May 31st, 2011

 
Grub Street News

Welcome to the latest installment of the Grub Street Rag, a newsletter of the Boston literary scene brought to you every Monday (except when we are fulfilling our patriotic grilling duties on Memorial Day) from the Royal Wedding Tchotchke Closet at Grub Street World Headquarters. As always, if you are receiving this e-mail in horror, please advance to the bottom of the page to unsubscribe yourself.

Memoir Project Reading

Ever since the Memoir Project workshops ended in Hyde Park over a year ago, dedicated senior writers have been meeting in an ongoing writing group and continuing to polish their memoirs. Join them this Friday afternoon (June 3rd) at Hyde Park Library as they read from new work and help them celebrate their commitment to their writing. Details below.

YAWP Summer Fellowship Applications Due By Friday

Each summer, Grub Street holds the Young Adult Writers Program Summer Fellowship, a rigorous practicum for teens who are truly passionate about writing. Through classes, workshops, and readings, students will generate new work, learn about the craft of writing, and gain knowledge of the writing/publishing world. If you're an incoming 9th-12th grader in the Boston area with an interest in creative writing, or if you know one, apply by this Friday to be a part of the program! Details and guidelines are available on our website at http://www.grubstreet.org/index.php?id=161.

Want a New Job? Get Your Applications In By 5pm Today

Grub Street is hiring! This summer, there are two new positions opening up in our office: Volunteer Coordinator and Administrative Coordinator. The deadline to apply is today at 5pm, so act fast! Check out all the details and requirements on our website: http://www.grubstreet.org/index.php?id=1050.

Our Daily Best

• Friday Five-O tackles how to approach a literary agent
• Listen to Jennifer Haigh's "Claire of the Moon"
• Interview with Michelle Hoover
• Writing exercise: Bad News
  

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

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.

GRUB STREET SOUTH: Tuesday, May 31st, 7-8:30pm, How to Overcome Writer’s Block
The instructor of this fantastic workshop is Hillary Rettig and the workshop is “How to Overcome Writer’s Block,” a condensation of her six-week Grub Street class, “How to Write a Lot.” Attendees will leave with tools and techniques that will help them become more productive. The workshop is suitable for all writers including academic, business, nonprofit and creative.
FREE, Reservations required. Please call Buttonwood at 1-781-383-2665 to reserve. Buttonwood Books & Toys, Shaw’s Plaza, Rt.3A, Cohasset.

READING: Friday, June 3rd, 1:30pm, Readings from the Hyde Park Memoir Project Alumni
The Memoir Project is pleased to present a reading by members of the year-long writing group in Hyde Park. Featuring Memoir Project participants Alta McDonald, Gloria Wright, Maryalice Bellew, Alice Palumbo, Bob Hannan, and more. Open to the Public. Refreshments will be served.
FREE, Hyde Park Library, 35 Harvard Avenue, Hyde Park (Just off Cleary Square, corner of Winthrop St. & Harvard Ave.) Wheelchair Accessible.

WEEKEND WORKSHOP: Saturday, June 11th, 10:00am-5:00pm, The Time of Your Life
One of the keys to success in writing is using your time properly. That can be tough when you have a job, family, home or other major commitments – and when occupational hazards like procrastination and writer’s block rear their ugly heads. The good news is that all of these issues can be addressed once you’ve figured out the root causes of your time “issues” and applied some practical strategies to address them. (Hint: it’s not that you’re lazy or uncommitted—so stop blaming yourself! Another hint: it is not so difficult to create and stick to a time “budget” and schedule that will help you achieve your goals.) Author Hillary Rettig (The Lifelong Activist) will help you achieve these goals with two three-hour seminars offered on the same day: “Time Management” first, then a lunch break, then “Stop Procrastinating!” The best news of all is that once a writer actually starts solving his or her procrastination problems or blocks and starts managing his/her time better, change can happen amazingly fast!
Instructor: Hillary Rettig
Sorry, this class is sold out. Please click here to be put on a waiting list.

WEEKEND WORKSHOP: Saturday-Sunday, June 11-12th, 10:00am-5:00pm, Line-by-Line
John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men is the perfect novel. Each line is a model of economy, crafted with precision. On the first day of this class, we'll explore how Steinbeck structured his work to ensure each scene, every last line, had a purpose, and how it all came together to support one of the most memorable endings in literature. The following day, we'll apply the lessons learned from Steinbeck to the students' own work. Students should come to class with the novel, having read it beforehand, and email up to ten pages of their work-in-progress to be shared with the class.
Instructor: Amy MacKinnon
$220.00/$195.00 members, Grub Street HQ. Register online now.

