We will meet at someone’s home at 7 pm, and the address will be in the distribution email. Use the contact form if you need me to add you to the distribution.

Discord and Meetups for Noble Pen

The Discord app provides another way for us to discuss. If you want to check it out, ask for an invitation link that will let you join. Also look for Creative Writing on Meetups.com for Cedar Rapids and make us look active there.

Writing Victories

1. Bill, Shannon, Jeff, and Adrianna wrote brilliant, very different homages to Nick.

Reading Victories

Personal Victories

1. Xander turrned in final grades for his Coe classes on Wednesday and is now officially on summer break!
2. David now has a tattoo that is thematically related to his book! The Neon Dragon in Marion did it and he’s very happy with how it turned out.
3. Xander finally watched “Galaxy Quest” at Adriana’s suggestion.
4. Jered is using the Google AI Pros tool at his Collins job as a technical writer. It’s proving to be helpful and cutting some of his tasks down to only a few minutes.

Literary News

Schedule

May 21
Robyn
Ciuin
Jered

May 28
Jeff
Xander
Tim

June 4
Laura
Robyn
open slot

June 11
Jered
open slots

Keep Writing!
Robyn

We will meet at someone’s home at 7 pm, and the address will be in the distribution email. Use the contact form if you need me to add you to the distribution.

Discord and Meetups for Noble Pen

The Discord app provides another way for us to discuss. If you want to check it out, ask for an invitation link that will let you join. Also look for Creative Writing on Meetups.com for Cedar Rapids and make us look active there.

Writing Victories

1. Jered has his author’s website up and is working on other social media outlets for his writing. He’s also trying to come up with a pen name as there are dozens of Jered Fitzgerald’s up on Amazon as authors.

Reading Victories

1. Ben S. read “Wired For Love: A Neuroscientist’s Journey Through Romance, Loss and the Essence of Human Connection” by Stephanie Cacioppo and found it fascinating.
2. Jeff finished “Wuthering Heights” and rated it a C+. He was a little put off by the writing style which was a narrator telling the story to another narrator who was telling it to the reader. He also disliked that the villain suddenly became good at the end without much of an explanation. Jeff is now waiting for “Jane Eyre” by Charlotte Bronte and “The Great Gatsby” by F. Scott Fitzgerald to be returned to the library.

Personal Victories

1. Bill’s wife, Karen, was up at the Mayo Clinics this week and testing showed that her treatments are already improving her health.
2. Ciuin has been working at controlling her diet, specifically her sugar and salt intake and is at her lowest weight in five years. Lifestyle changes make a difference!

Literary News

Schedule

May 14
Jeff
Robyn
“Homage to Nick”

May 21
Laura
Ciuin
Jered

May 28
Jeff
Robyn
open slot

June 4
open slots

Keep Writing!
Robyn

We will meet at someone’s home at 7 pm, and the address will be in the distribution email. Use the contact form if you need me to add you to the distribution.

Discord and Meetups for Noble Pen

The Discord app provides another way for us to discuss. If you want to check it out, ask for an invitation link that will let you join. Also look for Creative Writing on Meetups.com for Cedar Rapids and make us look active there.

Writing Victories

1. Tim is one step closer to his Master’s Thesis in Systems Engineering.

Reading Victories

1. Adriana is reading Steinbeck’s “Travels with Charlie.”
2. Jeff is about a third of the way through Emily Bronte’s “Wuthering Heights.” Whether he likes it or not…the jury is still out.

Personal Victories

Bill’s wife, Karen, is continuing with her new course of treatment and they are pleased with how it’s going.

Literary News

Schedule

May 7
Ciuin
Jered
Robyn

May 14
Laura
Jeff
“Homage to Nick”

May 21
Jeff
Ciuin
Jered

May 28
open slots

Keep Writing!
Robyn

We will meet at someone’s home at 7 pm, and the address will be in the distribution email. Use the contact form if you need me to add you to the distribution.

Discord and Meetups for Noble Pen

The Discord app provides another way for us to discuss. If you want to check it out, ask for an invitation link that will let you join. Also look for Creative Writing on Meetups.com for Cedar Rapids and make us look active there.

