Write Angles 5-09

8/9/2019 Write Angles 5-09

1/11

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Ray FaRaday NelsoN,

author, cartoonist,ex-President and life member

of the Berkeley Branch

and inventor of the propeller beanie.


2/11May 2009 WriteAngles 1

Table ofContents

A Many-Sided Talent:Talking About Writing

David Baker 1

The View From the HelmAL Levenson 2

Guidelines for theJuly and AugustWrite Angles 2

Member NewsAnne Fox 3

Mary: Mrs. A. Lincoln,

A Novel by

Janis Cooke Newman 4

Prevailing Winds 4

The 23rd Annual Fifth-Grade

Writing ContestLucille Bellucci 5

Tidbits 5

Make Sense!

Ray Malus 6

Fiction Faults by Ray Nelson,Part One 7

The Chameleon in GrammarJanis Bell 8

A SympatheticCharacter Struggles

AL Levenson 9

May MeetiNg:

Saturday, May 16, 2009.Social Hour: 9:30 a.m. - 10:30 a.m.

Meeting and Program: 10:30 a.m. - NoonEvent Loft, Barnes & Noble Book Store

Jack London Square, Oakland.

a MaNy-sided taleNt:

talKiNg aBoUt WRitiNg

Seeing your writing in print is an experience

treasure. How about seeing it published in more tha

one category? Janis Cooke Newman, our featured

speaker for the May 16 meeting, has been publishe

in threehistorical ction, memoir, and travel

writing.

Newman constructed Mary, a novel written i

the rst person, from notes composed by Mary Tod

Lincoln when the assassinated presidents wife was

conned in a lunatic asylum. Portrayed as a protofeminist, Mary seduces th

sexually repressed Lincoln, nudges him along in his career, and alerts him t

the issue of slavery. She is passionate, compulsive and, later, grief- stricken

but perfectly sane. Her story, as told by Newman, became a Bay AreaBestseller and was chosen as USA Todays Best Historical Fiction of the Ye

The Russian Word for Snow is Newmans compelling memoir about

adopting her son from a Moscow orphanage just before Russias rst

democratic election. She and her husband engaged in a six-month struggle

against a ponderous bureaucracy to bring the boy to the United States.

Pressuring, cajoling, and bribing their intermediaries, as political fortunes

shifted and anti-American sentiment ebbed and owed, they knew elation a

despair.

Newmans writing can be found in numerous anthologies, including

Secret Lives of Lawfully-Wedded Wives. Her travel articles have appeared in

theLos Angeles Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, and many other

newspapers, as well as inBackpackerand Country Livingmagazines, and

online at Salon.com.

With such a broad range of experience, Newman knows how to coa

other writers, which she does at Creative Caffeine, her online workshop, an

through classes she holds in San Francisco. Shell be coaching us at the Ma

16 meeting, so come prepared with questions. All genres are welcome.- David Baker

Cover Photo Series:

Distinguished Writers

of California

Self-Portrait,

Ray Faraday Nelson



The View From the Helm

We are coming up on two annual cycles

elections of ofcers and membership renewals.

It seems a good time to report on the state of the

Branch.

At the April board of directors meeting,

treasurer Ken Frazer reported a bank balance of$3475.98. None of the costs of the Fifth-Grade

Writing Contest have been submitted, but even after

setting aside the projected expenses, our balance is healthy at over $2000.

Ken also submitted a budget for our next scal year.

The Berkeley Branch operates frugally. We pay no rent for any of

our meeting spaces. Our primary income is from membership dues, 55

percent of which leaves the Branch and goes to the statewide California

Writers Club. Our largest expense is the subsidy of our agship activity, th

Fifth-Grade Writing Contest; yet we operate within our income.

Next year we will institute another ambitious program, The West

Side Writing Contest and Chapbook. We predict well need to subsidize

about $600 of this event in its rst year. By providing another activity to

current members, another attraction to new members, the subsidy is an

investment in the future of the Branch.

Twenty-ve members joined within the last year. Branch

membership stands at 82, including ve Life Members and ve Emeritus

members.At our May meeting the board will propose a slate of ofcers for

next year. Has the time come for you to be proactive helping the branch

to function? Please contact any board member to become a candidate for

nomination. If you believe someone would be an asset to the board but is

too bashful to step forward, please persuade that person to contact the boa

Elections will take place at the June meeting.

Memberships expire at the end of June. In the next Write Angles w

will commence our drive for renewals.

As a reminder, the Berkeley Branch is the only Branch that will

publish its newsletter over the summer. The July and August

issues will be devoted entirely to the creative writing of Branch

members. Submission guidelines are in the left column of this page.

