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July Meeting Minutes 2014

Today we held our July meeting. Our next meeting will be Sunday, August 17, 2014, at Bella Caffe in Park Rapids MN from 12:30 to 3 PM.

PRESENT:

Sharon, Jan, Jerry, Niomi, Ryan, Mary.

Welcome, Ryan and Mary, both new to our meetings.

TALKING STICK 23:

We are in the process of editing this year’s Talking Stick book. We hope to be done and books ordered by the end of July.

RECENT WRITERS’ EVENTS:

Nimrod Literary Festival #5 at Jerry Mevissen’s was a great success. This year’s writers’ retreat was on Beginnings and Endings. It was well attended with great food and great writing, as usual. Jerry is making plans for next year’s event. It looks like they may also be doing a smaller event in February. These events are always by invitation only.

Niomi’s book signing at Summer Hill Farm was also a great success. Thanks to all of the writers who came out in support of Niomi.

The Bemidji Library week and the Northwoods Writers Conference in Bemidji took place recently. No one who attended today’s meeting went to these but we hope to hear about them in the near future. These are both excellent events.

FUTURE EVENTS:

Friday, August 22, 2014 Friends of the Brainerd Public Library, Wine and Words. For more information, go to www.wineandwordsandfriends.com/#!authors/cee5.

Saturday, Sept. 13, 2014, workshop with Marsh Muirhead and Talking Stick 23 Book Release Party, both at Blueberry Pines Golf Course south of Park Rapids MN. For more information, email sharrick1@wcta.net or go to www.jackpinewriters.com.

Friday through Sunday, Sept. 26-28, 2014, Watermark’s Mississippi Headwaters Festival of Poetry and Haiku. Jane Hirshfield lecture and reading plus many other events. Contact Mgmuirhead@midco.net.

Saturday, October 4, 2014, Lake Region Writers Network meeting. For more information, go to www.lakeregionwriters.net.

Several of our writers read things that they have been working on and the rest of us critiqued. We had a good time discussing writing. One of the things we said was that you don’t want to spell everything out for the reader. You need to give subtle hints and use word choices and then trust the reader. But you also have to realize that not all readers will make the leap.

It was one of those meetings where we just hated to stop talking and go home! Welcome again, Ryan and Mary.

Hope to see you all next time!