Benefits of Writer’s Groups

One-Day Super Saturday Writers’ Conference

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A writers’ conference is a great place to learn more about writing techniques and marketing and publishing opportunities and possibilities.  It is also a great place to meet other writers and make connections and form bonds, which is a wonderful thing since writing is a lonely business.  You can make lifelong friends who can help and encourage you and you can do the same for them as you walk your writing journey.  I attended this event last year, and cannot wait to attend this Saturday.  If you are anywhere near Lancaster County, I invite you to come and see what this one-day conference has to offer, and if you like, I can meet you face-to-face if you let me know you are coming so we can connect.

LANCASTER CHRISTIAN WRITERS HOSTS ONE-DAY CONFERENCE ON APRIL 11, 2015, AT LANCASTER BIBLE COLLEGE

For a bargain of excellence and price, no writer, whether beginning or advanced, within driving radius will want to miss Lancaster Christian Writers’ Super Saturday 2015!! to be held April 11th, 2015, from 8:30am.-4:30pm at Lancaster Bible College, 901 Eden Road, Lancaster, PA 17601.

This one-day writers conference offers a full slate of workshops taught by top industry professionals in both fiction and non-fiction fields. An early registration price of $50 is due by Wednesday, April 8, and includes soup/sandwich buffet lunch (think Panini!) and LCW membership. Registrations after April 9 and walk-ins day of the conference are $60.

A fiction track will be taught by award-winning novelists Dina Sleiman and Kelly Long along with children’s author Brenda Hendricks. Non-fiction faculty include TV/radio speaker, marketing expert, award-winning author of 19 books Karen Whiting, professional memoir and ghostwriter Shawn Smucker, journalist/social media experts Lisa Bartelt and Alison McLennan.

Keynoting the opening session will be linguist, missionary, and author Grace Fabian. Workshops cover such topics as: 

Market Yourself Now! Learn Tools to Develop Press Kit, Bio, Website, and Other PR Products.

Writing Blockbuster Scenes: How To Keep Readers Flipping Pages and Asking For More.

 Transformed Manuscripts: Repackaging Your Ideas (Sold or Rejected) to Expand Marketability.

 The Unfortunate Truth in Fiction: Addressing Hard Issues Without Pulling Down Your Story.

 A Story To Tell: Surefire Do’s and Don’ts to Write a Gripping True Life Story or Memoir.

 Myers-Briggs for Your Protagonist: Applying Personality Types to Create Characters with Distinctive Qualities, Motivations, and Voices.

 Let’s Ride the Seesaw: Recruiting Your Inner Child to Communicate with Young Readers.

 100% Guaranteed (Oh, Yeah?) Secret to Blogging Success Beyond Your Wildest Dreams!

A conference bookstore will offer a wide variety of writer resources and faculty titles. Conference attendees can get personal consultations with faculty on a first-come, first-serve basis. Lancaster Christian Writers welcomes writers of all churches and denominations, all levels and genres. Monthly meetings offer opportunities for manuscript critique, networking with other writers, workshops and guest authors.

Discipline and Determination

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Okay, so I have shared, in the past, that I struggle with finding/making time to write.  Well, on Saturday, February 21, 2015, I attended my Writers’ Group meeting.  I was to give the devotion that day, and I shared a devotion entitled “First Things First” from the book Write His Answer:  A Bible Study for Christian Writers by Marlene Bagnull that focused on Matthew 6:33  “Give Him first place in your life and live as he wants you to.”  I also mentioned, before sharing the devotion that it is often a struggle for me to find/make time to write.  The devotion ends with this Bible verse:  “But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength.  They shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.”  (Isaiah 40:31), followed by this poem:

Pressures

Father, I have so much to do

and not enough hours in the day to do it,

I know that’s only partly true.

I do have enough time

to do the things you want me to do.

But, Lord, how do I sort out what they are,

when everything screams for my attention?

I’m exhausted from rushing —

uptight and irritable.

Please forgive me and help me.

Help me to learn from your Son.

People were constantly pressing in on him.

He could have been consumed–burned out.

But Jesus took time to be alone with you.

He made you his top priority.