And that is the view from the helm this month.

- AL Levenson, President

Guidelines for the

July and August

Write Angles

Open to members of the

Berkeley Branch only.

Short pieces of ction,

350-1000 words.

Poetry to 175 words.

Photographs and cartoons.

All topics.

No porn or gratuitous

violence.

Prior publication OK,

with citation.

Electronic submissions only

to [email protected].

In the subject line, write Story

Enclosed. Deadline for July

issue is June 10; for Augustissue, July 10. Receipt of

stories will be acknowledged.


4/11

September 2008

May 2009 WriteAngles 3

Member News

On Saturday, April 11, Bay Area News Group featured Laura Shumakers rst-person essay, Her Rain

Man brings out best in others, in their newspapers Real Life column, which appeared in the Home & Garden

section. (Essay contact person is Lisa Wrenn, [email protected]) Laura, our Program Chairperson,

the author ofA Regular Guy: Growing Up With Autism (2008).

You can hear the interview ofJoAnn Smith Ainsworth by Cat Johnson (All Romance eBooks) on

blogtalkradio.com/Whats-Hot-In-Romance. (Registration may be necessary.) JoAnns April 4 book signing sold ou

all copies of her novel Out of the Dark. Another signing was scheduled for April 8 in Sacramento. You can networ

with JoAnn on Facebook and Twitter.

Late-breaking news about Risa Nye, a co-author ofWritin on Empty. In addition to receiving honorable

mention in an essay contest sponsored by Skirt! Magazine, via WOW! Women on Writing, she also received from

WOW! a collection of books and a hand-written note. Nice acknowledgment for her essay, Making a Home From

Scratch.

On a humorous note, Tina Marie Stinnett wins 1st place in actress/author Mariel Hemingways Write M

Cartoon Caption contest, an online contest promoting the release of Hemingways new holistic cookbook, Mariel

Kitchen: Simple Ingredients for a Delicious and Satisfying Life.

Ken Frazer reports the great news that Sarah Sweeney, a winner in our Fifth-Grade Writing Contest last y

has gone on to win rst place in the Diablo Branchs Sixth-Grade Writing Contest. Denitely Sail On! events.

Using language with his customary originality, W. E. Reinka expounds in an unexpected and tantalizing w

on the word published in his essay Prepublished, which appeared in the March 2009 issue ofArt Times (a liter

journal and resource for all the arts, arttimesjournal.com).

Another feather in the cap ofTatjana Greiner. She has been selected as one of the judges on this years

Armenian Allied Arts Association Literature Competition (armenianalliedarts.org).

Therese Pipe sent copies of two covers of books to Allene Symons for the CWC display at UCLAs Festiv

of Books. One was of Lorna De Sosas book of poetry, Who Turned the Grass On; the other, of Fred Cody Award

Winner Dorothy Bryants oral history, of which Therese was managing editor.

With sadness, we announce the recent death ofLorna De Sosa, long-time CWC member. Lorna died on A

17 at the age of 95. A Memorial Mass was planned for April 24. Our heartfelt condolences to Lornas family.

Attention, Members: Every month our Member News column proves that getting published or winning a contest

depends on sending out your writing. Nothing magic about that. Extract that document from your desk drawer or

from the bowels of your computer. Give yourself a chance to get the attention of agents and editors looking for

something fresh, and keep us posted about your efforts. Consider the following grist to inspire CWC members: a

letter to the editor, a ller, a puzzle, ction, nonction, jokes, a book review, greeting cards, screen play, making a

lm, winning in a contest, appearing in an interview. Please send the memorable news to Anne Fox,

[email protected].



Mary: Mrs. A. Lincoln,

a Novel by Janis Cooke Newman

Abraham Lincoln stood so tall he

could look into the top of the beanstalk

without ever leaving the ground. Everyone

in Lincolns life was a bit player. Those who

remember Mary Todd

Lincoln dismiss her as the

crazy woman Abe was

married to. But not Janis

Cooke Newman, a Marin

writer who believed Mary

Lincolns story was worththree years of her

writing life. I, for one, am glad Janis made

the investment. Mary stands alone as the best

book I read in 2008.

Janis read from the book at the 2008

Squaw Valley Writers Conference. For her

reading she chose the only sex scene in the

book. Not very juicy as sex scenes go. I

wondered if the choice was a shameless

marketing ploy.

I buy books that I am unsure about as

a way to be a patron of the arts on the cheap.

My uncertainty left after only a few pages

into the book when the deft hand of the

author was clear.

Six hundred twenty pages ew by.

