Am at the CRRL Salem Church library branch, Room B, and the date is Saturday, 08 January 2011. The RWG is meeting. Fun times in Dodge City, or so I felt after it ended. The trip, well, the trip was fascinating.

The names and personalities of RWG members have been altered to protect the innocent, the guilty, and the unconcerned. These changes are taken as a CYA action, so I don’t suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous literary criticism at some point in the future. I doubt I will, as the altered RWG members are not computer savvy and probably never will ever see the Blog.

A few helpful notes - The RWG meets the second Saturday of each month at the CRRL Salem Church branch. Several poetry and prose events are coming up … the President (Evelyn Bickell and the Programs chair (Larry Turner) each commented on these, covering locations, times and deadlines for submissions. As I’m not interested in writing any poetry I’ll stick with venues for publicizing The Tessera Trilogy ©, but not enter any contests. I’ll skip the more mundane organizational topics mentioned and focus on my areas of interest. The RWG seems to focus on poetry and short stories. All members got a chance to mention their works and upcoming efforts/publications.

Steph mentioned a friend with interests in genealogy, so I provided contact info (networking). John (not at meeting) is a retired government type writing a novel.

Critiques are very word centric, especially for poems. The group chews up each word, each suggestion of symbolism. Hmm!!!

Monday evenings at 7 PM in Central Park, Fredericksburg at Borders’ Book Store readings are conducted. Entries are to be no more than 5 pages, double-spaced. Ten copies are to provided of the article to be read.

March 19^th will see The Festival of the Book in Charlottesville, VA. RWG members are encouraged to carpool.

The following Saturday, March 26^th, will be the Celebration of Poetry at CRRL HQ in Fredericksburg. The morning of that event will see a “Poetry Slam” of readings by members or the general public. There will be no charge if one puts ones book out for display or sale… Hmm!!!!

Critique of Golden Gate ©. I read Chapter 1, In the Sands, to the critique session as the last piece reviewed. Feedback included - “It flows really well”, two typos were noted (corrected), and “bring more to read at next session.” One member asked if she could keep the copy… of course. I mentioned that the entire novel would be provided to anyone sending an e-mail. I was asked if I had published the novel, as one reader noted the writing name (DP Tolan) on the cover. I responded that I had offered the book to cousins via my newsletters and had 34 copies in circulation.

Caution on the RWG, which like any group, has its little cliques and interest groups. Poetry, and prose, evokes the authors’ passions, and defensiveness (not just by ne) was evident. One member even did a bit of back biting after the meeting … fascinating! It is good to know what is in the waters one swims through.

 

After the meeting I asked Candice Ransom, our children’s book author, if she had ever considered using high school art students to illustrate her books. No … the editor or publisher require use of their illustrators. I noted the excellent artwork on display locally at Chancellor High School (CHHS), and the possibly of commissioning a student to do a book cover. I got a rather strange look. Was I slightly off my rocker? Oh, well …

Actions – Only submit double spaced articles, two to three pages in length, for review. Each will be read to the group.

Make your words “a portrait”, be visual and build tension. Include alliteration (personal interest… because it’s cool). Avoid superfluous words.

I might shorten and submit my research paper on “Passages of Josephus.” I checked and it is roughly twenty-two pages in length, minus references, foot and endnotes.

The date is Saturday, 08 January 2011, and it’s morning at the American Family Fitness (AFF) center in Spotsylvania; I'm struggling to stay interested in getting in shape. Well, to be precise or accurate, I am in shape, just NOT the shape I’d like to be in. It was pizza night last night, and I had a beer with four big slices. Lots of carbs and extra calories.

Sometimes AFF becomes a real drag! The time we spend here expands to fill the evening; today it was an hour and a half. I finish my abbreviated routing in forty minutes or so … so I sit and put together my thoughts on novels, life, and genealogy for the rest of the time, taking notes on the backs of flyers at the AFF desk. These expanded AFF periods end up screwing with timing of dinners, or weekend mornings.  

I even had time to conjure, out of thin air, a rough idea of a cover for Sooley Base ©. It would incorporate a background with Arabia’s red sands; I scanned and copied the draft to files, as its 22 meg size precludes use on the Blog.

At the Virginiana Room (VR), deep in the bowels of the CRRL headquarters building downtown, the date is Friday, 07 January 2011, and I’m at my post – Volunteer. I even have a nice Volunteer badge and neck strap, but not the promised CRRL Volunteer tee shirt. Promises, promises, promises!

