What do you get when you mix three writers, a chocolate shop and a Sunday afternoon?

You get two-plus hours of non-stop talking about books, fashion, boys (fictional ones, of course), social networking, agents, and words, words, words, oh that marvelous love of words.

Heidi Kling, Steph Perkins and Daisy Whitney

Heidi Kling, Steph Perkins and Daisy Whitney

You see, writers by nature and by necessity are solitary creatures. We commune most closely with our laptops and laugh, cry and live inside imaginary worlds. We do this alone — alone at the computer, the desk, the coffee shop, the library, the park bench and so on.

That’s probably why so many authors are Twitter addicts. Because we crave community and interaction. So when I heard fellow teen lit author Steph Perkins was coming to San Francisco I immediately insisted we meet for the best hot chocolate in the world (It’s at Bittersweet Cafe on Fillmore Street and if you’ve never been, you must go. In fact, if you go, call me and I will meet you there because I am increasingly convinced I could live solely off a diet of chocolate and write every single word of my books at that glorious chocolate sanctuary that is something akin to heaven.)

We were joined by Heidi Kling, also a debut young adult author and a fellow California girl like myself. And it was non-stop talk the WHOLE ENTIRE TIME. Not just because we’re girls. Not just because we were hopped up on chocolate. But because writers need other writers. We need critique partners of course (and I have the BEST ones in Amanda Morgan, Suzanne Young and Courtney Summers), but we also need the actual face-to-face, person-to-person interaction. Because when you spend all this time in the silence of your thoughts and the sound of the keyboard, you need to break free from time to time and connect IN REAL LIFE with someone else who understands exactly what your working-writing life is like.

For all the other writers, artists, creators, actors, producers and more who read this — where do you go when you need to connect? Where do you go when you need the camraderie of others who do what you do? Weigh in and tell me about your communities!

Heidi Kling is the author of SEA, releasing in June 2010. Steph Perkins is the author of ANNA AND THE BOY MASTERPIECE, releasing in late 2010.

Heidi Kling, Steph Perkins and Daisy Whitney

Heidi Kling, Steph Perkins and Daisy Whitney