Hilary trained in book publishing at PSU, which is the only such program on the West coast. Others in the US are in NYC. Hilary focused on agents and acquisitions but was open to any questions on publishing.
Continue reading Agents, Editors and Publishers with Hilary and Alan DeethEric Witchey is a well published author all around the world, and a well respected writing teacher – definitely a writer helping writers! Find him at https://ericwitchey.com/index.html
Continue reading Character Emotion and Word Choice with Eric WitcheyCarolyn Martin (https://carolynmartinpoet.com/) presented a wonderful hybrid workshop at our hybrid meeting on April 21 2024. The meeting was recorded and can be watched at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=83Iq4hT0DJA (submissions) followed by https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGL4rVOHbR0 (settings)
Continue reading Submissions and Settings with Carolyn MartinWith thanks to all the members who offered advice, questions, comments and more, most people present learned something during our “efficient use of Word” meeting, so now we just have to try not to forget it all. To that end, Sheila has added (she hopes) everyone’s suggestions to the file she was working from, and uploaded the file in DOCX and PDF format to our website.
Efficient Use of WORD, word doc: https://www.portlandwritersmill.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/The-Efficient-Use-of-WORD.docx
Efficient Use of WORD, PDF: https://www.portlandwritersmill.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/The-Efficient-Use-of-WORD.pdf
If you want to know what we did at the meeting, and if you want to use WORD more efficiently, please follow the links and download the files. Then you’ll be able to follow through all the actions and add to your own skillset.
Maryka Biaggio is a Portland author of several published historical fiction novels.
Ron introduced Maryka and stated that he had enjoyed reading her novel, The Model Spy. Her topic today concerned “telling lies”to flesh out historical fiction when actual facts are not readily available. She began by saying, however, that the “lies” must be believable, fitting into known history of the period. Background research is necessary, and there is nothing that throws off a reader more than finding an “oops”—words, dialog, events, etc.—that do not fit in with historical truth.
Continue reading Historical Fiction with Maryka BiaggioMollie Hunt currently has around 16 published titles: 11 mysteries in two cozy series, 1 standalone novel, 3 science fiction novels, 1 memoir, and 1 book of poetry! A common theme in her books is cats because…
Continue reading Cats on the Keyboard, with Mollie Hunt, Dec 17th 2023Sheila had a PowerPoint presentation prepared to guide us through the upload of this year’s anthology, but Zoom and PowerPoint both crashed. Fearing the computer might crash next, she proceeded to give the talk off the cuff instead. By the end of the following day, our latest anthology was on sale at https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CNPQ2F92/. Get your copies soon, before the price goes up!
Continue reading How to Upload your Book to Amazon, from Sheila’s talk, Nov 19th 2023David Porter started writing bad poetry at age 12 and soon progressed to good. In 1968 he was at PSU and was already being published. In the ’70s and ’80s he wrote freelance articles, poems, and short stories, getting published in the Oregon magazine and NW magazine (inside the Oregonian). Meanwhile he wrote grant proposals, newsletters, presentations, etc for nonprofits for 40 years. He’s even written Beaver Board Historical Markers! Plus many book reviews.
Continue reading Fulfilling That Writing Commitment: David Porter, Oct 15, 2023Self-publishing used to be somewhat frowned on and considered less legitimate than “really” getting published, but that is changing, as Erick showed us in his presentation.
Continue reading Self-Publishing Success: What Worked, What Didn’t, & What I Would Do Differently, with Erick MertzSummary of Jan Underwood’s presentation: Jan began writing at age six, when she wrote a story about Winnie the Pooh characters, and her father told her she could actually make up her own characters. For Jan that idea was the spark that enlightened her creative energy, and she has been writing ever since. Jan is also a Spanish teacher and loves to use flavors of foreign languages in her writing.
Continue reading Jan Underwood and Magical Realism