Fringe Words 2010: A Hoot

This year the London Writers' Society paired up with the London Fringe Festival to bring Fringe Words back to the festival.

If you did not attend Fringe Words 2010, you missed a good time and some great stories, all of which were linked through associations (real or imagined) with London, Ontario.

Hosted by LWS president Richard Nagel, this was what you missed

London Author Runs Contest With $3000 In Prize Money And No Entry Fee

London Ontario author Peter Riley sent me this info on a contest he is running to promote his novel. The contest begins on July 4th. From his website:

"Enter this contest to have a chance to win a chunk of $3,000 in total prize money...the catch is you’ll have to read the novel in order to answer the questions.

You’re probably thinking: Free e-book, cash prizes . . . What gives?

What gives is that I’m 65 god-damned years old, this novel means more to me than anything in the world, and I’m desperate to get it published while I’m still alive." 

Who cannot relate, no matter what your age? 

Peter's idea is to get his book noticed and, possibly, picked up by a publisher.

An innovative approach, this looks like a good chance to interact with another London author, have a bit of fun and maybe win a bit of cash for your own publishing efforts.

And - who knows - his book, Universes, might make a great summer read. (I love the cover so I hope you don't mind, Peter, that I put it in this post so people could see it.)

His website is www.universes.ca and contest information is HERE.

One Way To Avoid Rejection Of Your Manuscript Or Why Publishers Hate "Smart Quotes"

Ruth Zavitz forwarded this email on using "smart quotes" which was sent to her by Bob Zumwalt. It turns out that publishers are so busy that, sometimes, they will reject a manuscript simply because it will be too much time and work to clean it up.

From Bob Zumwalt:

"Gayle Surrette, IWW's Fiction admin, wrote this a while back.

It offers another perspective on formatting submissions that goes beyond our concerns at Novels-L. Learning proper formatting for our list is good practice for approaching an agent or publisher. They may not send a 'formatting problems' reminder in response to a sloppy submission."

From Gayle Surrette:

I have to speak to the smart quotes plain text thing.

Writers' Police Academy Workshops Include Firearms Training Simulator

Mystery writer and LWS member Pat Brown sent me the link to the Writers' Police Academy, a workshop for mystery writers given by police officers.

The workshop will include Firearms Training Simulator (FATS) and offers writers the opportunity to:

* Train like the pros
* Bring your writing to life
* Real police academy instructors
* Something for all genres
* Train with real police, fire, and EMS equipment
* An on site working fire station and EMS equipment

Pat says she's going to it and expects it "to be great."

From the blog of Lee Lofland, author of Howdunit: Police Procedure & Investigation A Guide For Writers, and one of the officers who teaches the course:

"Show me your hands! Drop the gun! Drop the knife!

Get out of the car, now!"

Strange Angel Calls For Original 30-Minute Plays

Strange Angel Productions is now accepting submissions of original 30 minute one-act plays. 

Six plays will be chosen to be a part of a 4-day theatre-based charity event which will be held at the ARTS Project November 3 through November 6, 2010. 

The six plays will be grouped into two sets of three allowing for one group to perform on Wednesday/Friday and the other on Thursday/Saturday. All are evening performances.

Submission Guidelines:

Call To Artists, Musicians, Writers For Saturday, October 2, 2010

From the L.O.O.K. Organizing Committee!

Just received an email from Ron Stewart who hosts poetry workshops once a month at Landon. A member of his group asked him to forward notice from L.O.O.K. about this event in October and its call to artists, musicians, and writers to participate. The following info is from the email:

A Call to Artists for Saturday, October 2nd, 2010

To convene in Queens Park on Dundas East, Old East Village

Between 10 a.m. and 6 p.m. in London, Ontario. NO FEES.

The Bicycle Powered Stage

Got a band? Love to perform on stage? This stage is going to be powered by the people. Literally!

Self-Editing For Fiction Writers

Ruth Zavitz, along with critique group attendees Paula Carr and John Hitchens have just recommend Self-editing For Fiction Writers.

I found self-editing to be a very slippery slope, since the eye and brain are wired to jump over mistakes and see what should be on the page instead of what is.

Had the text-to-speech software TextAloud2 been around back then, I would have used it to listen to my book for an audio proofread and catch those mistakes, but it wasn't.

I remember an email that circulated years ago. It was full of misspellings, but the joke was that no reader saw them until he or she got to the end and the misspellings were pointed out. I remember I found it shocking.

But the brain is very clever and an expert at making sense of misspelled words. All it needs is for the first and last letter of a word to be correct and  it will fill in the rest, especially if you're tired, bored, or have gone over a manuscript so many times you know it by heart.

According to researchers at the University of Toronto, as reported in an article in Science Daily:

June 9 - Locavore Author Sarah Elton At LPL

This sounds great. From LPL website:

Come and meet Sarah Elton on Wednesday, June 9 at 7 pm in the Stevenson & Hunt room in Central Library. Sarah is Canada's leading voice in the local food movement, the food columnist for CBC Radio's Here & Now, the author of the just published book:

Locavore: From Farmers'fields To Rooftop Gardens - How Canadians Are Changing the way we eat. 

Locavore describes how foodies,100-milers, urbanites, farmers, gardeners and chefs across Canada are creating a new local food order that is sustainable and can feed us all. In recounting the stories of its diverse cast of characters, Locavore lays out a blueprint for a local food revolution.

A book sale will follow.

Passion Test Profile

I'm definitely taking this test after I get the London Writers' Society June 2010 edition of the newsletter queued to go out.

Seeking Writing Festivals

LWS member Miguel Carbonell sent me the email below giving an update on how his book signing went and his desire to do more of them. He has one coming up this month on June 5th.

If anyone knows of a writer's festival other than the four he mentioned here -  Words Alive, GritLit, Eden Mills and Bookfest - please leave the info in a comment.

Hi Clyo,

I have a signing Saturday, June 5th from 1-3 p.m. at the Chapters in Ajax. My next signing in London will be at Chapters North (opposite Masonville Place) on Saturday, June 26th from 1-4 p.m.

    I thought the signing at Chapters London South went fine. I sold a few books and got to talk to a bunch of people.Also important, the salespeople at the store now know what the book is about.

    Often, people ask them for suggestions, so it's good to have them on your side. Because the children's section of the store was curtained off for remodelling, they placed me across the main aisle on the wrong side of the store. I had to explain to everybody that my book was a children's book.The store manager decided to keep my book and suggested another signing event some time in the Fall. That's good news.

    On another subject, I was going to ask you if you have a list of festivals in Ontario where writers can go and sell their books. I got some locations from Brian Henry, but maybe other members of the LWS know of promising opportunities. This might be useful information for the LWS website or your newsletter. This is the list from B. Henry:

    Words Alive, north of Toronto: www.wordsalive.ca/news/

    GritLit in Hamilton: www.gritlit.ca/

    Eden Mills festival: www.edenmillswritersfestival.ca/

    Bookfest in Windsor: www.bookfestwindsor.ca

I've looked into these four, and the one at Eden Mills in September appears to be the most promising. It costs $25 to rent a table and two chairs for the main day. I've asked them if they want me to present my book at one of the festival sessions, but I think I'll be running against some major writers for a spot.

    Cheers,
    Miguel