When there are no customers to help I get to do my own family research, so this is the perfect volunteer job for me; please don’t tell my boss Michelle. I even worked today in spare moments putting several scraps of notes for Sooley Base © into a Word document for cutting and pasting later into the current draft.

One of the chores I accomplished during volunteer hours was calling “cousin” Tony out in Las Cruces, NM. We spent about forty minutes on the phone – my own cell phone, in case the CRRL auditors (Are there any?) check on phone bills or what I put in this Blog. We discussed a myriad of family ancestors, and he cleared up some questions, informing me that certain Bermudez names were a generation earlier than I thought. This resolved some uncertainties, but clearly the recurring use of the same given names creates a research challenge. I have two second cousins, brothers in fact, who spell their family name differently. One spells it Riordan; his brother spells it Reardan. Tony has the same issues with Hispanic names. It makes for difficulties documenting families, and explaining the apparent misspellings. We shared experiences about trying to interest relatives, especially younger family members, in genealogy. He gave me lots of corrections about relationships within the family, and more stories that some may wish not to see the light of day. Every family, as any genealogist knows, has “root rot” – those ancestors no one wants divulged.

I promised to send him a CD with images of family members scanned, and he mentioned a photo he has. The photo is of Josefa Bermudez, his grandmother. He explained that due to age it is in fragile condition. I noted that I considered it a family treasure. I also promised to share his address and phone number with family.

In a phone call/conversation (phoncon) with former sister-in-law, we discussed a number of family ancestors, living relatives and particular research questions centering on Brownsville, Texas and a relative named “Maruca.” Maruca it turns out is Spanish for Mary, but finding that out didn’t solve any questions, merely providing a clue for further research. I cropped several photos of her paternal grandfather for comparison; these date to about 1915 when her grandfather served in the US Cavalry at Fort Brown in Brownsville, TX. Records reflect that someone with his name served with Colonel Teddy Roosevelt in Cuba during the Spanish-American War. If that Rough Rider was the same man, it tends to identify one individual in a photo as the grandfather, rather than another.

We both agreed that the grandfather and grandmother never married, perhaps a result of the times in the Old West. Her family, when questioned about him, said to “let the past die.” As a side note, if you are researching ancestors, I recommend using the following search site http://www.beta.familysearch.org/ , as it offers a great deal of BMD (Birth, Marriage, Death) as well as US Census records data, and is currently FREE.

In looking back at the data several hours later (at the AFF gym), I wondered how one could trace a person given just her first name, this is the Maruca, who lived in Salinas, CA and then Downey, CA in the 1970s and 1980s. I will have to pursue phone and resident records, perhaps cross checking between Salinas and Downey. The few clues suggest Maruca was a cousin, perhaps with Garcia or Pena as a surname. Maruca had children, so perhaps they (probably) were Catholics and went through their Holy Communions or Confirmation at Catholic churches in either Salinas or Downey; it would be a really long shot. Other data shows Maruca would have lived in Salinas in the 1975 to Feb 1978 timeframe, so that is another clue.

My brother, his appellation de guerre “Gomes”, provided two more supportive remarks about Golden Gate © …saying it was “well paced, it held my interest.”

Whoa there, just a moment, paleeze!

The date is Friday, 07 January 2011. I’m anticipating, possibly nervous about upcoming, first meeting with Riverside Writers Group (RWG).  Each member was asked to bring paper and pencil, plus something for the other members to critique. So, what do I bring?

I decided initially to do a short handout, with a printed cover of Golden Gate ©, plus the author bio, and an invite for RWG members to e-mail me for a copy of the novel, noting the Blog about writing the second book.

“The wife” as my oldest brother would so eloquently say, countered with a different approach. She suggested bringing several printed pages so the RWG critiquers would have something tangible to physically read and digest. I adopted her approach.

“Quid me Vexaris?” as Alfred E. Neumann of MAD magazine once so lucidly put it; “What, me worry?” For those slow on the uptake, I’m expressing natural anxiety one gets as one approaches an unknown, or in this case, a critical review of some dimension and severity by a group of more experienced writers.

“What if” they’re not only mildly critical, but deeply so. What if they chew up my words and spit them out … after I’ve given the book away to friends, Romans, and countrymen? Will they chop up my choice of words, my development of characters, the flow … or use of passive tense in certain scenes?  This would be most evident as my characters transition across several millennia in the first seven or so chapters. This is the typical anxiety one faces and experiences, but something uncomfortably new to me as a rather new author. What will they think of … me?

