July 26th, 2010

Grub Street News

Welcome to the latest installment of the Grub Street Rag, a newsletter of the Boston literary scene sent out every Monday from the Chamber of Perpetual Stamp Licking at Grub Street's World Headquarters. As always, if you are receiving this e-mail in horror, please advance to the bottom of the page to unsubscribe yourself.

Go, Cathy, Go

If you've been following first-time-marathoner Cathy Elcik's blog over the last few months, you know that her big race day (the Wakefield Around the Lake Marathon) is this Friday, July 30th. You also might know that Cathy has exceeded her fundraising goal and raised $2,200 to fund scholarships for Grub Street students. So cool! Just as cool, Cathy's "Run for Grub" blog has fantastic interviews with Grub Street instructors, as well as updates about Cathy's training progress written in her trademark funny, self-effacing style. Check it out, and be sure to join us in sending good thoughts her way on Friday as she completes her first marathon. Hooray, Cathy! We are so proud of you and so grateful for your support and enthusiasm.

Three cheers for volunteers

We are done with our big mailing, and we owe huge thanks to Jeff Schwefel, Johanna Pittman, Dolly Wilson, Rinat Harel, Patrick Sullivan, Sally Bunch, Kerri Donnelly, Kelsey Leach, Ally MacDonald, Jane Poncia, Jancy Johnson, Gini Cornila, Rudy Wilson Galdonik, Patrice Grattan, Sue Cutillo, Penny Snider-Light, and Robin Regensburg, who stuffed and sealed literally thousands of envelopes last week. We definitely couldn't have done it without them!

We want your art

Each quarter, Grub Street features the work of an emerging local artist on the cover of our newspaper, the Grub Street Free Press. If you’re an artist and would like to have your work considered for the next cover, submit PDFs or URLs to chip@grubstreet.org. The Free Press is Grub Street’s quarterly print newspaper, with over 5,000 subscribers. Covers are in full color. Dimensions are approximately 10.25" wide by 7.5" tall.

Elizabeth Strout and Ladette Randolph at this year's Muse and the Marketplace conference

Each week for the next seven weeks, we're going to be featuring a video from our Muse and the Marketplace conference. This week, writers Elizabeth Strout and Ladette Randolph talk about their muses and their feelings about the future of the book.

Elizabeth Strout and Ladette Randolph on Vimeo.

Cheers,
Whitney, Sonya, Chris, Chip, Eve and Alexis

Grub Events

In addition to our ongoing workshops, Grub Street offers numerous writing-related events around town. See our website for a long-term view of all we do. Ready to sign up? Call us at 617.695.0075 and we'll get you on the list.

SEMINAR: Tuesday, July 27th, 6:30-9:30pm, Funny Is the New Deep
Instructor: Steve Almond
Contrary to popular belief, writing funny doesn't mean sacrificing depth. On the contrary, for most literary writers the comic impulse is inextricably linked to tragedy. In this informal class, we'll look at the work of Lorrie Moore, George Saunders, and others, in an effort to learn how you can be funny and break hearts while doing it.
$65.00/$50.00 members, at the Arlington Center for the Arts.

WEEKEND WORKSHOP: Saturday, August 7th, 9:00am-4:00pm, The Next JK Rowling: Unleashing the Power of Fairy Tale and Myth
Instructor: KL Pereira
Readers can’t get enough of the fantastical. J.K. Rowling, and most recently Stephanie Meyer, have millions of devoted readers worldwide. So too does Philip Pullman, Margaret Atwood, J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis and hundreds of others who employ such worlds and characters. Over the course of this one fantastic day, we will delve into the glittering Aladdin’s Cave of myths and fairy tales and help you to find and develop your own fantastical kingdom. Revisiting a varied host of familiar tales from Little Red Riding Hood to The Odyssey, we will look at modern interpretations of these fairy tales and myths and see how you too can carve out your own magical world. We will do a few inspiring creative exercises and prompts designed to inspire you to start “opening the wardrobe door” and creating your own Narnia.
$115.00/$95.00 members, Grub Street HQ, 160 Boylston Street, Boston, MA.

WEEKEND WORKSHOP: Saturday, August 7th, 9:00am-4:00pm, Flash Fiction Marathon
Instructor: Cam Terwilliger
The market for flash fiction is booming, and this seminar is perfect for writers ready to crank out some new short-short stories. At the end of the day, you’ll walk away with a brand new assortment of stories, each created through writing exercises designed to unleash your flash fiction genius. The seminar will also feature discussion of published flash fiction—which we’ll draw inspiration from—as well as feedback on your own work.
$115.00/$95.00 members, Grub Street HQ, 160 Boylston Street, Boston, MA.