I must learn to do the same,

especially when I’m feeling pressured.

Help me to be still and know

that you are God.

Even as you created and hold together the universe,

you can bring order to my life if  I will let you.

Thank you, Lord.

I always make time to spend time in prayer with the Lord each day, but, I will confess, I haven’t made much time to read His word each day.  That is something I want to begin to make time for and I plan to.  My plan was to begin doing so this week, but so many unexpected things have happened this week, it got pushed by the wayside, again.  I need to learn to make it happen even if unexpected things happen.

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What does this have to do with writing?  Well, just like making time to read God’s word requires discipline and determination, so does making time to write.

Our guest speaker, at that February 21, 2015 meeting, mentioned during his speaking, that it is good for writers to have busy lives because it gives us a full life which gives us lots of ideas and information to use in our writing.  However, he also mentioned that he writes for two hours a day, sometimes longer on weekends, even in his busy life.

All of this resonated with me and made me think, and I thought, “If he can do it, I can do it.”  So I determined to set aside two hours a day to write.  I talked to my family about it, and they were encouraging.  So, Sunday, March 1, (no, I didn’t begin doing this right after the meeting), I finally found my determination.  We came home from church earlier than we normally do because it was snowing, and everyone wanted to do their own relaxing activities, so I decided to write.

I grabbed my laptop and went to the dining room table, and that’s when determination kicked in.  You see, I’m horribly guilty of procrastinating at beginning to write because I get onto social media first thinking I’ll write after spending some time on social media.  However, the social media time goes to long and the writing never begins.  So that Sunday, I determined NOT to look at social media, but to IMMEDIATELY begin writing.  I spent three hours, that day, writing.  That was last Sunday.

Today is Thursday, and I have managed to set aside 7 to 9 p.m. every evening to write, and though I haven’t written for the full two hours every night, I have written 1,000 words each night, with the exception of one, on which I wrote 800 words.  Now I look forward everyday to my writing time, and I believe, now that I have made it part of my routine, I will be able to stick with it.

How about you?  How do you make time for writing?

My Writing Process

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1) & 2)  What am I working on and how do I write what I write?

I currently have two works in progress (WIP).  I have been working on an outline and character questionnaires for a story and am still working on that.  However, that doesn’t seem to quench my need to be creative.  I guess I am just too used to writing “by the seat of my pants” (pantser), which is how I have written stories ever since I started writing way back when I was in junior high school, (what many places now call “middle school”).  I do not want to give up on the one that I am working on with an outline and character questionnaires, though, because I want to see what really does work better for me — “pantsing” or “planning”, or maybe I’ll be able to find something in between.  Any suggestions for something in between?

You may be wondering, “doesn’t pantsing require extra editing”?  All I can say is “not for me”.  You see, the way that I write, I simply sit down and begin writing and let the characters introduce themselves to me, and I let the characters tell the story.  I just type.  The next time I sit down to write, (which should be everyday, but, sadly, is not), I reread all that I have typed; and, yes, I do this each and every time I sit down to work on the story I am pantsing.  Isn’t that time consuming, you may ask.  Yes, it is.  However, it serves three wonderful purposes to me.  It refreshes my mind about the story, I change things and make edits on what I’ve written each and every time I sit down and reread, and it gets ideas flowing and awakens the characters, and they continue telling me the story.  That way, if I write a scene that I feel is lame or that doesn’t fit or advance the story, I can get rid of it the next day.  I just wrote such a scene last night, and the more I thought about it after walking away from my writing, the more I decided it does nothing to advance the plot.  Therefore, when I sit down to write again, be it today or tomorrow, I will get rid of that scene.  So, yes, I also spend time thinking about my stories and characters while I am not writing, which also helps my writing process for the next time I sit down to write.

3)  How does my book differ from others in its genre?

The only answer I have for this, is that it is written by me, in my voice, with characters I created in their own circumstances.  I hope that their circumstances and the plot is something fresh and new to the genre.  I hope that my characters are characters that you come to care about quickly and that you come to love and will not want to say goodbye to at the end of the story.  I hope there is an underlying Christian theme/message that will inspire you and touch your heart.

