Writing Tips for June 2015

Our writing tips posts usually feature a variety of articles from around the web offering great tips for writers, specifically those writing fiction and memoir. Today we’re going to do things a little differently because we’ve found a great resource stuffed with writing tips.

Botham Writers offers “Writing Tips from the Masters,” a collection of writing tips and advice from top authors including Neil Gaiman, P.D. James, Jack Kerouac, Michael Moorcock, Elmore Leonard, Billy Wilder, Joyce Carol Oats, Henry Miller, Joss Wedon, Struck & White, and a wide variety of classic and modern writers. It covers all types of writing, from general writing and professional writing tips to writing scripts and published material.

Examples include:

Get through all of these and you might find the secret sauce in good writing.

Inspiration

Inspired by a prompt on where you find your inspiration, Writers in the Grove member, Diana Kay Lubarsky wrote the following.

Where do I go to find inspiration for my writing? Good question.

When seeking inspiration I tend to go to the darker corners of my life. The black hole of unresolved issues, unwiped tears, fears and longings, or embarrassing situations. Old thoughts, long forgotten memories gleefully swim to the surface of my mind eager to be set free. Surprisingly, not all of the stories emerge as sad. Moments of social maladjustment often morph into humorous ditties. Like the one about my husband’s cane. (After years of yelling at my husband to use his cane he finally picked it up only to use it as a pointer and promptly knocked over a prized vase.)

My writing takes two forms … that which I share, and that which I don’t. I’ve never categorized it like that before, but it is true. The writing I do not share is comparable to a child’s temper tantrum, filled with the angst of not getting my own way. While that which I do share tends to be kinder and more tolerant and encouraging. But always, the inspiration comes from within.

Surrounded now by kindred writers every Monday morning in the ivory covered halls of the Forest Grove Senior Center, I am learning how others seek inspiration from the outer world, which I find fascinating. This wonderful group share the most marvelous inspirational tales … about Rosemary’s turtles, and Beverly’s flush toilets, from Susan’s farm happenings to Lorelle’s imaginings. I am learning to look outward.

Perhaps someday soon I will be inspired by buttercups smiling in the field. But for today the inner images still sing most loudly in my head.

DKL 6/8/15

Prompt: Choices

The prompt for June 15 revolved around choices: What has been chosen and was it the right path? Or, something that was of your own choosing; how it would be different today if the choice was different.

This was a lively discussion and writing exercise at the writing class. Some choices were light-hearted and silly, while others dived in deeply to thoughts and experiences. It is your choice for this prompt…where does it lead you?

Poet and Writer Mark Thalman June 22, 2015

Mark Thalman is an acclaimed author and poet. Writers in the Grove is honored to have him present a short workshop on Monday, June 22, 2015, at 9AM at the Forest Grove Community and Senior Center in Forest Grove, Oregon.

He will be talking about the art and work behind being a published author, including helping us learn more about poetry styles and techniques.

The workshop is free and open to all.

A Kaleidoscope Market

Cardamon, cumin, cinnamon, and sumac wafted, mingling with unfiltered cigarettes, rotting garbage, and urine, and the unmistakable stench of oily, perfumed bodies pushing past in search of their next meal or treasure. My foot shifted as it slid across a rounded stone in the narrow corridor, made wet by the dripping ice under the raw fish on display in one stall. Next to it, the source of the sweet scents, a ground spices carved into patterns and textures, their earthy orders turning heads to admire the edible artwork. Squeals screeched from another, brightly banded birds in gold cages matching the scarves next door of gold, blue, and red fluttering in the breeze of those hurrying by. Cut flowers in white buckets offered a momentary respite from the kaleidoscope of smells, sights, and sounds. A honking bray parted the crowds as I paused, a heavily laden mule clomping its way through a well-worn and practiced path on autopilot, unaccompanied Its baskets swayed back and forth as people inhaled to back away, then swelled together behind it, a never-ending stream of humanity snaking its way through the dark.

Location: Egyptian Spice Market, Istanbul, Turkey

Prompt: Describe a Place by Smell

The prompt focused on an excerpt from the book Weep No More by Mary Higgins Clark where she described a place by its smell. You didn’t have to know where it was but you knew its location based upon the signature scents.

The prompt is to describe a place using smell as the main reference without naming the place.

In our case, the group attempted to guess where the location was based upon that description.

Writing Fiction Tips For May 2015

From time to time we may share links to writing tips we’ve found on the web to help us improve our writing. The majority of these are focused on fiction because our workshop motto is everything we write is fiction, whether or not it is. 😀

Five Essential Tips for Anyone Trying to Write A Book – Forbes: Brett Arends offers excellent tips that may seem simple but are really the things that get in our way and hold us back. These include practice writing, finding a writing space and time, planning your book, and so on. He also highlights how a writing group helped him, which is what we are here for! Come join us.

Writing tips by Paul Coelho: Hard to argue with a master and award-winning author. A favorite:

I write the book that wants to be written. Behind the first sentence is a threat that takes you to the last.

10 Writing Tips from Legendary Writing Teacher William Zinsser, May He Rest in Peace – Open Culture: The world of writing is a little smaller with the recent loss of William Zinsser, author of On Writing Well, a staple of how to write since 1976. The article paying tribute to him selects some of the best writing tips he’s offered.

“A clear sentence is no accident. Very few sentences come out right the first time, or even the third time. Remember this in moments of despair. If you find that writing is hard, it’s because it is hard.”

12 Writing Tips I’ve Learned After 20 Books and 3,000 Articles Over 20 Years – Inc.com: Inc’s Andrew Griffiths offers us some great tips that are not just about writing from a writer’s perspective, which they are, but also from an avid book reader. There is something to be said about good advice from those who love books such as:

I had the great pleasure of seeing Seth Godin in Sydney recently and he said something that really resonated with me: “If you are just writing to get ‘shares’ or ‘likes,’ you are writing too safe and too conservatively. If we really want to connect and engage our community, we have to be prepared to write content that is not popular, but it needs to be written.”

20 Writing Tips from Fiction Authors – iUniverse: This is a collection of quotes from modern writers, for the most part, on writing. There are some great ones in this collection including:

“The nearest I have to a rule is a Post-it on the wall in front of my desk saying ‘Faire et se taire’ (Flaubert), which I translate for myself as ‘Shut up and get on with it.’”
Helen Simpson

Writing tips from the CIA’s ruthless style manual – Quartz: Finding out that Struck and White were CIA sources – well, their writing styles were sourced by the US government in their style guide for writing “Intelligence Publications” – was fascinating, but the tips and advice in this collection of their tips celebrates their “crisp and pungent” language “devoid of jargon,” something that I’m not sure the US Government, or any government, practices much any more. Still a good set of tips for the rest of us to practice.

5 Writing Tips: Jane Smiley – Publishers Weekly: Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, Jane Smiley shared a few fantastic tips including:

Exhaust your own curiosity about your project before showing it to someone else. Let your own ideas play out without getting input from others, then, after you show them your work, use their responses as input to push you forward. It may take you several drafts and a long time to come to the end of your ability to tackle a given subject, and when you do, you might be satisfied or dissatisfied with your product. If you are dissatisfied, the input of others will give you ideas for how to shape your novel further. If you are satisfied, the input of others will let you know if your novel is readable and accessible.

Rain Magazine Event

Writing and artistic contributions from throughout Western Oregon and Washington are compiled by Clatsop Community College each year. These submissions are put into magazine/review form, and the College invites the authors in for an event to debut the magazine. The audience gets to hear the authors as they read their articles.

This is the information from the Rain Magazine event coordinator;

Clatsop Community College invites the community to celebrate the release of the 2015 edition of Rain Magazine at a free public reading and reception,Friday, May 29 from 6:00pm to 8:30pm in the Towler Hall 3rd floor Commons, 1660 Lexington Avenue, Astoria. Gather at 5:30pm for an author meet-and-greet and reading signup before the program begins.
Many contributors will be on hand to read excerpts from their works, and original artwork from the magazine will be on display. Light refreshments will be served, and copies of this limited edition Clatsop Community College publication will be available to the public.
This year’s Rain Magazine includes new writing from Robert Michael Pyle, Alex Autio, Tricia Gates Brown, Nancy Cook, Wayne Downing, Tim Hurd, Lucien Swerdloff, Florence Sage, Jan Bono, Jim Dott, Reba Owen, John Ciminello, Richard Mack, and more. Artwork by Terry Shumaker, Vicki Baker, Stirling Gorsuch, Kerri Zell, Laurel Fleet, and many others is included. This year’s cover features an oil painting by Astoria artist Darren Orange.
Event contact: Alison Ruch, aruch@clatsopcc.edu