No Longer There But Not Yet Here Either

#AWP2025 Chronicles

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AWP 2025

I’m back home in Portland recovering this week after three days in LA at AWP. Funny thing: life doesn’t stop while you’re at a conference with 10,000 attendees and 600 exhibitors. I’ve been in that no-longer-there-but-not-yet-here-either space all week, trying to figure out which of the 2,346 to-dos on my list to tackle first. This post has been top-of-list and top-of-mind all week but it kept getting shoved aside for other things. (Such as the necessity to watch Octonauts with a sick four-year-old.)

The initials stand for Associated Writing Programs but nobody calls it that. You have to call it AWP, tossed off quickly and authoritatively, as if everyone on the planet knows what it is. I’ve been to six or seven of them now, attending off and on since the dark ages when I still an MFA student, back in, dear lord, maybe 2003? 2004? In case you haven’t been (and I do acknowledge that most humans on the planet haven’t), AWP is a world of its own, a mob scene of presentations (seriously there are hundreds of them) and exhibitors at the book fair (again, 600 or so). In whatever city the conference is in (this year LA), attendees swarm the designated convention center like ants and they are instantly recognizable by the lavender and orange-imprinted AWP tote bags carried over their shoulders and the lavender lanyards around their neck. (Props to the several writers who managed to wear outfits in lavender that matched the chosen AWP color scheme.)

Since it is an association for writing programs, it leans heavily towards the literary side of the writing world but there were also agents and editors in attendance and industry stalwarts like Jane Friedman.

Every other year I’ve gone to attend workshops and panels, and a couple of years, okay maybe it was only once, I presented. But this year I was an exhibitor in the bookfair, along with my business partner Debbie and our intrepid friend Jenni. Here is where I should plop in the photo of Debbie and I standing behind the table in our LGW aprons but I HATE IT SO MUCH I’M NOT GOING TO. I’m the boss here and I get to make that executive decision. Instead, behold, Debbie and Jenni looking chipper:

The way it started

But before we set up our table, we had to get there. Our plane arrived late to LAX, which is, pardon me, every bit the shit show you think it will be. The Lyft app says to schedule a driver as soon as you land and so once we got our bags I did. Turns out that was a mistake because at LAX you have to get in a long line to take a shuttle to the ground transportation pick-up point. Because of that, our driver almost left us. And then it turned out he did not speak a bit of English and to communicate with me needed to call a friend who did speak it. And his front seat was covered with his belongings and it wasn’t a very big car so the three of us sat crammed together in the back seat.

Fun ride.

And then we got to our motel.

Which was even more fun.

Pro tip: if you’re attending a conference at the LA Convention Center and trying to go budget, the Rodeway Inn on Olympic may not be your best bet. For starters, it’s in a dodgy neighborhood. The lobby is locked so you yell through a window to talk to a motel employee, the elevator is broken and the swimming pool is full of concrete. But the rooms were clean and did I mention it was cheap? And we are always up for an adventure.

Back in the dark ages of December, when we came up with this plan and booked the motel, their website promised breakfast. That did not happen. Did I mention the lobby was locked? Thus no place for breakfast. But luckily it turns out that the Korean coffee chain Tom N Tom’s is a great coffee bar. There was one across the street from our motel, it’s connected to the lobby of the Live Hotel, the place we should have stayed, had we known the Rodeway Inn was going to be what it is. Haha. Great breakfast sandwiches and coffee, and exceptionally friendly server. Actually, almost everyone in LA has been exceptionally friendly. (And that many of them are actively planning escapes to less stressful living situations.)

How it Went

After we got through registration and got set up (refer to above photo) we settled in. And for the next three days, in between breaks to wander the bookfair, use the bathroom, and eat lunch, we had pretty much the same conversation at least a hundred times.

Bookfair attendee: “What is it that you do?” (Variations: “What’s going on here? What do you have for me?”)

Charlotte, Debbie, or Jenni: “We run writing workshops in France and England.” (Variation: “We run writing workshops in France and England and around the Pacific Northwest.”)

And then, if the attendee expressed even a glimmer of interest, we would respond: “Would you like to sign our mailing list?”

So, yeah, that happened over and over. But it wasn’t boring. Because there was an incredible amount of diversity at AWP, in race, gender, and fashion prowess. You might expect most writers to show off a tweedy professor look and there was plenty of that. But there were also writers clad in slinky evening gowns, colorful dresses, slouchy yoga pants and/or jeans, and out-of-this-world combinations of all of the above. We got to talk to lots of fabulous people. And I got to see my old friend Katy Yocom. She and I met in 2001, when we were both newbie MFA students. She’s gone on to write a stellar novel and serve as the associate director of the Naslund-Mann Graduate School of Writing, from which we both graduated in 2003.

Some booths that impressed me:

Red Hen Press. They call themselves “the biggest little indie non-profit literary publisher” and they’ve been doing this for thirty years. The press does a lot of poetry but they also have some interesting fiction and non-fiction titles. (I bought two novels.) And writers who are querying—take a look at them.

Obsidian Press. These ladies were across the aisle from us and they had the most fun. Their booth was always crowded with people and often sounded like a party was going on over there. Alas, I cannot find them on the internet.

F and M Publishing. Our next-door neighbors. Besides doing regular publishing and digital content, they do augmented reality for books, which is seriously cool. For example, an author bio that comes to life when you point your phone at it. As in the author speaking directly to the reader.

But here is the most important thing, the biggest takeaway

It’s that this event even exists. That 10,000 people convened to panels and workshops on writing. On writing, people! On some aspect of writing. That this many people care about putting our stories out into the world for others to read.

And not only that.

But that 600 exhibitors lugged suitcases full of books and flyers, or sent boxes full of same ahead, along with posters and banners and stands on which to display them. All so that the words that they themselves or others had written could be shared with the world.

Never let it be said that what you do as a writer is not important. Don’t you let anybody tell you that. And don’t you tell it to yourself.

What you do is important. It’s one of the most important things a person can do in this crazy-ass world.

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See you on Sunday for my weekly love letter, which went on hiatus last week but will be back stronger than ever. And I also have an upcoming post on how to fix a flat scene. Earlier today, my oldest grandson called me a member of the Flat Earth Society. Coincidence? Synchronicity? You be the judge.