Writer’s Ink

Meeting Minutes 10/14

October 14th, 2008 by Erin

Attending: Stephanie, Donna, Virginia, Jamie, Erin, and Alex

NaNo Write-ins: There will be plenty of write-in opportunities during November. You don’t have to attend, but we’d love to have you at any or all. To help you make those NaNo goals (or to make whatever goals you set for yourself, if you’re not doing NaNo), there will be word wars, possibly prizes, etc. All we ask is that if someone sends out a headcount email before the write-in, please respond. If you don’t, you run the risk of the write-in being cancelled on you.

Tuesday and Thursday during November will be our NaNo “two-a-days.” Erin will be coordinating lunch write-ins on those days (expect appointments soon). The lunch write-ins will be an hour in a conference room. Bring your laptop/notepad and write while you eat (the already existing Tuesday WI meetings will stay an hour and a half as originally scheduled, but we will be writing then, as well).

Virginia is coordinating Tuesday night write-ins at Panera on University from 6 to 8:30 p.m. (you should already have appointments). Jamie is coordinating Thursday night write-ins — probably at Ol’ South, but we’ll find out when the meeting invitation comes out (soon).

There was some interest in write-ins on Wednesday nights, but half of the regular crew is busy that night. If you’re interested, contact Stephanie and/or Alex, and y’all can set something up.

Also, if you want to write at lunch more often than just Tues./Thurs. and want company, send out an email and see who else is interested. You’ll probably find someone.

Christmas Planning: No one was really in the mood for the story exchange this year, so we’re not going to do that. We discussed the idea of Secret Santa or white elephant gifts, but we’ve tabled the discussion until later. The idea of having a party (probably not at a regular meeting time) was also discussed. Think about the options, and we’ll make plans at a future meeting.

NaNo Prep and Homework: We had a handout about the Snowflake Method for writing a novel (http://www.advancedfictionwriting.com/art/snowflake.php). During the meeting, we did step 1 (writing a sentence to describe the novel) and brainstormed them.

Your homework for the next meeting, if you want to participate in the NaNo Prep, is to complete step 2 (expanding the sentence into a paragraph about the novel, covering the major plot points). If you want to go farther in the method, feel free to do so. We’ll share the paragraphs at the next meeting, and we will spend time brainstorming and helping each other with any plot holes that have developed. If you have questions, come prepared to share them. If we have time, we will progress into character creation, using character profile sheets provided by Virginia and character archetype synopsis provided by Erin.

Goals: This month, we had total and utter FAIL for meeting goals! No stickers for anyone!

For next time:

Jamie — work on illustrations
Erin — work on NaNo outline
Alex — work on outline/research for NaNo
Stephanie — work out NaNo outlines for short stories and finish two rewrites
Donna — work on NaNo outline
Virginia — write NaNo character list and work on NaNo outline

Upcoming Events:

10/26 — Saturday write-in, Kevin’s house, 3 to 5 p.m.
10/26 — NaNo WI kick-off party (potluck dinner, swag, and games!), Kevin’s house, 5 to 7 p.m. (or whenever we’re done partying Note that this is the same day as the October write-in — come to one or come to both, as your schedule allows.
10/28 — Tuesday lunch meeting, Blue (12), 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m., second NaNo prep meeting.
11/1 — NaNoWriMo 2008 BEGINS!!!>

Mood: