Next Noble Pen Meeting

August 21st, 2014 at 7 pm

Scott’s Family Restaurant

1906 Blairs Ferry Rd NE, Cedar Rapids

News

Amazon is aiming to become more dominant in college book sales, with a new partnership that lets students order on line and pick up locally.

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An author of Dystopian young-adult books talks about the genre and says although the books and films have been popular recently, she thinks their run is ending.

Victories

Tyree submitted and sold another story to the anthology that is in preparation.

Nick has re-edited eight of eleven chapters of his western.  He sent a report on a long train-spotting trip.

Dylan’s giveaway of Sand and Blood on Goodreads resulted in people in two states and Australia receiving copies.   Another 500 added it to their “to read” file so a few may actually buy it.  He is hoping for some reviews to be posted.

Education

While many authors do fine with an ordinary word processing program, others find help in writer’s software with more power, such as discussed here.  A summary compares several writing software programs.  Another review (as of 2012) includes some not in the other list.  Neither list rates free programs, of which there are many.   A few people write their own program.

These programs, costing $30 to $130 (list price), integrate the functions of outlining or storyboarding, note taking, character sheets, and writing to a much greater degree than word processors like MS Word and WordPerfect.  Some go beyond spelling and thesaurus to offer a full dictionary and even name lists from which to choose characters.  They still do not write the story for you, nor give a reader’s critique.

Come to think of it, there are already a million monkeys on a million typewriters, and the Internet is nothing like Shakespeare.  ~(modified from) Blair Houghton

Upcoming Schedule

August 21
Aimee
Ciuin
Cassie

August 28
Tyree
Ciuin (double slot)

Sept 4
Tyree
Ciuin (?)
Open slot

Sept 11
Open slots

Keep Writing,
Bill