What will they think? Yes, but will they say it, those real feelings?  Probably if they’re motivated. Unlike a familiar family member, my oldest brother, whose words have been encouraging – “Don’t change a word!” and “Good flow” and “Interesting.” What will they say? Then the question became a defensive one … Do I take their criticisms seriously? It depends! Will I cry? No!!!! Will I dramatically change any words … perhaps, but it’s unlikely. I would or maybe will tweak wording. Writing isn’t as easy as a reader thinks. I think in a stream of consciousness … my mind rambling from idea to idea at a fast pace. This unnerves my wife and frequently frustrates our conversations, as my mind races to an answer before she asks the question. These streams of thought remain creative, but often out of sequence to the timeline of the story …. So I have to regroup, rewrite and resubmit. R&R! This will be a big challenge in Sooley Base ©, while the character development and their interaction will be the bigger challenge in Kashan Kashmeeri ©.

The plan for the trilogy … is, or maybe was, to give away the first two novels, and market the third, with most proceeds donated to charity. Of course, being either a visionary, or a complete dolt, I envision a huge advance and then a movie offer for the third novel. My wife thinks I’m in La La Land … Nevah Hatchee!!!!

I asked a recipient of the first novel if he “had read any good books lately” … knowing he had a copy. With a straight face he said … “No, not really!” but then added that he’d only read six or seven pages. Alas the slings and thrashings of outrageous fortune!

This week is the first 2011 meeting of the Riverside Writers Group, which I joined late last year. Hopefully it will be a worthwhile endeavor. I had initially decided to get five to six pages of Sooley Base © ready for review, but have decided I’m not ready enough for even pre-prime time. I’m still brainstorming how to sequence bits and pieces of the story. I may just take a flyer to the meeting, with pull off tabs of my e-mail address to see if I can interest any other members to read and critique my first book. That shiny object that other blogger mentioned in her blog really does pose a continuing distraction.

Have been observing, and getting distracted by those shiny objects. Donated blood at the gym the other night; American Blood Services did the collection for vampires. They actually seemed more competent, and had more innovative doodads than the American Red Cross. Perhaps they have a better vampire in charge. At the gym my weight has been holding steady, though I’m not too serious at serious calorie burning. I’m more into muscle toning and working to be more flexible. Our diet hasn’t changed much – I say this because I’m the chief cook, bottle washer, and grocer.

Not much progress on the second novel, mainly those distractions. I’ve even been toying with the concept and rough ideas for a fifth book. But, my overarching distraction has been my infection with the genealogy bug, bacillus familius. I’ve been calling, e-mailing and recalling data on families long past pushing up daisies, and my former sister-in-law even suggested I write about their family. Like many families it features stories of a bizarre nature – thieves, murderers, boot leggers, gamblers, owners of brothels … all the things of the Old West about which numerous authors already write.

Anyhow, the data is making its way into a form appropriately termed a Family Group Sheet (FGS). Caught between CA, VA, and AZ are bits and pieces of how was related to whom, had whom, begatting and bequeathing in all sorts of strange and perverse ways. Some of the bits and pieces get down to what part of which town someone lived in, what color was their hairs, did they have kids, and on and on. I find it fascinating, and much like a detective’s work, trying to rationalize a choice for how to spell that person’s name, and figure which of the varying records to believe and bet the farm on.

Well I thought you needed to know how things were going, so there it is … Oh, look, a pretty light!

Well, while stumbling through the basement file cabinets, in pursuit of a candied yam … my notes from a course once taught stared out at me. It was at Germanna Community College and the course syllabus called it … “The American Experience in Vietnam.” I was looking for course materials to donate to a Military Museum. I found reams of material, even notes on special guests that came as guest speakers. One was the last Vietnamese Chief of Naval Operations. He was not the best speaker, as his worldview was very old school and paternalistic … I talk, you listen. Well, others were far more interesting. The course did not have that much of interest to the young student body and eventually failed to get enough sign ups to restart the next semester … a real shame.

The notes were next to another bit of memorabilia, notes from a Creative Writing course taken years ago, even before Alex arrived. Jane Derringer taught the course at Rappahannock Community College in Tappahannock, VA. This pursuit involved a 75 mile drive each way to take the course. Her handouts, and class notes may add to the creative process. They are included below. The lesson to be learned, jot down your thoughts, persevere in your desire to write.