Writing Victories

1. Shannon submitted his demon/angel short story to an annual anthology he is typically published in.
2. Jered will be attending a weekend writing conference in Minnesota this spring.
3. Ciuin and Robyn are thrilled to have found a new Friday night writing place at Carlos O’Kelly’s.
4. Jered is stablishing a new writing habit by getting up at 5 am. He tried it at the end of the day but found that didn’t work well as he was too tired. Doing it when he gets up is much better.
5. Ciuin’s former English teacher, Mr. Fogel, continues to beta read “Chessmaster’s Pawn,” and discuss it with her after church on Sunday’s. Though it’s not his usual kind of book, he is enjoying it.

Reading Victories

Jeff finished reading “Rebecca” and “For Whom the Bell Tolls.” He found Hemingway’s book, due to the subject matter, difficult to read.

Personal Victories

Literary News

Schedule

Apr 30
Jeff
Robyn
Tim

May 7
Ciuin
Jered
Robyn

May 14
Laura
Jeff
open slot

May 21
open slots

Keep Writing!
Robyn

We will meet at someone’s home at 7 pm, and the address will be in the distribution email. Use the contact form if you need me to add you to the distribution.

Discord and Meetups for Noble Pen

The Discord app provides another way for us to discuss. If you want to check it out, ask for an invitation link that will let you join. Also look for Creative Writing on Meetups.com for Cedar Rapids and make us look active there.

Writing Victories

Robyn and Ciuin were sad to find out their Friday night writing place, The Lindale Neighborhood Pub, closed, as of April 19. After having dinner, they spent several hours working on writing projects in the space and made friends with most of the staff. Ciuin wrote all of the wait staff and managers into her current fantasy book, “Bishop’s Decoy.” She was also working with the management, planning her first book launch of “Chessmaster’s Pawn” at The Pub this summer.

Reading Victories

Personal Victories

1. Enzo accepted a new position, Assistant Director of Engagement, at Knox College in Galesburg, Illinois. “I’ll basically be panhandling money from alumni,” he said. It will put him about halfway between Cedar Rapids and Naperville, IL, where his family lives. He’ll be moving in mid- to late May.
2. Adriana sold her house and bought her daughter’s home here in Cedar Rapids. She’ll be moving in mid-June

Literary News

Schedule

Apr 23
Ciuin
Jered
Tim

Apr 23
Ciuin
Jered
Tim

Apr 30
Robyn
Jeff

May 7
open slots

May 14
open slots

Keep Writing!
Robyn

We will meet at someone’s home at 7 pm, and the address will be in the distribution email. Use the contact form if you need me to add you to the distribution.

Discord and Meetups for Noble Pen

The Discord app provides another way for us to discuss. If you want to check it out, ask for an invitation link that will let you join. Also look for Creative Writing on Meetups.com for Cedar Rapids and make us look active there.

Writing Victories

1. Adriana was inspired for the first time in a while and wrote some ideas on an envelope that was handy.
2. Ciuin was doing dishes for three hours and rewrote most of the plot of her current fantasy novel, “The Bishop’s Decoy.”

Reading Victories

1. Jeff is on a roll! He finished “Great Expectations,” which exceeded his anticipation. He’d read “A Tale of Two Cities,” and was not impressed. He also finished “The Invisible Life of Addie La Rue.” While it was good, he did not think it lived up to its hype in the press. He’s also nearly finished with “Rebecca” and judges it excellent.
2. Adriana pointed out that the author of “Rebecca,” Daphne du Maurier, also wrote “The Birds.” The book, she also noted, is very different from Alfred Hitchcock’s film version.
3. Jered is reading “The Assassin’s Appretence,” by Robin Hobb, as part of the Farseer trilogy.
4. Robyn is venturing into the world of non-fiction, a rarity for her, with several books on the Royal Family. She has finished “Catherine, the Princess of Wales,” and started “William and Catherine.”

Personal Victories

Literary News

Goodreads has deemed “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” as a book that one can’t live without.

Schedule

Apr 16
Ciuin
Jeff
Robyn

Apr 23
Ciuin
Jered
Tim

Apr 30
open slots

May 7
open slots

Keep Writing!
Robyn

We will meet at someone’s home at 7 pm, and the address will be in the distribution email. Use the contact form if you need me to add you to the distribution.

