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The Electronic Write Stuff |
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| North Florida Writers * June 2005 In this issue: Sisters in Crime to Hear Karen Harvey June Weltman to Speak in July to NFW Members Hilton Head Writers' Retreat Set June 9-12 A Best-Seller Any Way You Look at It NFW to Do Critiques at June Meeting Quotes from a Writer's Quill -- Ludwig van Beethoven Writers Born in May Calendar of Events ___________________________________________________ SISTERS IN CRIME TO HEAR KAREN HARVEY The Northeast Florida chapter of Sisters in Crime will hear local historian Karen Harvey at 10 a.m. Saturday, June 4. The meeting will be held in the Community Room in the Mandarin Branch Library (on Kori Road). Attendees may purchase Ms. Harvey's books after the meeting. Brothers are also welcome to attend the meetings. JUNE WELTMAN TO SPEAK IN JULY TO N.F.W. MEMBERS The July 9 membership meeting of the North Florida Writers will feature a talk by June Weltman,the author of Mystery of the Missing Candlestick, a young adult mystery novel set in St. Augustine, Fla. The book, which received Mayhaven Publishing's First Place Award for Children's Fiction, was published by Mayhaven in 2004. The meeting will start at 2 p.m. in F128B, the auditorium conference room of Kent Campus of FCCJ (3939 Roosevelt Blvd., Jax 32205). Mystery of the Missing Candlestick was recognized by the Florida Historical Society in April 2004 with a special award, the Journeys for the Junior Historian Book Award. Ms. Weltman started her journalism career as a reporter with the Chicago Tribune and later covered the State Department and Congress as the foreign affairs writer for Congressional Quarterly. She worked in public affairs for U.S. government agencies, including serving as a writer and photographer on the Peace Corps staff, before turning to freelance writing and editing. Her articles have been published in newspapers and magazines throughout the United States. She has won many writing awards. She holds a bachelor's degree in journalism from the University of Illinois and a master's degree from Georgetown University. She has taught journalism classes at American University and public relations at the University of North Florida. She resides in Jacksonville, Fla., where she is working on a new mystery novel. She speaks frequently about mysteries and writing at schools, meetings, and conferences. She may be reached at mirandamanning@aol.com. HILTON HEAD WRITERS' RETREAT SET JUNE 9-12
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CALENDAR OF EVENTS Meetings of NFW are held on the second Saturday of the month at 2 p.m. on the Kent Campus of Florida Community College of Jacksonville. We generally meet in F128B (auditorium conference room). You may receive feedback from specific individuals by mailing the manuscript and return postage to the above address. June 11: Critiques only July 9: June Weltman, The Mystery of the Missing Candlestick Aug. 13: Robert Fulton Jr., But You Know What I Mean! Sept. 10: Critiques only Oct. 8: Karen Harvey, Ghosts of St. Augustine Nov. 12: Critiques only Dec. 10: Lillian Brown, Banned in Boston Past speakers have included novelists Jack Hunter, David Poyer, Page Edwards, Ruth Coe Chambers, William Kerr, Tom Lashley; poets, William Slaughter, Mary Baron, Mary Sue Koeppel, Dorothy Fletcher, George Gilpatrick; columnists Vic Smith, Tom Ivines, and Robert Blade; editors Buford Brinlee and Nan Ramey; agent Debbie Fine; magazine editor Sara Summers; medical writers Elizabeth Tate and Michael Pranzatelli; oral historian Robert Gentry; plus many others. "WE ASPIRE TO CREATE WITH WORDS." The Write Staff Carrol Wolverton, President (carrolwolve@hotmail.com) Richard Levine, Vice President (richie@rocketmail.com) Joyce Davidson, Secretary (Davent2005@comcast.net) Howard Denson, Treasurer and newsletter editor (hdenson@fccj.edu) Joel Young, Public Relations (joshua7786@aol.com) Doris Cass, Hospitality (ostie46@aol.com) Presidents Emeritus: Frank Green, Dan Murphy, Howard Denson, Nate Tolar, Joyce Davidson, Margaret Gloag (haggisgal@juno.com), Richard Levine, Bob Alexander, JoAnn Harter Murray Newsletter address The Write Stuff FCCJ Kent, Box 109 3939 Roosevelt Blvd. Jacksonville, FL 32205 Homepage addresses http://hometown.aol.com/nfwriters/ http://web.fccj.org/~hdenson/writestuff Submissions to the newsletter should generally be about writing or publishing. If possible, please submit mss. on IBM diskette in either WordPerfect, Word, or RTF format. We pay in copies to the contributors, with modest compensation for postage and copying. We pay $5 for pieces of 500-599 words. MEMBERSHIP IN THE NFW If you are writing a story or poem, you will need some expert feedback -- the sort that you will receive at a meeting of the North Florida Writers. You won't profit from automatic praise that a close friend or relative might give or jealous criticism from others who may feel threatened by your writing. The NFW specializes in CONSTRUCTIVE feedback that will enable your manuscript to stand on its own two feet and demand that it be accepted by an editor or agent. Hence, you need the NFW. The North Florida Writers is a writer's best friend because we help members to rid manuscripts of defects and to identify when a work is exciting and captivating. Membership is $15 for students, $25 for individuals, and $40 for a family. (Make out checks to WRITERS.) Is your membership current? To find out, check the mailing label. If it says "0104" next to your last name, your membership expired in January 2004. You do not have to pay back dues to activate your members, so, if you last paid in 1992 or 2002, don't worry about the months you were inactive. Won't you join today? The following is an application. Mail your check to WRITERS, Box 109, FCCJ Kent, 3939 Roosevelt Blvd., Jacksonville, FL 32205. Name___________________________________________ St. address____________________________________ Apt. No. ______________________________________ City ________________State _____ Zip __________ E-mail address(es) ___________________________________ HOW DOES CRITIQUING WORK? When you attend a meeting of the North Florida Writers, you eventually discover that NO ONE has ever died while his or her manuscript was being read and critiqued. You may be ready to face the ordeal yourself. . .or, reading this, you may wonder what exactly takes place during a critiquing. First, you pitch your manuscript into a stack with others' works-in-progress. Then one of the NFW members hands out each piece to volunteer readers, taking care NOT to give you back your own manuscript to read. Second, as the reading begins, each author is instructed NOT to identify himself or herself and especially NOT to explain or defend the work. The writer may never have heard the piece read aloud by another's voice, so the writer needs to focus on the sound of his or her sentences. Third, at the finish of each selection, the NFW members try to offer constructive advice about how to make the story better. If a section was confusing or boring, that information may be helpful to the author. The NFW will listen to 10 pages (double-spaced) of prose (usually a short story or a chapter). SUBSCRIBE If you think a friend would enjoy THE ELECTRONIC WRITE STUFF, e-mail us his or her e-mail address. You will notice that THE WRITE STUFF is not filled with links designed to solicit checks for the sun, moon, stars, and comets and everything else in the universe. If your friend doesn't want us, then he or she will be able to Unsubscribe. UNSUBSCRIBE If you are simplifying your internet life and can no longer handle us, then hit reply and type in UNSUBSCRIBE. If we inadvertently have you in the directory with two different e-mail addresses, let us know which one you want us to omit. |
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