As I mentioned in a previous post, I was to meet with a group of women this past Sunday for an initial meeting about forming a writers group. It turns out that a woman by the name of Mary Ellen and I were the only ones to make it. (Paula, another interested woman, had something come up--I got an e-mail from her on Monday). Mary Ellen and I had a very nice chat about forming our group and decided that we would forge ahead and see if others were still interested.
We've set a date to meet again on Sept. 18 at noon at the Turtle Bread Company. I am hoping that the others will want to join us. However, Mary Ellen did mention to me that she is part of another newly-formed writers group that would welcome me, if ours did not take off. We'll have to wait and see what happens.
Mary Ellen gave me a book to look through to help us shape our group. It is called A Group of One's Own: Nurturing the Woman Writer. It is a guide to forming writers groups and is very useful. I hope that we can incorporate some or many of the ideas into our new group as it forms and moves forward.
Specifically, the book suggests discussing the purpose of the writers group and suggests developing a mission statement and group guidelines. It also highlights strategies to solicit feedback within the group, ways to nurture inspiration within the group, ways to guide members into ritualistic writing (ways to stay on the writing track when life gets in the way), tips on how to understand group members' differences, ways to introduce a writer's work to the publishing world and offers exercises, such as clustering, random writing, character writing/enhancing tips and plot development tips, to perform in a writers group.
I am excited to meet again as a group and solidify plans for taking this group to the next level. Wish me luck with it!