Cleckheaton Writers Group (CWG) minutes Monday 28 October

With thanks to CWG member Pauline, here are the latest minutes:

CLECKHEATON WRITERS GROUP

Minutes of the meeting held on Monday 28 October 2019 at

Cleckheaton Library commencing 5.30 pm

Present

Pauline (Minute Taker), Alice, Barbara, Mark,

Martijn and Kathy

Apologies: Gemma, Karen, Mandy, Sam and Sarah

Welcome / Attendance

Pauline welcomed everyone to the meeting. . In addition to the standing apologies from Mandy and Sarah, apologies were received from Gemma, Karen and Sam.

As this was the first time Alice had met Barbara, they advised each other on the type of writing they do. Alice advising that she writes for children 9-14 year old. She has written two books and is at the Golden Egg Academy. Barbara said that she hasn’t written anything for a number of years, since college and is developing an idea of stories from her work as a carer in an aged person’s home.

Minutes of Last meeting

The minutes of the previous meeting were accepted.

WIP / Updates and Feedbacks

In addition to general work in progress updates, each member read out their work on the ghost story challenge set at the last meeting where members were asked to write a piece containing at least 8 words from 16 words set:

Alice – Is currently editing her books and found where she was supposed to be reducing the number of words she had in fact added words. So there was still a fair amount of work to do. She is also writing a book for her 6 year old (nearly 7) niece which will include her niece as one of the characters. She hopes to get this done for Christmas. Well done Alice. We look forward to hearing this in due course.

Martijn – Was inspired after our last session on a couple of pieces, using all 18 words.  One piece is a Halloween poem used the words, scream, asphyxiating, creepy, paranoid, gone, forgotten darkness, deserted and twilight, entitled My Condition – which is very creepy with good characters. Mark liked the build-up of suspense. The Christmas poem was about a boy named Tommy whose family didn’t have enough coal to heat the home and he’d heard that people who got on Santa’s naughty list got black coal instead of a present. He had 24 hours to get on the naughty list and carried out a series of naughty things he thinks will help him. Santa however knows what Tommy has been doing and why and decided to put him on the naughty and nice list, which meant Tommy got both a present and some coal. Everyone liked the stories very much and suggested he had these printed out. 

Mark – Has written three pages of a chapter for a story inspired from the session a couple of weeks ago and he used 16 words. His horror piece is the beginning of a potential story and he used the words darkness, creeping, twilight, corpse, tombstone, screeching, vile, chimera, void, scream, asphyxiating, gone, paranoid, deserted and putrefied. The story The Fallen Prophet was very creepy and he confirmed that the horse and corpse are puppets. The story sucked us in straight away and based on a fantasy world where the land is the enemy.

Barbara – Had written a story using an account that actually took place in the care home she worked in though she had changed the names of the characters, one of them, May, (who in reality was Barbara) and another character named Sarah. She used the words, dark, deserted, forgetful, freezing, forgotten, gone, tombstone, voice, darkness, froze, and gone. Barbara’s story reminded Kathy of a film entitled ‘Still Life’ about people who are not at the funeral. Her story was well pitched and everyone enjoyed her writing.

Kathy – Hadn’t written a typical ghost story, it was more of a remembrance of a place she’d been to with her mother, and how visiting somewhere after a long time still looked the same. Kathy used the words - gone, forgotten, scream, frozen, corpse, void and deserted. It was a great story which everyone liked and Alice commented on how everyone has a distinctive writing voice which meant she could identify who had written each piece.

Pauline – Had expanded on a ghost story she had started at Karen’s Creepy Story Workshop held at the Ribbon Tree Communitea Room on Friday. In Pauline’s creepy tale, told by the main character, who was dared by friends to enter a cemetery alone in the dark. She used the words – void, corpse, creepy, forgotten, vile, gone, tombstone, putrefy, darkness, and atmosphere. The ending wasn’t good for the character. Mark commented on how he was drawn into the story right from the beginning and others remarked on how the reader was being warned to read the story in the company of another as it was a little creepy.

Competitions / Festivals /Other

Pauline passed around recent copies of the Writing Magazine and the Writer’s Forum for information. She also reminded the group that Karen’s writing workshops were to be held once a fortnight on a Friday at the Ribbon Tree Communitea Room. The next session was on Friday 8^th November 2019 at 2pm and the theme would be on Plotting, with the theme for the session on Friday 22^nd November being on Mystery writing. Pauline recommended members attend these workshops, if they were able.

Writing Challenge/Session

Martijn suggested that the next writing challenge be to write a poem or story for Remembrance Sunday (which could be about Armistice Day - First World War or Remembrance Day - Second World War and/or subsequent Conflicts) for the next meeting on Monday 11 November 2019.

The meeting closed at 7pm.

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