Memories from the creative Writing course at RCC. I found a story of a visit to the Doctors; office, something worth sharing. Maybe Offspring will read it … wouldn’t that be a surprise for him! Jane Derringer taught the class. Classmates in Creative Writing class – Gail, Gordon, Mack, Jackie, Alda (lived in Hong Kong, Bangkok), Sheri (Navy brat), Hazel (Secretary to Saudi Ambassador), Katherine, Joan(won prize in Chesapeake Writers Conference), Mary (Postmistress), Margery, Danielle, Mary name-name (itsa Southern thang), Edwina Louise, Debbie, Phyllis, Pat, Ruby Lee, Louis, Dottie …

Louise, Joan, and others …  read their poems, short stories …  Phyllis – Problem; chronology; crisis; conclusion

Debbie – spoke, “On loving a memory”… Ruby Lee, also – “On geese announcing

Spring”

Mary … Her Daddy, is always there … “prowling the building “  “I can’t play piano,

can’t write, but I can spell…  That’s my ace in the hole”

One answered a question by another classmate … the classmate the editor of a rural

paper. “Why do you work for a paper if you don’t like to write … I like to

organize it … publication, getting story getting it ready to print” …

Another student (Elsa) provided her address … Editor of Matthews-Gloucester Gazette

Journal

Use specific verbs to capture actions …

Avoid passive tense, i.e. have been, was hit…

“Clash is a necessary ingredient of the dramatic scene” - from Jane Derringer’s class

handout on “The Complete Scene.”

Avoid stowaway words  … these are superfluous, extraneous words …

Try to use three complete scenes per chapter … seem to be best in narratives scenes

encapsulate meetings, conversations, purpose of character in scenes, conclusive

act(s) within scene, plot steps – summing up the scene, or acting as a lead-in to

the next scene (paragraph, or chapter)

One “ can use bad grammar, colloquialisms, improper language in (Character) dialogue.”

Hints are termed “plants”

Coupled images – Easter … bunnies, turkey, dressing, real cranberry sauce, ham, flowers,

daffodils, family feast    I forgot to do and turn my Easter assignment…

Hurricane - rain, winds, blowing objects, leaves falling …darkening skies, people bent

over in the wind … darkening skies then a calm…

Bare dialog … bare words alone, no He said, She said …

Full dialog … spoken, words, gestures, bits of business, characters internal dialog

(thoughts, concerns, memories) …how words were spoken… The clock struck

three ... He glanced to his watch, his thoughts raced … Oh my Gawd, I’m going

to be late … again!” Do I really want to meet him?” 

Good dialog … characterizes speakers … make each character one the reader can

associate with, want to be

Shows emotions of characters … spooky dialog, spooky characters  … give backgrounds

in an interesting manner, raining … must sound natural, but not be the way people

talk …

To advance the plot, don’t let characters ramble

Add local color by the way a person speaks, Dr. George Richey … Your body language

… folded arms show you’re closed, not open or concerned with the speaker …

Good ideas for aspiring authors

Join the Virginia Writers Club …

Buy “Writers Market”, a writer’s source of publisher information…

5 to 6 lines of dialog is max a reader can keep up with and yet differentiate the speakers

… use a concomitant gesture …

Do Not include sighs, grunts in dialog.

If using a dash between   use double dashes ( - - ). One dash means hyphenation.

When sending books to Publishers, send along desired TITLE, with nine other

“acceptable” titles… Also, spell out all numbers below twenty.

Simon and Schuster require agents …

Write to editors (journals or papers), or publishers for … tip sheets are guidelines as to

number of words, length, number of pages …

If their reply says “won’t accept unsolicited” inputs, it means you need an agent…

Never accept no … try another publisher …

If want to retain personal control of an article, specify “self syndicating” or mention local             markets …

Annual Writers Conference at Christopher Newport College, reviews, agents, reception,

short stories – less than 3000 words; poems less than 300 words…. 

If “selling an article”  … you need to discuss, agree on … first serial, second serial …

non-competing markets for reprint rights …

When sending a “query” letter to editor, start with grabber sentence … synopsis of what

you’re going to write about, AND why you should write it.  Use editors personal

name, provide SASE, wait three weeks before resubmitting to another

editor/publisher

Poems published in an anthology will not count as published works… Anthologies charge to include your poems…

Reporters DO NOT let interviewees read their story before publication…