed agents—and most of them are not any better or doing anything much different than the writers at the conference who hadn’t yet reached those achievements. The breaks, they do come; you just have to stick with the game long enough to start getting noticed.

2. The book fair reassured me that there are many, many possible venues for publication. I’ve been researching, submitting to, and getting published in journals for so many years now, I sometimes feel like there are probably no journals I haven’t heard of—but there are. And being new to the book publication game, there are also many small presses that I either am not very familiar with or haven’t heard of at all. There are tons of places I can send my work out to, and I suppose I say this in part because I’ve had enough small-scale publication success to feel confident in my abilities as a writer, but just the knowledge that there are so, so, so many options available makes me believe that anything I try to publish, will get published eventually—I just have to keep sending it around.

3. Even though I understand the complaint I heard from many other writers at the conference—that it got to be grating being immersed in this limited world where everybody you see is in the same field and everywhere you go people are having the same conversations—I really like talking about writing. Talking writing, even when it’s nothing new, even when it’s just the same conversations I’ve heard or the same panel discussions I’ve sat through hundreds of times before, still gets me going. I leave this kind of thing feeling totally keyed up and ready to write.

That’s not to say there aren’t depressing things, too, for example, the stark contrast at the book fair between the people working the tables, who were mostly trying to convince people to buy their books, journals, and paraphernalia, and the people stopping by the tables, who were mostly looking for places they could submit their own work. I have to admit, I find it disturbing that unknown authors who publish with small presses don’t always seek out and read other work published by unknown authors through small presses; likewise, people who want to publish their work in journals don’t always read journals. I would be a hypocrite if I only read work published by major publishing houses and famous authors—if I don’t even read unknown authors like myself, how can I expect other people to give me a chance?

This has been especially on my mind because I did see one such hypocrite up close at the book fair. She was an editor from a small press (I won’t say which one), and she was a bit curt with an editor at another small press table for trying to tell her about some book she had never heard of. “I believe you that it’s a good book,” she said, “but I don’t know who this author is. There are probably tons of good books that I’ll never read. I want to buy something I’ve heard of.” How did she live with herself when she returned to her own small press table and tried to sell the unknown authors and books her press publishes?

Still, overall, I found the conference far more encouraging and motivating than depressing. I left the conference exhausted, as I said, but also anxious to get back to work. I had a ton of fun, went to some cool panels, and bought some new books I would probably never have heard of anywhere else. I could definitely see doing this every year if I could afford to.