The Noble Pen for Dec 18, 2014

Next Noble Pen Meeting

December 18th, 2014 at 7 pm

Scott’s Family Restaurant

1906 Blairs Ferry Rd NE, Cedar Rapids

News

The annual Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award contest will open soon.  Here’s the 2014 FAQ.  Winning, or even making it into the later rounds, is a huge achievement for an author.

Victories

Tyree finished writing Wolf, and has only minor tweaks left to do.

Ciuin wrote all night on a 3,000 word paper and visual presentation, but the instructor can’t open her file.  She got an A- on a paper.

Aimee is getting a lot of writing done in idle moments.

Education

Every story requires some world building.  Even those stories that take place in our present day world, or its history, have to select where it is placed, who is involved, and which cultural aspects are significant to the story.

Writing SF/F or alternate history does free you to have different elements (wikipedia-worldbuilding), but David Hair lists thirteen  basic principles that will usually apply in any world of people.  Using most of those rules will make the story more believable to readers.  Breaking one or more can make your story interesting.

Fiction Factor lists a bunch of resources for world builders.

Upcoming Schedule

Dec 18
Cindy
Cassie
Dylan
Mark (hold-over from Dec 11)

Dec 25
Christmas – no meeting

Jan 1
New Year’s Day – no meeting

Jan 8
Eugenia
Greg
Ciuin

Jan 15
Tyree
Cindy
Greg

Jan 22
Nick
Aimee
Ciuin

Keep Writing,
Bill