WEEKEND WORKSHOP: Saturday, August 7th, 9:00am-4:00pm, Workshop Your Website or Blog
Instructor: Amy Marcott
Do you have a website and/or blog but want to learn ways to enhance the design and content? Looking to broaden your reach or boost your professional appeal? This class will offer a venue for receiving feedback on your online presence. Along the way, you’ll learn strategies for more effective design, navigation, usability, search engine optimization, and content. We’ll also do some writing exercises to help your work stand out. Note: this seminar is only for those who already have a designed website or active blog. Submit the URL(s) of your website and/or blog to chip@grubstreet.org by August 1st. If you have a blog, also submit two of your best posts that could be discussed in class. The instructor will prepare thorough critiques of each site before class so submitting URLs as early as possible is appreciated. Amy Marcott is a web writer and editor at MIT who blogs frequently and assists with web redesigns and incorporating new technologies into online strategies.
$115.00/$95.00 members, Grub Street HQ, 160 Boylston Street, Boston, MA.

SEMINAR: Monday, August 23rd, 7:00-10:00pm, Crafting the Villain
Instructor: KL Pereira
Some of the best and most memorable characters in literature are villains, rough and tough monsters, sly and sexy femme fatales, and naughty and deceitful oligarchs. They unnerve and excite us, sending a chill down our spines, and striking fear into our hearts. Yet when creating our own villains we often fail to overtly acknowledge the complexity and moral ambiguity that compels them to cause mayhem, delegating their motivation to a need to cause evil for evil’s sake and resulting in two-dimensional baddies. In this one-day seminar we will discuss traditional and non-traditional villains, why they are an essential part of any juicy tale, and how we can develop truly sinister and captivating characters that will antagonize, needle, and provoke even the bravest reader.
$65.00/$50.00 members, Grub Street HQ, 160 Boylston Street, Boston, MA.

SEMINAR: Monday, August 23rd, 7:00-10:00pm, Question Every Word: The Art of Micro-Editing
Instructor: Michelle Seaton
Before an editor evaluates your manuscript’s themes, plot, characters, or voice, he or she judges its sentences. The best way to impress any reader is to write clear and efficient prose. Good sentence-level editing can increase the pace, enhance the description, and deepen the mood of your work. In short, it can make your writing more compelling. In this workshop, we will take apart and reassemble sentences and paragraphs from both fiction and nonfiction drafts. You will learn to read like an editor, to question every word and remove abstraction in order to take your writing to the next level.
$65.00/$50.00 members, Grub Street HQ, 160 Boylston Street, Boston, MA.

SEMINAR: Monday, August 23rd, 7-10pm, Poetry Jam
Instructor: Rebecca Morgan Frank
Do you want to experiment with writing poetry? Are you looking to get back to those poems you wrote a while ago? Are you in a rut with your writing and in need of a jumpstart to find a fresh approach? Or are you a prose writer who needs to cross train by flexing some poetry muscles? Poets of all levels are welcome in this one night workshop in which we'll experiment with various poetry games, collaborations, and exercises. You'll leave with some seeds of poems, and with a toolbox of writing exercises to help you keep writing on your own. Be prepared to write, collaborate, and have fun.
$65.00/$50.00 members, Grub Street HQ, 160 Boylston Street, Boston, MA.

SEMINAR: Monday, August 23rd, 7:00-10:00pm, He Said/She Said: The Necessity of Feedback and How to Take It
Instructor: Lynne Griffin
Athletes and singers engage in regular practice, receiving ongoing coaching and “notes” to enhance performance. For the writer, positive feedback as well as constructive criticism serve an equally valuable purpose. This workshop will delve into why you need feedback and what to do with it once you get it. We’ll discuss techniques for examining positive, negative, and conflicting feedback—specifically how to incorporate it into a manuscript or story revision. If you want to take your work to the next level, join Lynne for an informative evening aimed at honing this all important skill set. Additional topics will include how to find trusted readers, working with a writers’ group, as well as knowing when it’s time to stop workshopping a piece.
$65.00/$50.00 members, Grub Street HQ, 160 Boylston Street, Boston, MA.

SEMINAR: Tuesday, August 31st, 7:00-10:00pm, Creating Complex Characters
Instructor: Lisa Borders
Stories often begin with a character the writer loves -- or loves to hate. But characters who come to life on the page are full of contradictions, neither wholly good nor entirely evil. How do we infuse our characters with the complexity that will make them believable? Through a combination of exercises and discussion, this seminar will show you how to create characters whose human contradictions make them vivid and memorable.
$65.00/$50.00 members, Grub Street HQ, 160 Boylston Street, Boston, MA.

SEMINAR: Tuesday, August 31st, 7:00-10:00pm, Art of the Scene
Instructor: Amy Marcott
Scenes play important roles in fiction and nonfiction—an opportunity for the reader to experience the action as it unfolds in the real time of the story and for the writer to dramatize crucial encounters and key moments. But combining numerous narrative elements into a successful scene can be a challenge. This class will look at the way scenes work and strategies employed by various authors. We’ll focus on pacing, choreography, dialogue, tension, details, subtext, and more and practice these with in-class writing exercises designed to inspire and elevate your own writing. If time permits, we can workshop a short scene you bring (up to about five pages double spaced) in small groups. Bring 3 copies.
$115.00/$95.00 members, Grub Street HQ, 160 Boylston Street, Boston, MA.

