Just About Everything I Know I Learned From My Critique Group

          It's amazing. When you're part of a writing critique group, you can drink from the fountain of knowledge, and get your thirst quenched every time.

       Last night we met, and here are just a few things I learned:

• Sometimes gold is unearthed when you're digging for potatoes.

       One member ("Cammy"* Her name is changed to protect the guilty) has pulled the same prank twice in a row. She professes to "have nothing" and then the most brilliant thing in the world reveals itself on the pages of her piece. Sometimes an older piece that we've set aside--for whatever reason--is a true gem. (ELynn and I didn't fall for it this time; we're too savvy. Galinda took Cammy's bait--hook, line and sinker. We're now calling them Cammy's POOB stories--"Pull Out Of Butt" pieces, because it's as if she reaches down and pulls them out of her rear end...)

       Scour your files and folders. You just might have something that's a true gem. 

• Five wheels are better than four. One of our members had a "business dinner" (wink wink) last night, and was MIA. The night was quieter, no police were called due to excessive laughter, and substitute snorters were called into action.

     In a great group, each person has something different to offer, and is integral.

• If one member is of the same "age" as you, and informs the group that apricots make her explosively gassy, it is not a good idea to take the leftover dried apricots and gobble them on the drive home to test her claim.  Blast off!

• Along with the pajama jeans I already ordered, I am also going to order a "gut-butt dickey." One of the WWWP's lives in pajama jeans in the evening hours; her endorsement of them made my fingers do the dialing right away (before they ran out). Now I'm going to order a gut-butt dickey (and a few for my friends).

       ("What is it?" It's a band of elasticized fabric that fits around your middle, making it appear as if you have a different-colored t-shirt under your other shirt. It's real purpose: to hide your "muffin top" and any cracks that might appear.)

      I think all of the commuters that ride Pearl's bus should get one of these. However, from the sounds of it, they might wear nothing but the gut-butt dickey. 

         More lessons and tidbits will be shared after our next meeting. Stay tuned...



         

Super Donna

         Donna Volkenannt is the writer we'd all like to be. She is humble (to a fault). She doesn't talk about what she should write. She simply writes. And she
        doesn't           give           up...

        Recently named first place winner in the Erma Bombeck Writing Competition, Donna was surprised. The folks who know her and know her work? Not so surprised. The competition? Over 500. 

        Congratulations, Donna. And in honor of two great writers, Erma and Donna, I will share one of my favorite Erma Bombeck stories.

Erma Bombeck
photo by sitsgirls

      Erma and her family were on vacation. Her husband was the type that would not stop the car. No sit-down lunches. No break to stretch out. Keep it movin', he maintained.

      Erma and the kids pleaded with him to pick an exit. "There's a restaurant that looks good," they'd beg, but the car continued on, hurtling past every spot they spied. 

      Digging into her purse, Erma offered her husband a piece of chocolate. "That'd be great," he replied. And thoughtful wife that she was, Erma unwrapped the piece of chocolate and handed it to her husband.

      'We'll be stopping soon,' she thought. 'He thought it was chocolate but really, it's Ex-Lax...' 

Let's Make a Deal

       Right now, an illustrator (Mark) is busily working on drawings for my picture book. Probably tirelessly tiredly as well, because he also has a full-time job, chickens to tend and hounds-from-hell to corral.

       This has been a drawn-out process. I initially begged my daugher (who is also an artist, besides an extraordinary mother), but keeping pace with my four-year old granddaughter left her no time or energy for it.  Enter Mark. 

        I have no money to entice him, but that's okay. Mark is just as whorish as I am. He's eager to get his name on the cover of a book. And he's taking the task quite seriously.

        A week ago, I went to the Saturday Writers meeting, and something that Joe Schwartz* said hit me like a freight train.

        He mentioned that he is broke, so when he needs someone to edit, he offers to mow their grass or change their oil. He doesn't have the money, but he does have skills he can barter with. He does the same thing when he needs a bookcover designed. 

photo by amanda (slh)

       Right now there is not much grass to mow, and nobody would want to drive their car after I changed the oil in it, but I do make a mean batch of fudge. It takes four hours  to make this fudge, but it's well worth it.** 

       So, I'm going to hold the proverbial carrot in front of Mark. For every illustration he finishes, I am going to make his some fudge or some Symphony brownies or some other chocolate delicacy. (He is a chocoholic just like me.)

     It seems only fair...


* Joe was so persuasive, he convinced me to get onto facebook, which is indeed miraculous...