4)  Why do I write what I write?

Because I have to.  I have a need to get these stories on paper (or computer) because they will not let me rest if I do not.  I also write the kinds of stories that I love to read, and I may be writing more than one genre eventually because I have a story idea burning inside me that was born of helping my son with one of his writing assignments for his homeschool writers’ club.  It introduced me to a new genre that I never tried writing before and didn’t think I’d want to write, but I had so much fun helping him, that I just might give it a shot when I finish the two WsIP I am currently spending my time on.

5)  How does my writing process work?

I described my writing process near the top of this post, and when I did, I alluded to the answer to this question.  I haven’t reached a definite decision which writing process works best for me yet, but I do still enjoy writing as a pantser much more than as a planner.  However, because I haven’t yet had a story published, I can’t really say that my writing process definitely works, but I do believe that whatever writing process I (or you) are most comfortable with will be the one that will work in the end because if I am (or you are) using a process that I am (or you are) comfortable with, I believe I (or you) will be more productive and produce good, if not great, work.

What is your writing process?  Is it working well for you?  Leave a comment and let me and my readers know.

My First Writers’ Group Experience

/ kellyfbarr / 1 Comment

Some time ago, I went searching online for writer’s groups in my area.  I found two, but only one that I really felt would be a good fit for me.  They meet once a month but take the summers off.  They had their seasonal ‘kick-off’ this morning.  They had a guest speaker, Dean Drawbaugh, who spoke about the “Nine Qualities that Generate Book Sales”.  He spoke for almost two hours.  It was very informative and interesting.  Mr. Drawbaugh is a writer, publisher and consultant.

It was definitely a step out of my comfort zone to go to the group this morning, as I am an introvert and am uncomfortable going into a group situation not knowing if anyone I know will be there.  It was a good-size group, between 30 and 35 people, some of whom drove for an hour or more to get there.  I didn’t notice anyone really reaching out to people they didn’t already know, but it is easier to get to know people and learn more about them in the small groups, so I’m sure that’s where I’ll get to know more of the people.  I did speak with the leader of the small group for a little while afterwards to gather a little more information about the group and the sharing process.

Mr. Drawbaugh also said something that I had posted here in the past about writing.  I had shared a while ago that I have been seeing a lot of stuff about writers writing for themselves and the fact that this seems to have become more important to some writers than determining their audience and writing for a specific audience.  I mentioned that unless you know who you are writing for and write to that audience, you probably won’t sell many books.  Mr. Drawbaugh said the same thing.  He said that if a writer wants to write for him or herself, that’s fine, if he/she only wants to sell one copy.  He stressed the importance of knowing who your audience is, writing to that audience, and then preparing to market to that audience.  That’s how you become a successful writer who sells lots of copies of your book.  So, the real question is, do you want to achieve a level of success that enables you to earn some money or do you just want to write for your own pleasure?  I know I want to achieve a level of success and earn some money.   Writing is hard work, and though I love it, I would really like to be paid to do it.

This particular writer’s group frequently has guest speakers.  Most months, though, they divide into small groups and whoever wants to can share a piece of writing for feedback from the others in the group.  There is a limit on the number of words your piece may have, to enable everyone who wants to share to have the time to do so.  Then there is the ‘oreo cookie’ rule that says that those giving feedback must start with something positive, followed by tips and advice on things that they think should be changed or that could be done better (this is also done in a kind, polite manner), and then end with another positive.

I think this is a great way to get and give feedback.  It gives the writer helpful advice and offers them another point of view or perspective that can be helpful without tearing them and/or their writing apart in a manner that is simply defeating.  This type of writer’s group is very helpful and encouraging.  I think I’m going to like this group.  I plan to continue attending.

It has inspired me to write more, and I look forward to seeing what I can come up with and, maybe, share at the next meeting.

Many people speak of a writer’s life as solitary and in many ways it is, but it is so important to have a network or group that you can be a part of to prevent yourself from giving up or becoming depressed.  It’s always good to know that you’re not the only one struggling with a scene or a character or whatever.

Are you a member of a writer’s group?  Can’t find one in your area?  Maybe you could start one.