WEEKEND WORKSHOP: Saturday, June 11th, 10:00am-5:00pm, Characterization
The creation of compelling, vivid characters is the foundation of any successful work of fiction. Whether you’re an experienced author or just getting started, this one-day seminar on character-building techniques will help you move forward as a writer. Through a wide array of readings – from Raymond Carver to Junot Diaz, Virginia Woolf to Z.Z. Packer – we will examine the specific strategies authors use to bring their characters to life. But the primary focus of the seminar will be to practice these strategies in our own work. We will practice both “off the page” techniques used to achieve a nuanced understanding of our characters, as well as “on the page” techniques used to convey that complex humanity to our readers. By the end of the course, you will have a dramatically expanded toolbox for the creation of believable, engaging, and memorable characters in your fiction.
Instructor: Adam Stumacher
*2 spots left* $115.00/$95.00 members, Grub Street HQ. Register online now.

WEEKEND WORKSHOP: Saturday, June 11th, 10:00am-5:00pm, Jumpstart Your Writing-- Creative Nonfiction Focus
This one-day weekend version of one of our most popular courses has a very clear mission: spend the day writing. Through a series of fun directed writing exercises, we will explore the terrain of creative non-fiction (no five-paragraph essays here!) and some poetry: mining for material, constructing characters and settings, shaping vivid dialogue, understanding point of view, exploring the many forms of non-fiction today, and finding your voice.
Instructor: Jennifer De Leon
Sorry, this class is sold out. Please click here to be put on a waiting list. $115.00/$95.00 members, Grub Street HQ.

WEEKEND WORKSHOP: Sunday, June 12th, 10:00am-5:00pm, How to Plan, Write, and Develop a Book
Mary Carroll Moore, award-winning author of 13 books in three genres and a PEN/Faulkner nominee, will guide you through a simple and successful book-writing process that can take your book from idea to publication, a process using a three-act structure that eases organization and makes a manuscript vivid and engaging to readers.
Sorry, this class is sold out. Please click here to be put on a waiting list. $115.00/$95.00 members, Grub Street HQ.

LUNCHTIME WRITING: Wednesday, June 15th, 12:30-1:15pm, Brown Bag Lunch Series
Do you work downtown and want to fit some writing into your day? Or do you have a schedule that gives you free afternoons instead of evenings? Bring your lunch and come on over to Grub Street for a Brown Bag Writing Workshop. For 45 minutes, you’ll meet fellow writers and get your creative juices flowing with some cool writing exercises. Led by one of our award-winning instructors or ambassadors. Best of all, you’ll leave lunch with some new ideas to ponder for the rest of your day, and beyond. No need to RSVP-- just come!
Instructor: Jennifer Elmore
Level: For Everyone
FREE, Grub Street HQ. Register online now.

WEEKEND WORKSHOP: Saturday-Sunday, June 18-19th, 10:00am-5:00pm, The Murky MiddleWriting the middle of a novel can feel, for many writers, like being lost in the forest with neither a breadcrumb trail nor a compass. You know where you want to end up, but are not sure how to get there. If you’ve written at least 50 pages and feel lost in the murky middle of your novel, this class will help you forge a path toward the story’s climax. Through intensive in-class exercises and brainstorming as well as an overnight assignment, you will leave on Sunday afternoon with a new mid-novel scene, and a possible path out of the forest.
Please come to class with 12 copies of both the first paragraph of your novel and a plot outline of what you’ve written so far, broken down chapter by chapter. We will be working with these outlines in class.
Instructor: Lisa Borders
$220.00/$195.00, Grub Street HQ. Register online now.

WEEKEND WORKSHOP: Saturday, June 18th, 10:00am-5:00pm, Read, Publish: Polish and Place your Book Reviews
Itching to write but unsure where to start? Why not turn the last good book you've read into your first published piece of writing? Contrary to what you may have heard, book reviews are flourishing online and, yes, in print. In this day-long workshop John Cotter, Founding Editor of Open Letters Monthly, will talk participants through the good and bad -- the paying and the non-paying-but-prestigious -- in the world of book review publication, from the TLS to The Second Pass and The Quarterly Conversation. Part one of the class will be an overview of the reviewing world, part two will be an in-depth discussion about what editors to approach and how to approach them, and in part three each participant will polish one of their own reviews to publication-quality.
Instructor: John Cotter
$115/$95 members, Grub Street HQ. Register online now.

WEEKEND WORKSHOP: Saturday, June 18th, 10:00am-5:00pm, Our Lives in the Middle AgesThis is a workshop for writers of a certain (middle) age, according to their own definition. Based partly on James Atlas’ book My Life in the Middle Ages, and partly on the instructor’s own experience in facing ‘50’ and beyond, this session will explore how we can use the universal themes of aging—letting go, dealing with physical illness, the earning of hard-earned wisdom, and laughing at our own foibles—as the raw material for personal essays, memoir vignettes, radio commentaries, etc. In this day-long session, we will examine the work of writers such as Nora Ephron, David Sedaris and others, and then write on a series of prompts, which touch on themes of growing older and (hopefully) wiser. We will share ideas to strengthen and further develop these drafts. Finally, we’ll share ideas about getting our work ‘out there’ through publication in various media, including literary journals, newspapers, and on-line publications.
Instructor: Judah Leblang
$115/$95 members, Grub Street HQ. Register online now.

