Last month, I had the pleasure of attending Bouchercon 2023. The Anthony Boucher Memorial World Mystery Convention is an annual conference of creators and devotees of mystery and detective fiction. It is named in honor of writer, reviewer, and editor Anthony Boucher, and pronounced the way he pronounced his name, rhyming with “voucher.”

Unarguably the world’s largest mystery writers’ conference, this year’s event was held in San Diego and was attended by over 1,700 participants. Yes, that’s correct. 1,700 people who are there to talk about murder.

The guests of honor there that weekend were David Baldacci, Ann Cleeves, Jacqueline Winspear, C.J. Box, Cate Carlisle, and Dru Ann Love. The Toast Master was Naomi Hirahara.

Some other notable names were Hank Philippi Ryan, Bruce Coffin, S.A. Cosby, Matt Coyle, Martin Edwards, Lori Rader Day, Alex Segura, and Heather Graham.  These were among dozens of others too numerous to list.

Did I mention that there were 1,700 participants?

I’m reluctant to attend events of this size simply because it’s easy to get lost in the crowd. However, also attending are agents. In particular, my agent was in attendance, and I had a chance to have a cocktail with her to discuss my immediate future as an author. A good agent is not only your representative in the publishing world, but a trusted advisor. She’s someone who knows the players and the market.

Her advice to me was to finish at least one more Geneva Chase mystery.

And then there are the parties and the events. One of those was a cocktail party my agent threw for her clients, attending publishers, and assorted entertainment representatives.

Another was a book signing specifically for Poisoned Pen Press/Sourcebooks authors. How many books did we go through? All of them.

The next day Poisoned Pen took us all out to breakfast, giving me a chance to talk with one of our new editors, our marketing people, and some writer friends of mine, including Sara Johnson, whom some of our Carteret Writers have met.

And most importantly, Bouchercon was attended by readers. These are really the most important participants. And among them are aspiring writers, there to learn from the panel discussions and network. They’re the most fun to listen to and talk with.

Sitting at our table on Saturday night were a married couple who live in both Naples, Florida and Tacoma, Washington who had driven all the way to San Diego.  They’re world travelers, and she writes a travel blog. She’s thinking about writing mysteries incorporating their travels.

Sitting right next to me was a young lady by the name of Susan who is working on her first mystery manuscript. She’s religious about attending mystery conferences, learning as much as she can, and networking with other writers. Her enthusiasm was sweeter than the dessert on the table that night. She remembers seeing me on a panel at a very small conference in Phoenix with Ian Rankin as the special guest. That event was much smaller, attended by around a dozen writers and maybe a hundred fans.

Shhhh….don’t tell anyone, but I like those types of conferences the best.

The nice thing, though, about being in this business is seeing author friends again and making new ones. We’re all passionate about writing and publishing and those are the primary topics at a mystery conference.

That, and murder, of course.

Special thanks to the author for sharing the featured photo of Poisoned Pen Press authors Sara Johnson, Ann Parker, Frederick Weisel, Thomas Kies, and Jeffrey Siger at Boucheron 2023.