exercise, inspiration, Minutes, Writing

Minutes 201607

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With thanks to Karin and Judy…

WRITERS’ MILL MINUTES

13 writers attended the Writers’ Mill meeting with Wildfire Writer Christi Krug.  As Sheila was vacationing in England, Norm had the honor of chairing the meeting.  The inspirational talk and writing exercises provided by Christi were followed by Robin’s delicious snacks. After the break Judy handed out the writing awards on behalf of Jean for the July contest. Thereafter Lavonna led the critique of the second part of Matthew’s story as well as Robin’s story. Continue reading Minutes 201607 →

Guest Speakers, marketing, networking, publishing, Research, Writing

Notes from Ken Baysinger’s Talk in June 2016

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Notes from Ken Baysinger’s talk, June 2016

Ken’s road to writing began early when hi English teacher gave him an F for writing too well (his teacher wouldn’t believe the piece was Ken’s own work and Ken, being stubborn, wouldn’t rewrite it). Writing was replaced by a language of 2-syllable words when Ken joined the Navy, but afterward he took an elective in expository writing at Washington State, just to see if he still had any literary skills. Luckily for his readers, he did. A degree in English led to work in creative advertising, but the white shoes and golf stories didn’t fit, so he moved into other areas. But… Continue reading Notes from Ken Baysinger’s Talk in June 2016 →

Book design, Journal, Minutes, networking, Research

Minutes 201606

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Writers’ Mill June 19thminutes

22 writers, including several new members, left their homes on Father’s Day afternoon to attend a Writers’ Mill meeting with local author Ken Baysinger. A fun, inspirational and informative talk was followed by delicious gluten-free snacks from Jean, writerly awards from Karin for the monthly contest, and a fun all-hands-on-deck critique of Matthew’s story. By the end it was clear lots of us could have stayed longer than the usual 2 hours. But the room would be needed for other events, so we finished at 3 and planned to return next month, July 17th, for more inspiration from Wildfire Writer Christie Krug. Continue reading Minutes 201606 →

Critiquing

Critique Questions

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Have you been asked to lead a critique? Are you wondering what questions to ask, or how to keep the conversation going around the room? The following questions are given in sets of threes – the idea is you can ask the original question, then guide discussion toward the others if people aren’t answering. Thank you to all of you who used the questions so well in sharing the critique this month.

  1. What is the story about?
    1. Storyline
    2. Theme
    3. Genre

 

  1. What grabs you first?
    1. Strong beginning?
    2. Interesting question?
    3. Interesting character?

 

  1. What makes the location real?
    1. Description?
    2. Writing style?
    3. Atmosphere?

 

  1. What makes the character(s) real?
    1. Description?
    2. Internal dialog?
    3. Interactions?

 

  1. What makes the dialog real?
    1. Different voices?
    2. Dialog tags?
    3. Choice of words/phrases?

 

  1. What makes the dilemma real?
    1. Internal confusion?
    2. External threat?
    3. Unsolved mystery?

 

  1. What narrative voice?
    1. 1st/2nd/3rd person?
    2. Personal/distant/omniscient?
    3. Does it fit story/genre/theme

 

  1. Favorite scenes?
    1. What makes it a favorite?
    2. Is it important to the story?
    3. What more would you want?

 

  1. How does it end?
    1. Has character changed?
    2. Has situation changed?
    3. Has reader changed?

 

  1. Did the author have questions, or do you have other questions to ask?

 

We usually ask the author not to speak until the end of the critique, when they get to ask other questions arising from what’s been discussed, or to answer questions raised by readers.

We hope you’ll enjoy leading a critique for us sometime, and that the questions might help you in critiquing your own work.

Critiquing, Journal, Minutes, publishing, self-publishing, submission guidelines

Minutes 201605

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Writers Mill Minutes May 15th 2016

21 members attended May’s meeting and listened to an excellent discussion on all things writing, led by poet, short story writer and novelist Jim Stewart. Jim has generously agreed to a return engagement to lead a poetry workshop for us soon. We really appreciated meeting with him, and notes from his talk will be included in a separate post.  Continue reading Minutes 201605 →

Journal, submission guidelines

Submissions Closed – Watch this Space!

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The Writers’ Mill Journal, Volume 5, will be released in time for our November meeting.

Writers’ Mill Members will have emailed their (edited) submissions  BEFORE THE END OF JULY to

admin@portlandwritersmill.org

Please send any questions to this address!

Stories, poems, essays, pictures, photos, snippets, etc… to be included in one of the following journal sections – please interpret the section heading as loosely as you wish!

  • Murder, Mystery and Mayhem (based on November)
  • White (based on December: anything related to white – clothing, weather, peace, Christmas…)
  • January’s contest was “A Year” – we’re pretty sure you can find another section in this list for your timely tale.
  • Misunderstood (based on the February, It’s not what you think contest)
  • Windows (based on March)
  • Irresistible temptation (April)
  • Switching places (May’s contest was just people, now includes places)
  • Home and away (June’s contest was home, now includes travel, time, and any other homes and aways that inspire you)
  • Just for kids – Enter your kid-safe pieces to this section
  • Just for inspiration  – Enter your inspirational pieces here if you’d prefer this to another section. But remember, entries for Joe’s Inspirational Journal should also be sent to Joe.

Please include the following information in your email:

  • Title of your piece (story, photo, poem, essay, snippet, whatever…)
  • Section to which it is being submitted
  • Author name (this is not always clear from your email address!)

Illustrations should include the same information. If you have illustrations to go with your piece, please send them as separate files with the piece (not as part of the word document). Make life easy for us, then we’ll do a better job for you!

Word count limits? Ugh! We’d rather not impose any, but if you keep your total word-count to below 10,000 words, we might avoid ruinous print costs when we put it all together. If we end up with something that takes too many pages, we’ll look forward to your helpful cooperation in fixing it!

Happy Writing!

marketing, memoir, Minutes, publishing, Writing

Minutes 201604

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201604 minutes Sunday April 17th

Nearly twenty people gave up two hours of a sunny Sunday afternoon to attend April’s Writers’ Mill meeting and hear the talk from Steve Theme. Of those, many were able to buy copies of his book, and we hope you’ll remember to post reviews when you’ve read it. Steve would like you to know he’s happy to be contacted with questions at any time via the “contact form” on his website: http://stevetheme.com/contact/ Continue reading Minutes 201604 →

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