WriterCon is a community of writers working together to build skills, exchange knowledge, and achieve dreams. People assume the “Con” is short for “convention” and it’s true that we hold an annual convention over Labor Day weekend. But in my mind, it’s also short for “conclave,” which is the name of a literary magazine my wife and I started publishing in 2015—and means “a private group of people with a shared goal.” That’s WriterCon.

According to locals, when he was seven years old, little Billy Bernhardt was running around Midwest City telling people he was going to be a writer. The problem was—he didn’t know how to make that happen, and neither did anyone else in the vicinity. It worked out okay in the end—my first novel, Primary Justice, was published in 1991 and became a national bestseller. And soon after, I started speaking at private gatherings of aspiring writers to share what I’d learned on my journey. Eventually that developed into WriterCon.