Smart Bitches Trashy Books | All of the romance, none of the bullshit.

I literally spit beverages out of my mouth when Nathalie Grey sent me the most awesome link ever.

Are you ready? Are you sitting down?

Mrs. Giggles has opened her own ePub!

Get ready, all you eBook junkies out there: Trixy Lion Publishing has opened its loving, familial arms to anyone looking for a publishing home. [UPDATED to add: Mrs. Giggles’ awesome publishing house at Geocities keeps exceeding its bandwidth - but that only means its super popular, right? Check out the mirror and make sure to get your submissions ready!]

I personally will never say anything cranky or mean about Trixy Lion, as it says in their “Marketing PLnas:” we will also protect u from mean ppl out there on blogs and message boards. if u let us know who is badmouthing u, we will gather ur friends and com eto ur rescue.

How can you not love an ePub whose written public communications read like LOLCats on a meth bender? I’m sold!

New author starting out? Publishers screwed you over yet again in terms of publicity? Have to get your name out there somehow, some way? Us Smart Bitches are here to tell you: nothing helps author visibility like an eye-catching pseudonym and an even more eye-catching costume for an author signing. And being the helpful, thoughtful bitches that we are, we've done allllll the grunt work for you and have come up with the following pseudonym and costume generator. No, no, it's no trouble at all; we do this for the love, baby. A dedication in your next NYT-bestselling novel is renumeration enough. Really.

Your name should be:

And your faaaaabulous costume for author signings should be:

So it’s one week till national, and I’m pulling my hair.
I’m still trying to decide on what shoes I will wear.
Pregnant feet get so swollen,
They’ll each want a Croc,
but with all that “business casual,”
They don’t want to be mocked!

And meanwhile Sarah, as big as a barn,
will waddle the hotel with a parka on.
She hears that the A/C in Dallas is arctic,
But with 90+ humidity, that cold is cathartic!

The FAQ online recommends tote bags and pens
and business cards and goodies and a stack of Depends.
You might not have time to go relieve yourself
while loading up on 612,573,870 books for your shelf!

So what are your tips and your gems of experience,
for those whose prep work has made them delirious?
And who’s going to National? Who’ll be at the Hyatt?
With both the SBs there? It will be a riot!

Seriously, folks - what are your tips for RWA National? What little gem of brilliance did you learn at a past conference? What do you do to preserve your feet? Your makeup? Your sanity?

While I’ve never been to National, here are my tips :

1. Download the Conference Schedule of events from the RWA site and print it out. Take it to your nearest copy machine and reduce it so that 4 pages fit on one 8x11 sheet of paper. Cut them up, staple together - and presto: a very, very small and very portable version of the RWA Conference Schedule that takes up a LOT less room in your bag.

2. If you see an itty bitty booklight or similar book light apparatus as a giveaway, grab it. I got one at the RWA-NJ conference two years ago and we use it all the time. And what do we use it for? When Freebird was a newborn and in a basinette in our room, we used it to light our way toward making his late night bottle without turning on the lights and waking everyone up. The dim light from the booklight let the other one of us sleep while we switched off on night feeding duty without getting out of bed. Those booklights? I love them so much I start crying hormonally when I see them. It’s kind of sad.

3. Make sure to identify all the nearest ladies’ rooms, keeping in mind that the closest ladies’ room may be behind you. This is probably my biggest concern, but then, I fully plan on pitching to every editor and agent that walks in the ladies’ because I’ll be in there anyway most of the time already, just for fun. They’ll dread going in in case that crazy pregnant lady is in there waiting to pitch them a book about alien sanitation workers kidnapping women bike messengers for toe-orgies in Oklahoma.

So, Bitchery conference-goers - what’s your advice for the rest of us?

Hello to all our British readers! 231 years ago we declared our independence from you - aren’t you, like, seriously bummed? I mean, you too could have a politically divided society with a pesky terrorism problem and some big issues to conquer in your next elections. Wait, never mind.

In the spirit of celebrating the independence of the United States of America (Motto: “Independence? Let’s celebrate by grilling things and lighting things on fire!") we present to you these fine gifts from the heart and mind of MamaNice:

Courtesy of Darlene Marshall:

International Condom ads. I think the wrestlers are my favorite. I almost snorted coffee out my nose.

Remember: Not Work Safe for Office Bitches!