From youth to old age, told in the rst person(what a challenge that must have been),

historical ction written in the best manner

of a memoir style of today. Awesome.

- AL Levenson

WestSide Story Contest

The WestSide Story contest for short ction is now

in its fth year. This year the Berkeley Branch of the

California Writers Club has taken over the sponsorshipof the contest. Tatjana Greiner, contest founder and BB

member, will continue to serve as editor-in-chief.

In past years the contest has drawn entries from all

over the world. This year the contest will award $400 in

cash prizes. The Berkeley Branch will publish a chapbook

of the three stories winning cash prizes as well as the

stories receiving honorable mention.

All club members and everyone who submits a

story will receive a chapbook.

The submission window opens June 1. Detailed

guidelines will appear in the June Write Angles.

Abreviated guidelines: ction only; 2200 words max; $11

entry fee. Help us publicize the contest and your club to

nonmembers.

- AL Levenson

Tweet-Tweet

The California Writers Club is now on Twitter.

Follow us at twitter.com/CalWritersClub.

31 Flavors Summer Essay Issue

East Bay Monthly is now accepting short essays (900

words maximum) for possible publication in the July

issue. Use 31 avors as a theme or as a jumping-off

point for your writing, and see where your creative mind

takes you. To submit, paste the essay into your email to

[email protected] and attach as a Word

document. Deadline: May 14, 2009.

These can be fun to try!

- Risa Nye

PReVailiNg WiNds



THE 23rd ANNUAL FIFTH-GRADE WRITING CONTEST

On Saturday, May 23, at 10:30 a.m., California Writers Club, Berkeley

Branch, will celebrate at Barnes & Noble the achievements of the fth-grade

participants in our annual writing contest. The response to the contest this year

topped 280 entries, and their variety continues to be entertaining. Many of the

stories demonstrate surprisingly mature effort. We have not seen for a long time

a story as cheeky as the one about frying slugs and serving them up on toast, or

about playing a ball game using a watermelon.

As always, youngsters reect the times surrounding them. Are kids

growing up faster? Are current economic tensions forcing that growth? Is

writing stories a way for them to express their worries? It would seem to be the case. One of my readers alerted

me to a story that was somewhat disturbing. I left a message with the teacher to call me back for a discussion.

This being the 100th Anniversary of the California Writers Clubs founding, the Berkeley Branch, along

with sister branches, are launching several promotions to celebrate the event on radio and television. Under the

guidance of Linda Brown, our PR Chair, the Fifth-Grade Contest will be highlighted as the Berkeley Branchsongoing community-service project.

The Berkeley Branch will benet from another enterprise in that our host, the Barnes & Noble

Bookstore, will be donating 20 percent of their book-sale proceeds to the club on May 23, the day of the

Awards Ceremony.

We expect the rst-, second-, and third-place winners to attend, as well as the 12 fourth-place winners.

Their families and teachers will be present as the students read their stories. So come to meet and mingle with

them. We might be recruiting new members for the CWC in the future.

Again I thank my valiant readers, Betsy Hess-Behrens, Janice Armigo Brown, Ken Frazer, Sasha Fu-

tran, Willie and Manuel Rose, and Stan Sciortino, for their input as judges this year.

- Lucille Bellucci,Chairman of the Fifth-GradeWriting Contest

Web Sites for Writers

The Writers Network News

writers-free-reference.com

WordHustler.com

Clear Writing with Mr. Clarity

wsu.edu/~brians/errors/index.html

Tidbits



Make Sense!

We experience life through our sensessight, sound, taste, smell, touch; and through emotional reactionj

fear, pleasure, anger, revulsion, love, et. al. For me, the aim of writing is to evoke these emotions. But how can this

done if reaction is tied to sense stimulus? The answer is simple: through the use of imagery.

As writers, we are all aware of this. The reader reads an image and experiences the same reaction as if s/he

had experienced the event. (Note: s/he is my concession to the P.C. polices insistence on he or she. Feel free to use

it or ridicule it. I nd it convenient.) This reaction to imagery can be as strong or stronger than the reaction to a real

event, depending on the choice and vividness of the image, and can involve any sense.Once reading is uent, it doesnt seem to matter much whether the brain gets the images

through the senses or through reading about them. They enter and are processed in much

the same way.

Most edgling writers focus on sight images, describing events visually:

The dog walked into the room.

This describes the event, but the reaction is limited. As writers mature, they start to include other sense imag

The clacking of dog claws on the hardwood oor pricked my attention. The dog ambled into the room. He

moseyed insolently over to me and snufed his snout into my lap. His warm nose belied the pungent odor of wet fu

that rose from him. I reached down and let my ngers dig through his dank coat, feeling his warm body within. The

world was better.