** The fudge does take an extraordinary time to finish. Five minutes to cook, and 3 hours and 55 minutes to cool.

Lucky 13

          Bylines  2013 calendar is almost closed for submissions. If you want to check out the guidelines, go here. It's quite a helpful site. There are even a few examples of the kind of pieces they want. 

This is the 2012 Bylines calendar.

       I sent a submission a month or so ago. I've got another one I'm almost finished with. And since the deadline is tomorrow (at midnight) I am sure I will be up until an unreasonably late hour 10 or so, writing a third.
      They welcome all genres. That means you, Shay, could get your spirits working to compose several submissions. (You might even be able to bring Emily into your piece.)
        Lisa, you're so wonderful at inspiring others. I know you have a submission in you.
        Zandrea, here is your chance.  It's short (300 words, which includes your bio). Send it to me tonight or tomorrow; I'll be glad to help you with it. 
        My WWWP peeps--you better send something off. (Lynn, you could create a "letter" to your inner critic?)
       Marcia, Rebeca, Becky, Donna, Barb, Val and all my other blogging and writing friends...Surrender and submit.
       (And Sylvia Forbes...You might get tired of seeing my emails pop up in the next two days, but at least I'm trying.)

Are You Hooked on Hockey?

        Chicken Soup for the Soul has extended their deadline for hockey stories. That means only one thing: they have not gotten enough marvelous entries to round out their anthology.

      And that means one thing to us as writers: we have a few more days to send  in a submission (or another submission). The deadline is March 4.

      I sent in a submission about being in the locker room with Brett Hull; getting drawn in by his impossibly-blue eyes, I became a cougar--or at least a cougar in my mind. (I hope my submission is not one they have tossed aside as crappy...)

     I did have another story that I had worked on, but it needed major revising. Chicken Soup's extension has prodded me to take the time to work on it, so I can increase my chances...a little.

     Neither of my stories are true hockey stories. I've never been to an entire hockey game--only to one partial game. I imagine there are writers out there who have a hockey story to tell (their son played street hockey or hockey in school) but it's stuck in the crevices of their mind.

    Dig around. Unearth that story. And submit...

A Bloody Writing Contest

          Saturday Writers' latest writing contest has just opened up. This time, it is a short story murder/mystery/whodunit contest. The word count limit is 2,012 and the entry fee is $5 for members and $7 for nonmembers. If you would like to check out the specific guidelines, go to Saturday Writers.  I would encourage all my blogging friends to send in an entry. Why?  Read on to find out...

        This year our contests are designed for writers to think outside the box. For example, the contest that just closed was a short story romance. I am so far from a romance writer, nor do I read them. However, some of the "romances" that were highlighted in our January meeting were "Sid and Nancy" and "Twilight." There are no heaving bosoms and no Fabio-like men on the covers of those books. I brought up the movie Fargo when someone got spitting mad and said that "all romances have a happy ending." If I went over the edge and chopped up my husband and put him in a wood chipper, it would indeed be a happy ending...for me.

      I submitted two entries to the romance contest. Neither one involved a man and a woman. Neither one even involved two people. And probably, neither one has a chance of winning.

      So why enter, if I'm fairly certain that I will be deemed a loser? Because one, it got me writing. (Actually, it was more "recycling" but that's beside the point.)  And two, it got me thinking outside my comfort zone.

     At the meeting, a new member leaned forward and asked me, "What kind of outside-the-box ideas are there, besides the 'mystery' of childbirth?" (She's too new to realize I'm the wrong person to ask that kind of question.)

photo by mikaspics
This photo gave me a bunch of new ideas...The "murder" of an apple or a pumpkin...
"Murdering" an expensive piece of meat by roasting it until it's dry as a bone. The
possibilties are endless...

     I replied, "What about the mystery of men? We try to figure out how they work, but are probably just overthinking them. What about the mystery of hair? As we age, on some parts it starts to disappear and on others," (and I gestured toward my "mustache" that needs to be macheted away every month) "it grows more prolifically."  At lunch after the meeting, we spoke of murder by frozen leg of lamb. One of the members--I won't name names, but she has the same name as one of the Brady Bunch daughters--is working on a story involving a knife, and when someone in the works-in-progress group asked, "How big a knife are you talkin' about?" she pulled a knife out of her purse! (She claims she was taking it to get sharpened after the meeting, but I don't know. I think I am going to make sure I don't tick her off from now on.)

       So, check out the contest. The romance contest did not have too many entries, so your chances might be good.