Save $30 – Register for

Cuesta College’s Writers’ Conference

by July 29 – Only $129.00

Calling all Writers!

The 26th Annual Central Coast Writers’ Conference at Cuesta College in San Luis Obispo, CA takes place on Friday evening and all day Saturday, September 17-18. If you register by July 29, you will have an extra $30 to upgrade your room at the Inn at Morro Bay or enjoy Central Coast wines with your fresh seafood dinner or have a great lunch in SLO when you attend the Central Coast Book and Author’s Festival at Madonna Plaza, a benefit for the SLO Library Foundation. But if you must wait until September 13 to register you’ll still get a bargain at $159, but why wait? www.communityprograms.net.

http://www.facebook.com/CentralCoastWritersConference

TIP FOR JULY 2010

Sheri McConnell is the President of the National Association of Women Writers (http://www.naww.org/). She helps women writers and entrepreneurs discover, create, and profit from their intellectual knowledge! Free reports for writers available with subscription to NAWW Weekly. Sheri lives in San Antonio, Texas with her husband Seth and their four children. Contact her at naww@onebox.com or her toll free number at 866-821-5829.

1. You Must Find YOUR Market. Know who you are writing for. It’s critical!
2. You Must Create a Community. Speak, teach, social network. Get out there.
3. You Must Create a Database. Create fans at your fingertips.
4. You Must Have a Call to Action. “Act now,” “limited time offer” are proven winners.
5. You Must Have Fun. The more you love your project, the more your reader will.

Congratulations to  SLO NightWriters’ second-place  Poetry Contest winner Evelyn Cole.  We are proud to publish her poem.

Cold Quarrel

His upper lip lifts
on the left.

Ice blue eyes like a cat’s
reflects light

He tilts his head back,
peers down his slender nose,

lines up insults
like croquet balls,

and smiles as he
cracks the mallet.

Now and then he condescends
To succor and lets me hit through.

Score one for me,
I think with a pinch of pride,

but my ball
sticks in the wicket.

Destry Ramey, author of the “Pug Series“, is having a second surgery on July 15th and she requested our prayers. Jim Leonard wrote a special prayer for her:

Prayer for Destry by Jim Leonard

Father:

We are asking for your gifts of healing, compassion, and strength for our friend Destry and her little Pugs.

She is suffering again with an illness and we are sure her Pugs can sense her pain.

Touch her heart and let her know that you love her.

Encourage her to keep fighting because her friends and readers need her.

Amen.

Contributed by:

I’m attending.  Are you?  The deadline for early registration is July 29th.  Hurry, please don’t miss this wonderful event.  For more information contact:

www.communityprograms.net

http://www.facebook.com/#!/CentralCoastWritersConference?ref=ts

Contributed by:

Through a freak accident we lost our beloved horse, Finn McCool.  He was pictured in post http://www.slonightwriters.org/2010/05/21/mavens-of-literature/ on this site.

Read more about him at:

http://www.kritiquekritics.com/2010/07/wanted-second-best-horse-in-the-world/

When I trusted Finn and let him take me over my first jump, I gained the confidence to trust my writing voice and to lead a critique group.  I found out that when you do something that you don’t think you can do, you gain great confidence from the effort–even if you don’t achieve your goal like I did.  Thank you, Finn.

Contributed by:

Fayrene Parrish, Avila Beach artist, known for her fine art and sculptures has created and illustrated ‘Pancho Saves The Day©’. The first book in a new series “The Shipmates Adventures©”, teaching the wonders of ecological habitats through adventure and art. The ‘Shipmates’ are the salty crew living and exploring the world aboard the good ship ‘Scooter’. Each book contains an adventure story, an art lesson and a narrated CD reading the story. They are aimed at children through grades 1 and 2. A great resource for all teachers, preschoolers and home schoolers.

Coalesce Book Store, 845 Main Street is sponsoring a book signing for Fayrene and her new book Saturday, July 10 at 2 pm, and ‘B Wise’ School Supply, 1324 E. Grand Avenue will present a book reading by Fayrene of ‘Pancho Saves The Day’ on Thursday, July 26, at 2 pm.

Fayrene will be participating in the Central Coast Author and Book Festival, Sunday, September 19, and her illustrations will be traveling trhough the County Public Library System during August.

” In these books I’ve been able to combine my favorite things – the ocean, nature and
art, as well as these salty sea types, ‘The Shipmates’ I’ve created over my career as an artist.”

‘Pancho Saves The Day’ can be purchased from Coalesce Book Store in Morro Bay and at B Wise School Supply in Arroyo Grande. Signed, first editions, are available from Fayrene at
www.shipmateslearningadventures.com

Fayrene is the founder of the Annual Sculptures Symposium in Cambria. Her paintings and sculptures are in the collections of the United States Government, Boeing, General Motors, Ford, and others. Her fine art can be seen at www.fayreneparrish.com, The Seaside Gallery in Pismo Beach and Amsterdam Fine Art, Carmel, California.

As an illustrator/author of Children’s Books, she was commissioned to write and illustrate a book using the Shipmates characters several years ago by the Space Needle in Seattle, called ‘The Shipmates Visit The Space Needle’. She is a member of the SLO NightWriters and The Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators.

Tip for June 2010

WEASEL WORDS

Angie Hunt calls these weasel words because they hide in the writing and make it weaker. Most of the time they are not necessary. She gave us a list and then she also said to search our own writing for words we overuse, for they become weasels too.

Here is the list:
just
just then
began to
to
suddenly
some
rather
thought
wonder
that
started to
decided
it was
it
were
all at once
immediately
very
to be
-ing words
-ly words

What’s an extension?  Dictionary.com has sixteen definitions for the word.  However, we are only interested in definition number 14:

14. Also called file extension. Computers . one or more characters at the end of a filename, usually following a period, used to indicate the type of file.

Examples of extensions from:  http://pcperformancetools.com/file-extension-list.html

If you see a file name and you don’t know what it is or what it does, you can start with the extension.  If you see a “.wav ” after the file name, it is a audio file. The blog you are viewing was created as a .doc file, except for the center chart.  Can you guess what type of file that is?

I hope this helps!

Contributed by:

In 2007, in the process of moving from Woodland Hills to Los Osos, I entered the NW Short Story contest for the first time. I hadn’t been writing for long and I was nervous: would I be good enough? My first contact with the NightWriters was with Anne Schroeder, who couldn’t have been more welcoming and encouraging. When I got the entry in on the day of the deadline and alerted her that it was in the mail and that I was sorry it wasn’t more timely, she said: “All great writers wait until the last moment so that they can make that last minute word change that will make the story even better.”

In 2008 I joined the NW Board and got a first-hand appreciation for the work that goes into much of the NW work, but especially the contest. I knew that Anne would be encouraging the new writers with the same enthusiasm she had encouraged me.

Before last week’s meeting I knew I’d be a finalist. I’d rehearsed a little speech for Anne and the judges (whoever they are), wanting to thank them for the months of work that goes into the coordination and selection of the finalists and winners.

But then, after the reading of the wonderful 1st Prize winning story by Anne Unkovich, my name was called as the 2nd Prize winner. Me? A winner? My speech left my mind, the rest of the evening was a blur and I never thanked Anne.

So here goes: Anne – for the countless hours of work you put into the Contest: thank you. And for the encouraging words, the patience, the welcoming to the “circle of writers”: thank you a thousand times and then some.