Not only does this involve more of the senses, but the adjectives and verbs cue the desired emotional

responses. A dog could be a pet or a guard animal. But vicious pit bulls dont amble or mosey; they stalk and prowl

Pets amble.

A pitfall here is to write vividly but not verbosely. Weve all heard, A picture is worth a thousand words. B

its also true that The right word is worth a thousand pictures.

Look back over literary styles. Our collective attention span is shrinking. Everything is getting shorter: book

chapters, stories, sentences, words. Writing needs to be distilled, concentrated.So, how to strike a good balance between tepid writing and arduous writing. The answer has to do with the

senses again.

If I were to ask you which sense is most important in reading, you would probably answer sight. But most

paragraphs are about as visually interesting as bricks in a wall. I think that hearing is the real key.

As we read, our minds ear acts as a gatekeeper. If it is comfortable with what were reading, it passes it o

to the mind with no comment. But let it be jarred, and the process stops until it is comfortable.

So, one of the best keys to successful writing is reading your work aloud. If you cant read at open mikes, re

aloud to yourself. Youll discover ungraceful passages, unfocused images, weak plot points. Youll be amazed at wh

you think you wrote but didnt, and what you did write but didnt mean to.

- Ray Malus

Make Sense is reprinted with permission from Ray Malus. The article originally appeared in In Focus, th

newsletter of the West Valley Branch of CWC, which meets in Woodland Hills.

Although he writes commentary, short stories, and poetry, Ray Malus is primarily a playwright. Hes

fascinated by character and dialog. Hes had six plays produced in Southern California. Asked his favorite, he

grins and says, The next.

Ray welcomes correspondence from other writers at [email protected]



Fiction Faults by Ray Nelson, Part One

IN THE BEGINNING, I DO NOT LIKE:

Premature fashbacks.

Suggestion: Dont tell me about the past until I am worried about the Present.

Action or dialogue in a vacuum.

Suggestion: In the opening paragraph unobtrusively tell me where we are, whether indoors or outdoors, the locationof people and important objects, particularly doorways, windows, stairways, furniture which will be used, importan

props, etc., and most vital of all, how the scene is lit.Characters I cant visualize.

Suggestion: Immediately after each characters entrance, begin telling me his or her age, sex, social class, majormannerisms, race, physical type, etc., feeding me everything in little bits, not all at once. And make sure I know, at

least in a general way, how the character is dressed.

Narration in the present tense.

Suggestion: Though some modern writers use it, they pay for it in obtrusiveness. Stick to the simple past tense unleyou have a very good reason not to.

IN THE MIDDLE, I DO NOT LIKE:

An inconsistent emotional tone.Suggestion: If you have begun in a comic mood, continue in a comic mood. If in a fearful mood, grow more fear-ful; if in a tragic, remain tragic. A touch of contrasting emotions is all you can allow yourself, never a total change

tone.

Missed opportunities.

Suggestion: Make good on every implied promise you have made the reader, and let the bigscenes take place on-stage, not off stage or after the story ends.

Showers of trivia.

Suggestion: Determine the point of the story, then ruthlessly cut what is not relevant.

AT THE END I DO NOT LIKE:

The Little Nemo ending, in which it turns out It was all a dream.Suggestion: The reader has been kind enough to suspend disbelief. Dont tell him he neednt have bothered.

The Paper Tiger ending in which we learn It was all a misunderstanding, He wasnt really murdered, etc

Suggestion: Surprise me by giving me more than I expect, not less.

The unresolved ending.

Suggestion: Tell me frankly if your protagonist wins or loses or draws, or what the solutions are to your puzzles ormysteries, if any.

A Protagonist who ends in apathy, suicide or insanity.

Suggestion: There are so many ways someone can solve his problems theres no excuse for these arty clichnon-solutions

A false surprise ending.

Suggestion: Early in the story, plant enough information so a few really alert readers may guess the ending, and theothers will kick themselves for not guessing it.

Ray Nelson joined the Berkeley Branch in the early 60s. He is a Life Member of the Branch and served as its

president for many years. Next month, Fiction Faults, Part Two, from Ray.



The Chameleon in Grammar

Why is it that Americans remember what an adjective is yet cant dene other parts of speech? Not that

we need to, actually, unless were learning a foreign language. Still, its odd. Ask anyone what an adjective is, and

youll get an answer. Ask anyone what another part of speech is, and youre likely to get a nice long silence in

which to plot your next short story.