SEMINAR: Tuesday, August 31st, 7:00-10:00pm, Crafting the Pitch
Instructor: Ethan Gilsdorf
In this seminar, you will how to write killer cover letters for submitting essays to literary magazines, non-fiction book proposals to agents, and articles to editors of magazines, newspapers and online publications. We'll look at top mistakes that writers make and examine some pitch letters that actually worked. We'll also see how to leverage your background and expertise to best present yourself, even if you don't have a lot of publishing experience. Bring 15 copies of a draft of any pitch letter for a non-fiction project you are currently working on.
$65.00/$50.00 members, Grub Street HQ, 160 Boylston Street, Boston, MA.

SEMINAR: Tuesday, August 31st, 7:00-10:00pm, Book Smarts: A Novel Approach to Marketing Your Work
Instructor: Marisa Pagano
Writers receive a lot of bad advice. They are told to submit widely and often, be persistent, and say yes to every opportunity. They are expected to trust their agent as they “shop” their work and believe wholeheartedly in their publisher as they position it. Writers make themselves available for tours and readings post-publication, but no one explains how to act once the public (and the publisher’s) interest winds down. Taught by a ten-year publishing veteran who has worked with the industry’s top talent, this course not only demystifies the process of getting your work into print but also recommends the right approach to a successful publication and career. Strategies discussed include targeting the best agent for your specific work, evaluating the publication options presented to you by your agent, optimizing the promotional plan devised by your publisher, and solidifying the success of your work post-publication. The seminar applies to commercial and noncommercial works in multiple genres and will primarily interest novelists, memoirists, poets, short-story writers, and nonfiction writers.
$65.00/$50.00 members, Grub Street HQ, 160 Boylston Street, Boston, MA.

Be sure to check out our website for a comprehensive view of upcoming events.

Spreading the Love

Grub Street wants to promote YOU! Please send events for consideration to whitney@grubstreet.org. Bonus points and undying gratitude for submitting your event info in the same format as the events below. Our apologies in advance if we cannot fit you in. Please note that we do the best we can to evaluate requests, and do privilege requests from members, but cannot be held responsible for the quality of these events and programs or the legitimacy of contests. We expect that readers will do their own due diligence before sending their work or their money to any individual or organization.

--READING: Tuesday, July 27th, 6pm, Author Talk with Adrienne McDonnell
Adrienne Mcdonnell will talk about her novel The Doctor and the Diva, a breathtaking tale of romantic obsession based on the true story of a woman who deserted her wealthy husband and child in order to further her operatic career.
FREE, Boston Public Library, Abbey Room, 700 Boylston Street, Boston.

--READING: Wednesday, August 4th, 7PM, Jacob Ritari, author of Taroko Gorge
Grub Street thinks of Jacob Ritari as one of our own: he came to us at age fourteen, took many Grub Street classes and amazed us all even back then with his amazing talent. We're not remotely suprised that he has his first novel out now, at age 21! About his book: A disillusioned and raggedy American reporter and his drunken photojournalist partner are the last to see three Japanese schoolgirls who disappear into Taroko Gorge, Taiwan's largest national park. The journalists--who are themselves suspects--investigate the disappearance along with the girls' homeroom teacher, their bickering classmates, and a seasoned and wary Taiwanese detective. Poets and Writers calls it "a page-turning literary mystery."
FREE, Newtonville Books.

--PANEL: Thursday, August 5, 7:30 PM, PEN/New England & the Woods Hole Film Festival present Adapting Stories into Short Films Panel Discussion
Featuring a lively panel discussion with published authors and filmmakers about the process of adapting stories to film, the artistic experience of making and viewing shorts, and the ways that aspiring writers and filmmakers can enter into the ever-expanding short film world. Panelists include Hortense Gerardo, a writer, anthropologist, and member of The Dramatists Guild and the International Center for Women Playwrights; George Harrar, author of over a half dozen books including The Wonder Kid and The Spinning Man; Matthew Quinn Martin, director of the short film Celebrities in Disgrace, based on a novella by Elizabeth Searle; Alysia Reiner, an award winning actress and producer appearing on the NY stage and on TV shows such as The Sopranos, Law & Order and 30 Rock; and Taylor Toole, a Cape native whose most recent short film is After Work. For more information about the festival and event visit www.woodsholefilmfestival.org/2010. For tickets visit http://www.ticketweb.com/t3/sale/SaleEventDetail?dispatch=loadSelectionData&eventId=2390135.
$7 - $10, Woods Hole Community Hall, Woods Hole, MA.

--SEMINARS: Wednesdays, September 8, 15, 22, 29; 6pm 7:30 pm; Creative Women and Money Seminars
Women writers and artists face unique financial challenges, often complicated by an irregular income. Financial Advisor Sally Boyle from Morgan Stanley Smith Barney will explore 10 critical steps in a holistic financial review. You'll come away with a clearer picture of your finances and the issues important to your wealth planning. RSVP: Mary Johnson, AROHOretreats@comcast.net.
FREE and open to women writers and artists, Morgan Stanley Smith Barney, 1000 Elm Street, 14th Floor, Manchester, NH 03101

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