Public Speaking ... Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid.

Your heart begins to race.
Your breathing becomes faster.
You start to wonder if the strongest antiperspirant on the market will be good enough or if you should've lined your blouse with disposable diapers. Yup. It's time to get up in front of a crowd and speak.

Speaking in public is part of the author package. You're expected to not only climb out of your writing cave and put yourself out there to interact with the public, but to come off sounding like a reasonably intelligent person. Ack!

I'm not particularly afraid of the actually speaking part. What concerns me is whether or not I'll make a good impression. After a workshop will the attendees come away thinking they enjoyed the session, felt it was worthwhile, or whether they thought, "She's an idiot! What a complete waste of time!"

Writing is hard work but teaching writing is even more difficult. As I fine tune my session for the Surrey Writer's Conference this weekend, I find myself constantly battling the self-doubt demons.

Do you ever do public speaking? Are you afraid or confident?

And the winner is...

To be announced :)

This morning my kids helped me draw the name of the winner of an Advance Reader Copy of Remains. I've emailed the winner to tell her. If she tells me it's okay, I'll post her name on my blog.

In the meantime if you didn't receive an email from me saying you've won don't give up. You can still add your name to my mailing list by clicking here. I'll be making another draw in two weeks :)

Happy Weekend All!
UPDATE: The winner is Julia L. Rule!
Congratulations Julia!

A Rose By Any Other Name ...

When I'm at conferences or signings I get asked all the time if I chose the name Roberts so my books would be shelved next to Nora's. Come to think of it, that would've been awfully clever. I could've hoped to suck off some of Nora's millions of readers and steal them for my own! A problem with that theory is that my books aren't shelved in romance. :)

Actually, I chose the last name Roberts because it came with the man I married many moons ago.

Tess Gerritsen's discussion about pseudonyms and secret identities made me curious. If I had to come up with a pen name to write under, what would I choose? Something that was close to my real name ... Wanda Robot? Something in line with what I write ... Eidolon Macabre?

You can see I'm not very good at this LOL!

What pen name would you choose if you could? If you're a pre-published writer, do you already have a pseudonym picked out or do you plan to write under your real name?

Reminder: You can still enter to win an Advance Copy of Remains by signing up for my mailing list here.