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March Writers’ Meeting

Today we held our March meeting of the JWB. The next meeting will be held on Sunday, March 21, 2013, at Bella Caffe from 12:30 to 3PM at Bella Caffe in Park Rapids MN.

PRESENT:
Sharon, Jerry, Deb, Betty

TALKING STICK 22:
We had over 160 submitters this time with a total of 327 writings. We are reading them now. Tarah is working on artwork for the cover.

WRITING EVENTS:
Coming up, check on this: Mystery, Crime, and Thriller Conference at the Loft on April 27-28, 2013.
Red Bridge Film Festival will be in April in Park Rapids. We don’t have much information on this yet.
Don’t forget the Great American Think Off at New York Mills Cultural Center. The deadline for submissions to the Great American Think-off approaches. This years topic is “Which is more ethical: sticking to your principles or being willing to compromise?” How relevant is that? Write an essay of 750 words and win one of four $500 prizes. That’s sixty-six cents a word, better than the New Yorker. See think-off.com for details. Deadline is April 1. Still time to submit. No reading fee.

MISCELLANEOUS:
There is a neat description of the short story written by Benjamin Percy in Esquire magazine.
A short story is a red-faced sprint. A short story is a one-night stand you’ll remember years later in the shower or on a two-lane country highway. A short story is a precisely cut diamond. A short story is a glimpse — like the flash and buzz of a hummingbird — that stills your breath with its beauty. A short story, because it is short, can forgivably push boundaries, take risks. A short story attends to language in a gymnastic way that would exhaust any reader past 20 pages. A short story is impressionistic. A short story is a shot of whiskey, a snort of cocaine, a hand on a hot stove. A short story demands strenuous attention, supplying only the most essential components of character and narrative, asking the reader to infer the rest. A short story can be perfect — a novel cannot.

We took turns reading things we were working on and the others critiqued. Hope to see you next time!