Tuesday 1 December 2015

Cleckheaton Writers Group minutes

 The Cleckheaton Writers Group took place last night with Andy, Neil, John and myself (Karen) in attendance, Martijn, Kathy, Pauline, Pippa and Mandy having passed on their apologies.

WIP updates were as follows: Andy had finished planning and mind-mapping a new idea for a short story today which he had brought to share for feedback, John had nothing new but had brought along an older piece for feedback and Karen had been working on her NaNoWriMo WIP (currently just over 35k words) which she had brought sections of to share for feedback.

Feedback sessions: John shared a short story entitled Outrage that he wrote in 2009. It was a powerful political and somewhat predictive piece based in a scary future that could be more than possible. It was tightly written and could easily have been the beginning or ending of a longer story. The story was very well received and the group did not feel that it had any editing points.

Andy shared a short piece he had written that morning. It had a sword battle with two warriors vying for leadership. The characters in it were very distinct in such a short piece and the foreshadowing using the sword was used to great effect for a tight ending. This led on to a discussion about the merits of the Scrivener programme which Andy has used for sometime now (Andy recommended Googling literature and latte/scrivener.com.php for anyone wishing to purchase).

A discussion took place about well written TV series, where Arrested Development (Netflix), Sleepy Hollow, Peaky Blinders and new series Man in the High Castle (Amazon) featured. The Western Hell on Wheels was also recommended.

Karen shared some chapters of her WIP for feedback on character development. There are three main characters, brothers and a sister, and she wished to know if they were distinctive enough. It was felt that Gabriel was a deadpan sarcastic type (a loner) and Kane was the clearest as there were plenty of pointers to age and personality (it was felt that there was more of her background given which made it easier to feel character), Sammael was the hardest to get a handle on, but that it appeared that this was a deliberate character ploy.  There were a couple of editing suggestions made by the members and it was recommended that Karen watch Night Watch and Day Watch (films).

The next Cleckheaton Writers Group meeting is scheduled for Monday 14 December and it was suggested that this be a Christmas get together.

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