Routon rocks DragonCon

I took some time off of my next project to take a short vacation weekend with my husband. We headed to Atlanta to meet up with my brother-in-law and his friends for Anime Weekend Atlanta.

We'd been to DragonCon in 2008 and had always wanted to go back, but we'd never been to an anime / manga con before. I had no idea this con had been held in Atlanta since 1995 and was one of the largest anime cons in the country. We had a great time just watching people in costume, taking photos, and watching anime.  It wasn't nearly as crowded as DragonCon and covered only two buildings, so we felt we were able to see and do a lot more.

There were such amazing costumes there, and not just anime costumes. There was plenty of steampunk, fantasy adventure, and sci-fi television favorites. The best part was everyone felt free to be themselves. There were people of all shapes, sizes and genders dressed as their favorite characters.

A lot of readers ask where writers get their ideas. The answer for me is simple - they're everywhere. But when I get out of the day-to-day routine the ideas seem to flow fast and furious. This con had me leaving with a good sized list of possible plot points, from the obvious boy-geek/girl-geek romance to the geek/non-geek romance, or maybe a murder mystery? Or a robbery? Or focusing on the vendors instead of the participants – an artist/performer  or con-volunteer/con-guest. I definitely gave my phone a workout emailing myself several ideas as well as costume photos and notes on Japanese television shows and anime. At least one of these ideas will end up in a story sooner or later, and I can't wait to write it!

Do you enjoy going to fan conventions? Do you wear a costume? Leave a comment, I'd love to hear about it. And you can check out my pictures from the convention on my Facebook and Pinterest pages.

Hillbilly Rockstar is available at Amazon - http://bit.ly/HBRSKIN, Barnes and Noble - http://bit.ly/HBRSNook, Smashwords - http://bit.ly/HBRSSMASH, Kobo - http://bit.ly/HBRSKobo and All Romance Ebooks - http://bit.ly/HBRSARE.

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Christina Routon is originally from Manchester, Georgia, and currently lives in Alabama with her family. She works from home as a general transcriptionist, which allows her time to write fiction and non-fiction as well as work on her general transcription website. A self-professed geek, she enjoys tabletop role-playing games, watching Doctor Who (David Tennant is her favorite, but Matt Smith is growing on her), and watching anything written or produced by Stephen Moffat or Joss Whedon.