20BooksVegas, POIs and UNSUBs, and Wiretap Technicalities - 068

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transcript:

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​This week on the Writer's Detective Bureau: 20BooksVegas, POIs and UNSUBs and wire tap technicalities.

I'm Adam Richardson and this is the Writer's Detective Bureau.

Welcome to episode number 68 of the Writer's Detective Bureau, the podcast dedicated to helping authors and screenwriters write professional quality crime related fiction. And this week I'm talking about the 20BooksVegas conference and answering your questions about police acronyms and slang like POI and UNSUB as well as the more technical side of setting up a wiretap investigation.
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But first I need to thank Gold Shield Patrons, Debra Dunbar from debradunbar.com, C.C. Jameson from ccjameson.com, Larry Keeton, Vicky Tharp of vickytharp.com, Chrysann, Larry Darter, Natalie Barelli of nataliebarelli.com and Craig Kingsman of craigkingsman.com for their support. I also want to send a huge thank you to my coffee club patrons, both my brand new coffee club members and those of you that have been supporting me for months and even over a year now. Thank you so much. I appreciate you. You can find links to all of the writers supporting this episode in the show notes at writersdetective.com/68. To learn about setting up your own Patreon account for your author business or to support the show for as little as $2 a month, visit writersdetective.com/patreon. P A T R E O N.

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​If you hear some extra rasp in my voice this week, it's likely because I just got home from 20BooksVegas. Whiskey, cigars, and speaking on the police procedural panel took their toll on my throat, but all of it was an absolute blast. Patrick O'Donnell, author of the book Cops and Writers moderated the panel and we were joined by author and former LAPD detective, Paul Bishop, who is a master at interview and interrogation as well as Scott Moon, who is not only an author and police sergeant, but is also one of the hosts of the Keystroke Medium podcast. So definitely check that one out as well. The highlight of the entire conference though was getting to meet so many of you. I still find it very surreal that you are really out there listening to me talking to this microphone in my home office. So for those of you that came up to say hello, thank you so much.

There were a lot of highlights like drinking whiskey and beer on Mark Dawson's dime. Thank you Mark. Not that you're listening and hanging out every night with my new best buddy Patrick O'Donnell. Now we were already friends online and through the telephone, but we are definitely drinking and cigar smoking buddies for real now. And by the way Patrick, well so I should let you guys know that on Patrick's way home, that bastard won $1,000 on a video poker machine at the airport. Nobody wins at the airport. I know you're listening, Patrick, you are buying the next steak dinner next year. Seriously, if that isn't a sign that you are in the right place doing the right thing. And by that I mean heading into retirement in a matter of weeks and getting more writing done, then I don't know what is. You deserve it buddy. Okay, so I can't stop talking about 20Books because it was overwhelming.

I mean, it was overwhelmingly awesome, but it was a lot to process. Being only five or six hours from Vegas depending on traffic, the drive home was the perfect way to decompress and think about the entire weekend. You may, since we're just kind of getting to know one through this magic of the podcast thing, I guess I should explain that I'm an introvert. What Myers-Briggs calls an INFP or an INFP-A depending on what online test you take, but I'm an introvert that has learned how to put on the extroverted hat or helmet when needed. I wear more helmets than hats these days, but you might be surprised to learn just how many cops are actually introverts, which I think plays more into that gruff public exterior that many cops have than most people realize. So keep that in mind for your character creation.

But anyway, the conference. 20BooksVegas was amazing, especially for introverts. I've been to a ton of conferences and trainings over the last two decades, probably more than most pharmaceutical salespeople and there have only been a handful that would classify as amazing. 20BooksVegas was one of them. 20BooksVegas is the main conference for the 20BooksTo50K group, a conference of self published authors that are there to learn how to grow their self publishing author business meeting other self published authors that are making five, six and even seven figure incomes. Man. I mean, this is not snake oil salesmanship, none of the phony get off your feet and dance, MLM motivation, musical conference kind of stuff. No one was selling you on anything but the power of you. A lot of hard work and some pretty tactical and practical knowledge.

This conference was unlike any other because everyone there...                                                                                                     Continue reading...