MY MUSINGS ON THE HAMPTON ROADS WRITERS' CONFERENCE

        Congrats! to the organizers of the Hampton Roads Writers' Conference I attended this past week in Virginia Beach, Va.  The HRW surely must be  filled with magicians as everything was done with what appeared to me (an attendee) as sleight-of- hand precision.
       The daily keynote speakers, NY Times Best Selling Author, Michael Palmer,  and Agent Marisa Corvisiero, respectively, were outstanding.
       Chuck Sambuchino of Writers' Digest Books and editor of the Guide to  Literary Agents gave us guidance and suggestions in a "pitch" session that went beyond cursory.
       The one-on-one pitch sessions, the 15 minute manuscript evaluation, the 10- line reading of your work and the one page reading evaluated and commented on by the prestigious panel was enlightening.
       I came away from the conference with a surreal feeling of confidence as each agent and author found my work--in the words of Michael Palmer--"quality writing."
      I made lots of new writing friends in the Hampton Roads area and have already been contacted by some of them who want to keep in touch. 
     This is one conference that will definitely be pencilled in on my calendar for next year.

COMING SOON! "MARCEL'S GIFT"

          Yes," MARCEL'S GIFT," my debut novel, will be available soon at eBook retail venues. Projected date is February 2012. Lots of things to do before its release date: editing, proofreading, cover design, auhor photo, marketing plan etc. etc. My super efficient publisher has already designed the cover and it is an eye catcher. I love it.
           I'll keep you up to date as things progress.

IN THE SHADOW OF VAN GOGH

          Did I ever tell you I once stood next to Vincent van Gogh when I visited France? At least I think I did. Maybe not. Perhaps it was just his ghost. Nevertheless, I found the image so compelling I had to include it in my novel, "MARCEL'S GIFT.".
         
            While sightseeing in the sunny town of Arles in the south of France (where van Gogh painted and spent much of his miserable life) I came to a clearing between a stand of chestnut trees where an arthritic, old artist-- bent over his canvas and easel--painted the colorful, foral valley beyond.
        
          He wore a light blue shirt under a dark blue or black ( I couldn't tell which) moth ravaged jacket. His navy blue pants were paint spattered and he wore a tattered straw hat that had several broken straws poking through the edge of its rim leaving jagged shadow-lines on his face.
         
          When he saw me approaching, he smiled an almost toothless, yellowed, tobacco stained smile, but the vibrancy of his clear, grey-blue eyes diverted my attention from the one thing that betrayed his age--his weather beaten, leathery face. I imagined he must have been a seaman in his earlier years. Who knows?
        
         I held up my camera and with charade motions indicated I wanted to take a photo. He stood to pose next to his oil painting. To please him I snapped one picture. Then, I motioned with my hand for him to sit and continue his painting. I took more photos when he was fully absorbed in his work and checked the images in my digital camera.
       
        I could have sworn I was looking at the artist, Vincent van Gogh. However, three things were missing: van Gogh's red hair, his mutilated ear, and one of his unfinished masterpieces on the old artist's easel. 
 Au revoir, mon ami.

TIME TO CELEBRATE

     On Friday 9/9/11, I found an email from a publisher that indicated they were forwarding a contract to me for the publication of my first novel, "Marcel's Gift." It will be published as an ebook so all you Nook, Kindle and iPad owners will have access to it as soon as Amazon.com gets it from the publishing house. (Estimate 30 days). Details will follow.
      As a writer, I'm usually not at a loss for words, but ask me, Am I "Happy?" of course; Do I feel I'm in a "Surreal" world?  indeed; "Thankful?"--you bet!

A RELATIVE COINCIDENCE

           What do you think the odds are for 2 first-cousins seeing their works published and sent to market the same week?
            My award winning short story, "No Trespassing!" (1st. Place in Writers' Journal "Write to Win!Contest") was just published in the Sept/Oct issue of the magazine; the same week that my cousin, Anthony Cirone, had his book "The Great American Symphony--A Look behind-the-scenes- of its Artistry, Passion and Heartache" leave the publisher's house and head to retail establishments and Amazon.com. (title of book to follow). Writing must be in the genes.

TO THAT, OR NOT TO THAT...THAT IS THE QUESTION.

          Since I joined a local Lynchburg critique group two years ago,  our leader has made a point of pounding a few golden tid-bits into us to help improve our writing.   One of these tid-bits concerns the word "THAT."
         I never gave much thought to the word that. I used it casually in my writing--perhaps a little too often. For me, it was such a good word for emphasis or specificity as in "I want that one!"
        But on the other sideof the coin of good writing, there lurked the "bad" that that had no business weakening my sentences as in these samples: "Give me the flashllight so that I an see where I'm going." Or, "She was surprised that he was not there."
         If you remove the that words in each sample sentaence above, you'll see that the sentences become tighter and cetainly more professional.
        I actually never noticed that I used so many thats. They were simply words that spilled from my stream of consciousness and that hid in plain sight among the "good" necessary words on the page.
        In our group, we argued and complained that a particular that our leader suggested be deleted was indeed very necessary."It emphasizes the meaning!" or "It highlights the author's intent!" etc.etc. were some of our points about overusing the word that and soon I was truly treating "that" as a 4-letter word (which, of course, it is.).       
        Now, whenever I finish a page, I go to FIND in the MicroWord Tool Bar and type in "that" in the FIND WHAT space. All my "thats"come up highlighted. All I need to do  is cull the unnecessary thats from my page with a tap on the Delete key
        Try this on something you've already written or use my overuse of the word in his posting to get my point.
       You'll see an immediate improvement of your word flow, tighter sentence structure and a cleaner manuscript, query or synopsis that you can send out in the submission process.
        Have fun deleting  the unnecessary thats in this posting. It's worth the effort.
        And, for now, that's all I have to say about "that."