Word Pirates

2nd ANNUAL INNERMOONLIT AWARD FOR BEST SHORT-SHORT STORY NO ENTRY FEE Deadline September 1, 2006. Entrants must specify that they are entering the Best Short-Short Story Contest and must indicate the number of words in their submission (500 words maximum). First prize: $100; second prize: $50; third prize: a signed copy of Brian Agincourt […]

Stolen from here:
In addition to being fun to write, flash fiction boosts your writing skills.
1. The limits of the form can spark your creativity as a prose writer, just as haiku and sonnets do for poets. The challenge of staying within the word length engages your inner critic and allows your creativity to come out […]

Awesome, no?

I declare the first Word Pirates critique a success!
Back by popular demand … Word Pirates will meet twice a month. Isn’t that great? We will meet the first and third Thursday of each month.
Meeting Schedule:

Sept. 7
Sept. 21
Oct. 5
Oct. 19
Nov. 2
Nov. 16
Dec. 7
(No meeting Dec. 21)

Word Pirates tonight at my house. Hope you all come!
I get an e-mail newsletter called “Writing for Dollars,” which you can sign up for here. The most recent issue had an article about procrastinating by Jennifer Brown Banks that I am re-posting here. The advice is kind of elementary, but also encouraging and a good […]

In case you need guidance on how to do this whole critique thing, here are some thoughts:

Read each piece
Summarize for yourself what it is about
Think of things you like about it
Think of ways to help the writer revise it
Consider any particular questions that the writer asked and try to answer them

When reading:

Keep in mind that […]

Word Pirates!
I am proud of you. Almost all of you have turned in something for the critique on August 17th at 7-7:30 p.m. at my house.
Before that, I want to remind you of the LIVEWIRE LITERARY SALON at Soho’s (formerly Zebulons) in Petaluma. Leona is reading on August 15th at 6:30 p.m. and, get this, […]

This is copied from a page I was given in my first workshop class in grad school. It’s extremely wordy, but having never workshopped before, I found it very helpful in terms how how to approach and critique someone else’s work. Hope you find it useful. I’ve cut out some parts about writing up a […]