Yesterday was my first trip to the Emerald City Comic-Con and I had a blast. ECCC delivered on everything I expected. Crazy costumes, interesting speakers and acres upon acres of exhibits.
I know one of the complaints about the San Diego Con is that’s it’s more about pop culture than comic books, and that was one of my trepidations about attending EC. Star Wars, Star Trek and Dr. Who were soundly represented, but thankfully, comics remained the main focus, at least in the exhibit hall. I could have spent an entire day looking over all of the work on display, and I scored a great piece of art (thank you Greg Horn). I was hassled by a couple of vendors because I was more interested in the unlicensed art, but I’m sorry, the montage of Batman through the ages was awesome, but I don’t have a $1000 to plunk down for wall art.
One of the panels I sat in on featured several editors from publishers that specialize in science fiction/fantasy work. The questions from the audience were exactly the same you hear in a newbie romance writing class. What’s a query letter? Do you need an agent to be published? What are you sick of seeing? And their answers were ones I’ve heard before at other romance writing conferences, which was kind of comforting to know basic publishing knowledge spans across other commercial fiction genres.
Under one roof there were independent comic creators sitting beside the big guns of DC and Marvel. When surrounded by people who love what they do, you can’t help but be inspired. I left ECCC eager to return to my writing and with the hope that no matter what my level of success, I will always create stories that are born from my love of the craft. While that plan may not always be profitable, I will keep in mind the time old saying, “If you do what you love, then it’s not work.” And who knows, maybe next year I’ll have my own table in the exhibit hall.
Hmmm, I wonder if I should work on a costume.