Reader's Options

Nov. 21, 2009

Met with Jude on Nov. 12th for feedback on 'A Meandering Road - Lita's Story'. Lots of good catches of typos, some really good questions about the story flow and names/situations that don't match. She did a great job and her upgrades will really improve the final product. Now, she's willing to do the same for 'Deborah's Story'. I'm a lucky writer to have such great support.

Later that same day, we had our Four Goddesses meeting. JoAn is dropping out for awhile and Lois is pulling back for a month or two. I'm glad Cindie still wants to meet. The feed back on the excerpt from 'Stephen's Boys' was sparse, but insightful.

Had our book club meeting on Nov. 14 to discuss the books of Raymond Chandler. Poor Mr. Chandler was not well received. In fact, this was the first time the reader's all voted that they would not read him again. The main complaint was way too much description.

Nov. 15 I went to Cindie Miller's book signing for 'Ask Me No Questions'. Lots of folks showed up and we had a good time. She has some beautiful flyers, postcards and a giant poster. Very professional.

Met with an accountant on the 16th to discuss whether my writing is a hobby or a business. She gave me a lot of information and it looks good for going business.

Nov. 19th was our writer's club monthly reading at Denny's. Nine folks showed up. I believe it was some of the best readings we've ever had. I think the place worked well. There was some noise with other customers and some dish clattering, but the music wasn't too loud and the service was excellent.

Yesterday, Lois, JoAn and I drove to the Hasting's stores in Kingman and Bullhead City to give them books and flyers for our book signings in Dec. We had a ball. the Hasting reps were very accommodating. They like our idea of a flyer offering a drawing for a chance to win a Hastings gift certificate to anyone dropping by the store on the day of our signing and taking the time to talk with each author for a few seconds. It will be interesting.

Today was the writer's meeting. I really thought that the feedback on my sub for last time would be badly received due to the fact that the reader wouldn't have all the facts, but the crits were positive. In fact, Buck felt that Stephen was the younger brother. That's good, because I'm trying to portray him as the weak brother. For my sub for today, I cut a 450 word story down to 247 to meet the prompt of 'a conversation with a literary person'. Some of the group have read the original piece and liked it. But, we have a lot of new folks, so it will be interesting to see if the word cut took away the gist of the piece.

Only another day until the kids arrive for Thanksgiving. My writing will probably be sparse, but the important thing is that I'll be with family.

My quote for today has to do with feedback. A writer's intent, as to plot and character development, may not be what his/her reader catches. And, that is a good thing. I do it all the time when I crit my fellow writer's work. So, here's the quote. "Writing gives you the illusion of control, and then you realize it's just an illusion, that people are going to bring their own stuff into it." - David Sedaris.