The other day a student of mine called to ask me what an adverb is. I said that its usually a word

ending in ly that describes a verbas in learns quickly orspeaks slowly. He then asked whether all ad-

verbs end in ly, and I said, No. Considerwell, as in writes well, orfast, as in think fast. In case he was

starting to get it, I added that not all descriptive words ending in ly are adverbs, either: weve got adjec-

tives, like curly,surly, and ugly, hanging around on corners, trying to look like slick. Like adverbs.

What about just, my student asked. Is that an adverb? I hadnt thought about justrecently, so

I put it in front of a verb to see whether it workedjust say no, just improvise, just do it. Yes, I said, its

an adverb. Then I thought ofjust beautiful. An adverb, I had to tell him, can also describe an adjec-

tive: just perfect, just delicious, just enough.

My student, for some reason, hung up. Yet my mind continued to roll.Just splendidly, just dessertsthelittle four-letter word can be an adverb before another adverb or an adjective before a noun. Justisnt any one par

of speech. Its a chameleon! It can travel across a sentence, change colors at every stop, and affect a writers

meaning. Take a look atjustdoing, well, just that:

Just Quakers waste time thinking about oatmeal.

Quakers just waste time thinking about oatmeal.

Quakers waste just time thinking about oatmeal.

Quakers waste time just thinking about oatmeal.

Quakers waste time thinking just about oatmeal.

So whats the role that justplays? It all depends on where you nd it. Look to the rightif a verb,

adjective, or adverb is coming up,justis an adverb. If a noun, pronoun, or noun substitute is coming up,justis an

adjective.

Now, what the heck is a noun substitute? Something less caloric than a noun? A person, place, or thing tha

kids give no respect to?

Time to plot your next short story.

- Janis Bell

Janis Bell is the author ofClean, Well-lighted Sentences, A Guide to Avoiding the Most Common Errors in

Grammar and Punctuation. An English professor and writing consultant in San Francisco, shes been teaching

writing in schools and businesses for over three decades. You can contact her atjanisbell.com.



I have this elegant formula on an index card push-pinned on the cork board at my writing

desk. From a writers magazine of decades past, this deceptively simple plot outline describes many

of the great novels and stories of all time.

Watching Susan Boyle on YouTube, I was struck by how perfectly her story interprets the

writing recipe. youtube.com/watch?v=9z0h1NNk1Ik.

In an April week, thirty million people watched a four-minute narrative arc that had

everything: A plain woman, a simple dream, an unsympathetic audience, an enormous talent, a

stunning triumph.

Susan, looking ever so much like a sacricial lamb selected by the pseudo-tastemakers for one

of the humiliation-based TV shows, came on the Britains Got Talentshow. At 47 and

never-been-kissed, she wants to be a professional singer. The panel of judges led the audience in a

couple of minutes of snickering and eye-rolling before Susan sang I Dreamed a Dream. Twenty

seconds after the rst notes, she owned the audience. She sang for two more minutes to continuous

applause from an audience that was on their feet. Her performance was emotional for the audience and

the artist alikesomething every writer I know yearns for.

Once again I am reminded of the basic elements of story.When I study the comments of my critique group that are of the why-doesnt-the-story-work

variety, I hold the comments up against the maxim on the index card. Is my hero uninspiring? Is his

conict minor, his challenge lame? Is his achievement unremarkable? Is his goal insignicant?

If my recipe misses one of these ingredients, I have a cake that wont bake.

- AL Levenson

A sympathetic

character strugglesagainst overwhelmingodds to achieve aworthwhile goal.


11/11

President:ALLev enson

VicePresiden t:Dav

eSawle

Secretar y:KenFrazer

Tre asurer:CarleneCole

Program:LauraShumake r

Membership:OPEN

ChildrensCont est:

LucilleBellucci

NewsletterEditor:

ALLevenson

Copy editor:AnneF

ox

Publicity:LindaBrown

Webmaster:StanScior tino

DelegatetoCentra l

Board:LindaBrown

Co-PublishingCom

mittee: AnjuelleFloyd

Berk

eley

Br

anc

h

O fc

ers

TheCALIFORNIAWRITERSCLUBisdedicatedtoeducatingmembersan

dthepublic-at-large

inthecraftofwritingandinthem

arketingoftheirwork.Formoreinformation,visitourWebsite

atwww.berkeleywritersclub.org.

Copyright2009bytheCaliforn

iaWritersClub,BerkeleyBranch.Allrightsreserved.Write

Anglesispublished10timesayear(September-June)bytheCaliforniaWritersClub,Berkeley

Branchonbehalfofitsmembers.

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