WEEKEND WORKSHOP: Sunday, June 19th, 10:00am-5:00pm, From Blog Post to Personal EssayThe personal blog is an incredibly popular and effective way for a writer to find his or her voice—but how do you move beyond blog posts to rich, complex, publishable personal essays? With the current cultural focus on personal writing, the essay, too, is “hot” right now—but where do ideas that go beyond navel-gazing come from? In the blog you write (or the blog you’ve imagined) you already have a record of the ideas you find most interesting. The next step is to develop them into fully realized literary explorations, and in this one-night seminar we’ll discuss how to do just that. Appropriate for the blogger and the aspiring essayist alike, the seminar will cover the narrative techniques established essayists like Didion, Lopate, and Dillard use to, in the words of Aldous Huxley, “look at the world through the keyhole of anecdote and description." We’ll discuss strategies for identifying those potential keyholes and how to use different structural models to produce writing with the simultaneous acuity and complexity that characterizes great personal essays. A reading packet will be distributed, containing both how-to craft articles and examples of the form both classic and modern.
Instructor: Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich
*2 spots left*, $115/$95 members, Grub Street HQ. Register online now.

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.

--DISCUSSION: Tuesday, June 7th, 9:45am - 11:30am, Coffee With the Authors
Buttonwood Books & Toys will host its semi-annual event “Coffee with the Authors,” on Tue. Jun. 7, 9:45 – 11:30 AM at the Atlantica Restaurant in Cohasset.  Enjoy a continental breakfast while three contemporary authors discuss their latest works. Sue Miller discusses The Lake Shore Limited, Kevin O’Hara discusses A Lucky Irish Lad and Sally Ryder Brady discusses A Box of Darkness: The Story of a Marriage.
$16, reservations and tickets required. Please call Buttonwood at 1-781-383-2665 to reserve or order a signed copy if unable to attend. Atlantica Restaurant, Cohasset, MA.

--READING AND PERFORMANCE: Monday, June 13th, 7pm, Funny as a Crutch
The Drum Literary Magazine presents “Funny As a Crutch,” a performance of dirty limericks, educational raps, recipes for cooking raccoon, Dungeons & Dragons-inspired poetry, children's stories that shouldn't be read to children, and fiction about the miracle of motherhood as seen from the bottom of a martini. Performed by Massachusetts, Vermont and Maine residents Kevin Kennedy, Ethan Gilsdorf, David Petrie, Carol Hammond, and Jeff Stern. Presented by The Drum (http://www.drumlitmag.com/), the “literary magazine for your ears.” $5 donation encouraged, The Enormous Room, 567 Massachusetts Avenue Cambridge, MA.

--READING AND BOOK PARTY: Tuesday, June 14th, 7:00pm, Michelle Toth
Harvard Book Store and Grub Street are very pleased to welcome Harvard Business School graduate and debut novelist Michelle Toth as she reads from Annie Begins. Annie Thompson is as brilliant in business as she is disastrous in relationships. It’s the dawn of the dot-com boom, and Annie is determined to make it big. But her love life takes a turn for the unexpected when her young, terminally ill cousin, April, makes it her mission to find Annie a husband. The fiancé April picks is definitely not the kind of man Annie would have chosen. Now, Annie has to ask herself what exactly she wants and values most deeply in a man—and in herself. Join co-sponsors Grub Street and Michelle at Grafton Street Pub after the reading (buy a book at the reading, get a free drink!)
FREE, Harvard Book Store, 1256 Mass. Ave.

--READING & CONVERSATION: Tuesday, June 14th, 7pm
Novelist Daphne Kalotay (Russian Winter) and dancer/memoirist Marie Paquet-Nesson (Ballet to the Corps) discuss their work and the challenges of writing about the arts.
FREE, Porter Square Books, 5 White Street, Cambridge, MA.

--CONFERENCE: June 23-25th, Ocean State Summer Writing Conference
KEYNOTE SPEAKERS: Robert Stone is the National Book Award-winning author of seven novels, which include A Hall of Mirrors, Dog Soldiers, A Flag for Sunrise, Children of Light, Outerbridge Reach, Damascus Gate, and Bay of Souls. His story collection, Fun with Problems, was published last year. Jennifer Egan is a novelist, journalist, and short story writer. Recipient of the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the National Book Critics Award for A Visit from the Goon Squad, she is the also the author of The Keep, Look at Me, Emerald City and other Stories, and The Invisible Circus. Tomaz Salamun is considered Slovenia's greatest living poet. Author of 37 books, his work is translated into 19 languages. Blue Tower, his latest book, will be out in 2011. Conference highlights include: Workshops in fiction, creative non-fiction, and poetry, Master Classes, Craft Seminars, Sessions on "The Writing Life" and Publishing, One-on-one Consultation and Manuscript Evaluation, and Networking Opportunities. http://www.uri.edu/summerwriting/2011/index.html