Shush! You don’t want to disturb a writer at work do you, and incur their fury, wrath and ire Put those thesauri (thesauruses is also correct by the way) away, dear students, and work from your imaginations … This week, members of my writing club are heads down polishing their poetry and prose for submission to the first ever Writing Club Anthology.
Yikes, the deadline is fast approaching – deadlines make a whooshing noise as they go past, as Hitchhiker author Douglas Adams once quipped. This one is more of a whiz-banger.
So what’s this anthology all about?
It’s a professionally produced, smart looking PDF/ebook that could have YOUR writing in it. The chance to be included in this once-every-18-months anthology is a free bonus of joining my writing club.
Each writing club member will have their own mini-section within the anthology to showcase their work. Those writers who’ve been in the club for two years can submit up to 7,000 words, while new members get 2,000 words plus a bio, headshot and links.
You get lots of extra help from me while you get your submission ready all as part of the service.
The anthology will have two different formats:
- In the first stage, the anthology will be a free-to-download PDF which will be available on my website as well as to all subscribers to my mailing list. Any new subscribers will receive it automatically too. All writing club members will be able to freely disseminate it to their own lists and contacts.
- Later on, we are hoping to turn the anthology into a free ebook, which all club members will be responsible for helping to promote and disseminate.
Why do it?
The aim is to:
- showcase the best writing from the writing club since it was formed in July 2014
- give the new, aspiring and emerging writers in the club the chance to show their work to the world – in some cases, this means being published for the very first time (please send positive vibes, as this is truly a brave thing to do)
- encourage the writers to push through their very real fears – to take their writing out from the safety of the group and show it to the world
- encourage writers to professionalise by embarking on an exciting, sometimes rollercoaster ride during which they’ll learn lots of new skills
- have as many readers, writers, agents and publishers view the anthology as possible
- have fun as a group – something we do very well indeed
What do club members get out of it?
New, aspiring and emerging writers get to walk through all aspects of preparing work for publication under my guidance and with careful handholding. Benefits include learning how to:
- select your best pieces, including those that display your strengths as a writer and genre/s for which you want to be known (writing club members range from bloggers and memoirists to children’s story writers and radio scriptwriters)
- rewrite and redraft your writing from scratch (when writers really get to grips with rewriting rather than tinkering with their words, this can herald a big leap forwards in their work)
- edit and copy-edit your own writing
- give and receive feedback on pieces other writing club members have put forward for the anthology
- present and lay out your writing for publication (beginning writers often fail to pay attention to the punctillious bits, but publishers and competition judges will use every reason to reject)
- proofread your own work
- order your pieces in a pleasing way that also fits the demands of the publication
- write your own author biography and provide a headshot
- work to external writing deadlines
- promote and market books in which you appear – these days writers have to be their own publicists, so it’s great to embrace this early on in your career
- work as a group of writers with a common aim
All writers also can include their website details and social media links in the anthology, and those who have published their books while in the club can of course promote these.
Find out more about my writing club, including details of how to join.
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