TEDx Postmortem
One of the twins from my fictional tale about publishing. I know what you’re thinking, and I agree. She’s gorgeous.
I did the TEDx event this morning at Pinewood Prep in Summerville, SC. I had a fantastic time, and I met some great people. I spoke to a roomful of mostly kids about publishing using a fictional tale of twins exploring separate paths to fame and fortune as authors. I’m not sure how it went from their perspective, or how long I actually spoke. I rehearsed several times before going in and came out anywhere between 13 minutes and 25 minutes, so I’m guessing I got close to the required 18 minutes. I kind of expected a countdown clock in the room to keep me on task, but there was just an old analog clock in the back of the room, and I was too preoccupied to do the necessary math to keep track of time. I used no notes, but I had prompts in my PowerPoint that triggered facts and figures I needed to tell my story. I had this whole thing about the honor in failing I wanted to get into, but I got sidetracked.
I got the opportunity to talk to a couple of the kids about writing after the program, and met one young man who has already finished his first novel. He asked for advice, and I’m afraid I failed to give him anything inspirational. I have to come up with a better response to that request from young writers. When I was his age, I wouldn’t have had the confidence to ask an adult about writing. My hats off to him for being passionate enough to complete a novel at such a young age, and for having the guts to talk about it so openly. It’s not easy to do. I know.
The speaker after me was Brian Thomas, a Yale graduate, renowned educator and former Emmy Award winning actor for his role in Fast Break to Glory. When I heard his credentials, I was convinced they had asked me there as a joke. He was a super nice guy, and made it a point to tell me that he felt like the kids got a lot out of my presentation. I don’t know if it’s true, but he made me feel better. I was up the night before with a stomach bug, so I was still kind of floopy during my presentation.
That’s enough rambling. Now that TEDx is behind me I’m going to do a feature on the narrator for the audiobook version of Bad Way Out. His name is Dan Wallace, and he is an incredibly talented voice over actor. He’s so good I don’t know how I was fortunate enough to get him. More on that to come.