Discord and Meetups for Noble Pen

The Discord app provides another way for us to discuss. If you want to check it out, ask for an invitation link that will let you join. Also look for Creative Writing on Meetups.com for Cedar Rapids and make us look active there.

Writing Victories

1. Jerrod has a job as a tech writer at Collins Aerospace, working exclusively in Word. He is also writing consistently again and enjoying it. He pulled out some old short stories and is reworking them. His plan is to polish them up and then publish the bundle on Kindle.
2. Dylan is writing on his Patreon account again and making a little money in the process.

Reading Victories

Personal Victories

1. Jeff made it back from his trip to the Amazon. He caught a 15 lb. peacock bass (and threw it back in), plus ate piranha and survived. He said it was quite tasty.

Literary News

Schedule

Apr 9
Tim
Shannon
Robyn

Apr 16
Ciuin
Jeff
Robyn

Apr 23
open slots

Apr 30
open slots

Keep Writing!
Robyn

We will meet at someone’s home at 7 pm, and the address will be in the distribution email. Use the contact form if you need me to add you to the distribution.

Discord and Meetups for Noble Pen

The Discord app provides another way for us to discuss. If you want to check it out, ask for an invitation link that will let you join. Also look for Creative Writing on Meetups.com for Cedar Rapids and make us look active there.

Writing Victories

Shannon is getting ready for his annual workshop and the anthology that comes out of it. Participating authors take a prompt to write from and the resulting stories are published in the anthology.

Reading Victories

Personal Victories

1. Tim and his wife are starting a business and found a programmer on Upwork to help them get it going.
2. Robyn is working to set up her freelancing business. This week, she applied for five jobs, received three invites for interviews. She wasn’t awarded any of the positions, but was excited about the interviews as that’s more of a response than she’s received so far.

Literary News

Shannon saw a piece on the television show “Macgyver” (the original series with Richard Dean Anderson) that explained they had scientists develop all of the gadgets and methods Macgyver used to get out of trouble. It was all real, but there was always one step or one key component that was left out so viewers couldn’t reproduce what they were seeing.

Schedule

Apr 2
Enzo
Dylan
Xander

Apr 9
Tim
Robyn
Shannon

Apr 16
Ciuin
open slots

Apr 23
open slots

Keep Writing!
Robyn

We will meet at someone’s home at 7 pm, and the address will be in the distribution email. Use the contact form if you need me to add you to the distribution.

Discord and Meetups for Noble Pen

The Discord app provides another way for us to discuss. If you want to check it out, ask for an invitation link that will let you join. Also look for Creative Writing on Meetups.com for Cedar Rapids and make us look active there.

Writing Victories

Shannon wrote for the first time in a month and finished a short short story.

Reading Victories

Personal Victories

Bill’s wife finally has a diagnosis for all of the symptoms she’s been having, and the Mayo Clinic has a treatment plan. Her condition is so rare that there are probably only three people in Linn County “walking around with it.”

Literary News

Xander did some reading about John Nash, the subject of the movie “A Beautiful Mind,” and discovered Nash was driven to madness by watching videos on quantum mechanics.

Schedule

Mar 26
Laura
Ted
Robyn

Apr 2
Enzo
Dylan
Xander

Apr 9
Tim
Robyn
open slot

Apr 16
open slots

Keep Writing!
Robyn

We will meet at someone’s home at 7 pm, and the address will be in the distribution email. Use the contact form if you need me to add you to the distribution.

Discord and Meetups for Noble Pen

The Discord app provides another way for us to discuss. If you want to check it out, ask for an invitation link that will let you join. Also look for Creative Writing on Meetups.com for Cedar Rapids and make us look active there.

Writing Victories

Reading Victories

Personal Victories

1. Xander received an email from one of his students complimenting him on his positive influence as a professor.
2. Bill LIKED a movie! He couldn’t remember the name, but the same scene was shown several times, all from different points of view.

Literary News

1. Adriana read an article about how romance novels are changing. Readers strongly prefer those books told in the first person and changing perspective between the heroine and hero. Traditionally, romances have been told from the third person POV.

Schedule

Mar 19
Xander
Ciuin
Robyn

Mar 26
Laura
Robyn
Ted

Apr 2
Enzo
Dylan
Xander

Apr 9
open slots

Keep Writing!
Robyn