Get Thee To A Writer's Group
Some say writing is best done alone in a crowded room, by weak light at the wooden table of a tavern or coffee shop. It’s where imagination lurks in an empty chair. Here stories grow loud and bleed techno-colors on a starched white sheet.
To bolster my pen, and having taken to shaking when I lost my compass on manuscript day #66, I found a Sonoma writers group. The rules were rigid. I had to hand in my pages, a copy for each reader. Then I read aloud and watched my babies be red-penciled to less. It was modern torture and I confessed all.
My babies amazed me. Cling not, they cried to the writer in me. Just go with the flow to new 26-letter combinations. My words raced ahead and spun the locks in my head. In a chapter critique, my flat characters popped out round, richer with detail and motive.
Authors and editors squint for extra eyes. Once we literary had them in ivory publishing towers as wards of civility. They’re gone now, off-budget in the global call for ‘more raw.’
Readers want bold strokes and less tip-toe. More gut-wrench and less sit-on-the-fence. It's voodoo to ward off work-a-day and leap to imagination transported, escaped from rows of toil.
In birth and war, no battle lasts forever. In critique I soaked up all the learning I could blot: a litany from confessional to animal sacrifice; a review of place, voice, verbs, action dialog and a hero's march past decision-points of storyline. My tribe survived.
More blood on the cover was the final request. What I showed looked like a sheep-breeding manual. I took a deep breath, perforated by zingers. A phrase or two rang my bell.
I plowed on; we launched and have landed a few 5-star lauds. Yes, I shall return to my critique group as a shorter writer but never short of words.
So began my public journey to address readership. Damn the semi-colons; I leaped with a new crew of characters. If you write, I hope you’ve paid dues at the portal of proof-reading. It helps to know how to bail on open ocean.
Place Is Character: I write of Sonoma to refresh my spirit. Sonoma, is just over the bar to country cream-top dairy -- where sun and rain outweigh us all – and green meadows roll onward in celebration of sun, moon and soil. With a moo-moo here and a bah-bah there. On'Ya readers all.
To bolster my pen, and having taken to shaking when I lost my compass on manuscript day #66, I found a Sonoma writers group. The rules were rigid. I had to hand in my pages, a copy for each reader. Then I read aloud and watched my babies be red-penciled to less. It was modern torture and I confessed all.
My babies amazed me. Cling not, they cried to the writer in me. Just go with the flow to new 26-letter combinations. My words raced ahead and spun the locks in my head. In a chapter critique, my flat characters popped out round, richer with detail and motive.
Authors and editors squint for extra eyes. Once we literary had them in ivory publishing towers as wards of civility. They’re gone now, off-budget in the global call for ‘more raw.’
Readers want bold strokes and less tip-toe. More gut-wrench and less sit-on-the-fence. It's voodoo to ward off work-a-day and leap to imagination transported, escaped from rows of toil.
In birth and war, no battle lasts forever. In critique I soaked up all the learning I could blot: a litany from confessional to animal sacrifice; a review of place, voice, verbs, action dialog and a hero's march past decision-points of storyline. My tribe survived.
More blood on the cover was the final request. What I showed looked like a sheep-breeding manual. I took a deep breath, perforated by zingers. A phrase or two rang my bell.
I plowed on; we launched and have landed a few 5-star lauds. Yes, I shall return to my critique group as a shorter writer but never short of words.
So began my public journey to address readership. Damn the semi-colons; I leaped with a new crew of characters. If you write, I hope you’ve paid dues at the portal of proof-reading. It helps to know how to bail on open ocean.
Place Is Character: I write of Sonoma to refresh my spirit. Sonoma, is just over the bar to country cream-top dairy -- where sun and rain outweigh us all – and green meadows roll onward in celebration of sun, moon and soil. With a moo-moo here and a bah-bah there. On'Ya readers all.
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I agree. Slash, cut and burn to get to the flame behind the media madness. It's a training diet to swim the Indie Ocean. Thanks!
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We like to write and read and muse awhile and smile. My pal Prasad comes to mutter too. Together we turn words into the arc of a rainbow. Insight Lite, you see?
- Peter Prasad's profile
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And yes, editing with a bold pen is important. My current book out, Unexpected Gifts, was double the size when my publisher first formatted it. At the time, we both gasped simultaneously before I said, "Oh, well, I'm taking out my exact knife..." But after going through the first couple of chapters, it was a huge relief, because I realized all the details that weren't all that germaine to the story. And the more I examined and slashed, the better I felt.
As one friend said to me once when I asked how he was doing, "Oh, fine. I just went on The Adjective Diet."