Who is the most famous writer you have had contact with?

HourglassMemory

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What has been the most famous writer you have exchanged messages with?
Or the most famous writer you have actually talked with?

How did it go?
 
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KTC

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I spoke on the phone with and met Anne Rice a couple of times. She won't listen to reason... she totally disregards her one masterpiece; The Feast of All Saints. I have spent time with Wayson Choy... he is an amazing human being. Utterly and completely amazing. I've exchanged a few postcards with Natalie Goldberg too.
 

James81

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Probably someone from here. :tongue
 

Bubastes

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Michael Ruhlman reviewed a book proposal for me. Fantastic guy.

Anthony Bourdain. Chatted with him for a few minutes at a conference and listened to a presentation he gave. He rawks and is super nice. His success has not gone to his head at all.

Tess Gerritsen. We exchanged a few e-mails about being Asian-American writers. She's a class act.
 
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cray

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john updike - he liked me.


...and my neighbors are related to mark twain.
 

KTC

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...and my neighbors are related to mark twain.

They should have a seance and invite you over. He'd make a great interview subject.
 

jhtatroe

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I ran into Nick Hornby browsing alone at the Tattered Cover after his reading and signing there and chatted with him for a few minutes.
 

WendyNYC

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You mean non-AWers?

Frank McCourt--he spoke at a luncheon and I met him after
Anna Quindlen--at a school function, though just briefly
Karen Quinn--I've met her a few times and we have communicated via email
Jill Davis--she goes to my church

Ask me again after the conference I'm attending in July. Meg Wolitzer is going to be my teacher. I'm excited.
 

inkkognito

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Ray Bradbury. Way back in the late '80s I wrote him a letter and he responded with a wonderful letter of his own, along with a signed poster from the movie "Something Wicked This Way Comes." He had signed it with a silver pen and used the same pen to put doodles all over the big purple envelope he sent it in. I still treasure it to this day.
 

Vandal

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Email from Patricia Wood

PMs from Will Lavender and Ray Wong

I once took a writing course from Patricia Wallace, who has published several medical-related novels
 
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MelodyO

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I'm internet friends with Kate Holden, author of "In My Skin", her autobiography. She's very nice, and very busy. :)
 

DL Hegel

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i can't believe i forgot Ray Bradbury(he was very nice guy)
i met them at cons
Alan Dean Foster
Stephen King
Anne Rice
all of them very nice.

and i dated a certain screen writer when he was a not so struggling singer-- trust fund baby-- (whom shall remain nameless and was a monkey's bum)when i was a 20something wild thing.
 

Jcomp

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Ray Bradbury. Way back in the late '80s I wrote him a letter and he responded with a wonderful letter of his own, along with a signed poster from the movie "Something Wicked This Way Comes." He had signed it with a silver pen and used the same pen to put doodles all over the big purple envelope he sent it in. I still treasure it to this day.

That is cool.

I've yet to make contact with any famous writers...
 

TerzaRima

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Mary Gordon. Your favorite aunt who just happens to be a novelist. Warm, unassuming, and willing to share what she knows.

Howard Nemerov. I picked him up at the airport when he spoke at my college, and we went for drinks. He spoke movingly of his sister, Diane Arbus.

My sister went to high school with Jeff Eugenides.

Marilyn Robinson lives around here and I bump into her sometimes. She listened graciously to my fangirl burbling about Gilead, too.
 

WendyNYC

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Marilyn Robinson lives around here and I bump into her sometimes. She listened graciously to my fangirl burbling about Gilead, too.

That's very cool. I heard her speak recently, but I didn't get to meet her.
 

williemeikle

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I stood beside, and chatted to, Hugo winners Charlie Stross and Ken McLeod at a signing of an anthology I was in with them.
 

DeleyanLee

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Used to chat on the phone with Hal Clement for a couple of years, started when I was pro liaison at the local con. He was a delight to escort about the con and even remembered me several years later when we ran into each other at a restaurant. Very dear man. Also shared several meals with Barbara Hambly one con.

I worked for a while with the Charlie Card Foundation (Orson Scott Card's son) and chatted with him several times over the course of the project.

C. J. Cherryh read a fanzine I edited for three years. When we finally met at a con some years later, she remembered me and my character and we chatted for a time. I was chosen pro-liaison as well as programming chair for a local con later because I still had her home contact information. She was also a delight when I wrote a little play that got put on one con she was GoH at that lampooned much of what she'd written to that date. Very gracious, wonderful lady.

I've beta'd for Laura Kinsale, Holly Lisle, Wen Spencer (but I've known her since before she was published, does she count?), Tamara Siler Jones, and Susan Krinard.

I was a member of the Yspilanti (MI) SF group which spawned the Myth series, so I have very fond memories of Robert Lynn Asprin from those days. And if you hung around Bob back then, you got to meet Gordon R. Dickson at least a few dozen times.

You stick around long enough and be even moderately active in a writing community and you will meet lots of people. It didn't take long for me to get over the "gosh wow! It's YOU!" experience when meeting authors. My ex-sister-in-law lived a block down from Stephen King and got over the fanworship pretty well after watching him mow his own lawn all summer.
 

TrainofThought

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David Baldacci at a book signing at Printer's Row Book Fair. And like the dork I am, as he was signing my book I said, "I'm your biggest fan." LOSER!!!!!!!!! He probably told security to keep an eye on me.
 

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Many years ago, when I was a teenager, there was a young couple in our church who taught the Sunday School lessons for us teenagers. Brother and Sister Hawkes were wonderful and all the kids loved them. Than one summer, our lessons went from Bible study to art and publishing discussions and Brother Hawkes started bringing in his huge canvases too show us his paintings. The reason was, that after years of submitting to every publishing house under the sun, one of his children's picture books had gotten accepted and it was all he talked about. It was the best year we ever had in Sunday School and while we didn't learn much about the Bible we learned all the ins and out of finding a publisher!

They moved away the next year, so I haven't seen them again since than, however, today, he has gone on to be the internationally famous award winning Kevin Hawkes, author and illustrator of children's books.

I email Don Rosa from time to time, cause I'm a huge fan of his books and I come up with the craziest dang questions to ask him about his characters. He's really nice and he always emails me right back with an answer.


I also live a stone's throw and half from Stephen King's house, though I've never meet him. :(
 
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Old Hack

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Oh, all sorts (she said casually). But my very, very favourite encounter wasn't with a writer, it was when I met Ian Ballantine--yes, that one, of Ballantine Books, creator of the paperback. I met him in his offices, spent nearly an hour chatting with him, and he even gave me some little cards that he had, and asked me to keep in touch. Wonderful man. He looked like a tiny, shrivelled tortoise, but made me laugh so much I could hardly speak.