9 in-person and 11 online attendees were present to see the upload of this year’s anthology to Amazon. We were delighted to welcome new NaNoWriMo participants, and very much hope they might join us at future meetings too. If you’ve not already signed up for our newsletters, please go to the SignUp page on the portlandwritersmill.org website and follow the instructions there. (You’ll get the instructions in an email from admin @ portlandwritersmill . org, so make sure you flag those emails as “not spam” when they arrive.)
NANO NEWS
November is the month when we upload our annual anthology, but it’s also National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) so the meeting started with a few questions for attendees:
- Who is doing NanoWriMo (National novel writing month in November – several members and visitors said they are)?
- Who has done Nano in the past (more hands went up)?
- Who has something already written that they’d like to self-publish on Amazon (several people have)?
- Who thinks they might have something soon that they’d like to self-publish (several more)?
Sheila promised to (try to) write good notes to send out in these minutes. But don’t forget, if you want any steps described in more detail, make sure you come to January’s meeting where we’ll discuss plans for topics and speakers for 2024. Also, you can find detailed notes from previous talks at https://www.portlandwritersmill.org/help-2/anthology-help/ on our website.
WEBSITE BLUES
Sheila demo-ed the website (and its problematic error message) and begged for assistance. The technology is moving faster than the team can keep up with it. Please would anyone who has website experience, or who has children or grandchildren with experience, email admin @ portlandwritersmill . org. If you were the one who spoke to Sheila, please would you email us too! The site is created with WordPress and hosted on iPage (or BlueHost, I think). Then we can discuss how to add you to the volunteer list, and how to give you access to fix our site!
CONTEST NEWS
Our monthly prompt inspired some amazing and varied writing for the November ezine, which can still be read (and commented on) at https://www.portlandwritersmill.org/contests/nov-2023-contest-page/nov-2023-entries-voting-page/. Clayton gave us the writing prompt and announced the winners (those who gained the most “votes” from readers as favorites):
- FIRST – Judy Beaston for “Jolene”
- SECOND – Lyndsay Docherty for “Both Sides of the Barriers” (poem)
- THIRD – TIED RESULT –
- —Karin Krafft for “Just Keep Pushing Through”
- —Sheila Deeth for “What Lay Beyond the Fence”
OTHER entries (all truly excellent reads) were:
- Crossing the Corpus Callosum – By Gary Romans
- Escaping From the Gravity Well – By Peter Letts
- Every Step Matters – By Judy Beaston
- I Believe (poem) – By Joe Mendez
- Of Man and Beast, part 1 – By Robin Layne
- The Bike Ride (poem) – By Dian Hillard
- Time’s Barriers – By Jessie Collins
UPCOMING CONTESTS (send entries Contest @ PortlandWritersMill . Org, 1,200 word limit, any genre, up to two entries per person, and the deadline is always the end of the 1st Sunday of the month)
- DECEMBER – Deadline end-of-day, Sunday, December 3rd
- THEME: The Last Time I Was In… HOST: Elizabeth Maggio
- When was the last time you were in a place, perhaps with someone, doing something that left a good or bad memory? Call up personal memories or invite a character (perhaps one you’ve used in stories before) to regale their tale of “The last time I was in…” (or, as Sheila pondered, “The last time I was in trouble with my mum!”)
- JANUARY, 2024 – Entries accepted from Dec. 4-Jan. 7th. Be sure to weave time for writing into your holidays!
- THEME: Euphoria (intense feelings of wellbeing and happiness) HOST: Lyndsay Docherty
- How? What? When? Where? Why?…. Have fun and do read the information under UPCOMING CONTESTS about the January theme BECAUSE… January also is a month with an optional challenge for those who want to impress the world (just kidding) – or just to spark some alternate ways of writing to this month’s theme.
- FEBRUARY – Entries accepted from Jan. 8th – Feb. 4th
- THEME: When I’m Daydreaming, I… HOST: Elizabeth Maggio
- A fascinating follow-up to our January “Euphoria” theme, whether you wrote for that theme or not. Here we pump the brakes, stop the train, act like ATLAS and hold up the world… And then let our inner muse step off onto a pristine beach, or a quiet, isolated country trail, meandering all the special sights in Europe—but in your imagination (daydreaming).
- MARCH – Entries accepted from Feb. 5th – March 3rd
- THEME: Season of Mystery HOST: Judy Beaston
- Initial thoughts on this reflect both the mysteries of Spring AND the mysteries of life, whether just how amazingly mysterious we beings are OR the mystery writer’s weaving of fiction appearing as fact and the hidden puzzles we readers try to solve.
ANTHOLOGY UPLOAD
This year’s anthology includes entries from most of the contests/ezines from Oct 2022 to Sept 2023, making for an intriguingly eclectic mix that your volunteers managed to combine into a smoothly flowing whole. Altogether, 19 authors, plus 9 editors, 3 content organizers, 2 formatters, and several additional illustrators gave their time to create this book. We hope you’ll all take advantage of the cheap offer ($5.77) and buy Christmas presents before we increase the price (to $9.95) at the end of the year. (Kindle copies are $1.99).
Sheila had a PowerPoint presentation prepared to provide a visual guide through the day’s upload, but she probably had too many windows open on her computer. PowerPoint crashed. Zoom crashed. Zoom crashed again and mild panic ensued, so she gave the presentation “freeform” without PowerPoint.
What We Learned
Find notes from Sheila’s presentation at https://www.portlandwritersmill.org/20/how-to-upload-your-book-to-amazon-from-sheilas-talk-nov-19th-2023/.
By the end of the process, we had kindle and print versions of the anthology uploaded, and were just waiting for Amazon’s approval of both books. This was received later on Sunday for the ebook, and on Monday for the print version – YAY!
We repeated the whole process then with another volume, in hopes this would help people remember what happened and how to use the tools. We will be happy to give talks on how to use other tools – Styles and Format with Word, InDesign, Photoshop, etc. – in 2024 if members want us to. Just be sure to attend January’s meeting and let your voices be heard.
DATES TO REMEMBER
- Oak Hills Holiday Bazaar – Sheila and, hopefully, other Writers’ Mill members will have their (and our) books for sale the Oak Hills rec center: 2400 NW 153rd Ave, Beaverton, OR 97006 on Friday and Saturday, 1st and 2nd December, from 10am to 4pm each day. Email admin @ portlandwritersmill . org for more info.
- Ezine submissions (The Last Time I was in…) due by the end of Sunday December 3rd. Send entries to contest @ portlandwritersmill . org
- Next meeting, Mollie Hunt: How and Why (cats, cozies, series, publish, etc.), Sunday December 17th
- January’s meeting when we make plans for 2024, Sunday January 21st
Links From Today’s Presentation
- https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CNP1XX54/ for our kindle anthology (in the US)
- https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0CNP1XX54/ on kindle in the UK
- https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CNPQ2F92/ in print in the US
- https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0CNPQ2F92/ in print in the UK
- Please email admin @ portlandwritersmill . org if you need the other links.