Our treasurer, Rosie Baillie, provides this week’s write up from our last meeting.
The group began by discussing current opportunities for writing competitions and further learning opportunities. We heard about a new writing class available in Longforgan on Monday evenings, and reminded ourselves of The Law poetry competition, the Botanic Gardens writing project, New Writing Scotland submission deadline (end of September); and Scottish Book Trust’s ‘Next Chapter’ award for new writers over the age of 40 (deadline also end September).
Craig and Roddie confirmed that bids had been successfully submitted to the 2023 City of Culture process.
Members of the group were reminded to complete the writing questionnaire to enable Craig to add some more content to the website.
Then it was time to look at some writing!
First, we had a continuation of David C’s “You Told Me…” tale about a chance meeting in a graveyard of an ex-lover and the ex-lover’s son. The group had a lively discussion about how the work might go forward and talked through various narrator/viewpoint options.
Next was a return to Roddie’s mythical Icelandic saga. The group enjoyed this re-work of a short story they’d seen before and gave Roddie some excellent suggestions in relation to language and also the female character and viewpoint. As with the first time the descriptions of Iceland were wonderful and made us all want to visit there – although perhaps not in the context of the story itself – I won’t say any more – we wish Roddie luck with his competition entry with this story and you may see it in print sometime soon!
We then looked at a number of 50 word stories with potential for inclusion in our proposed “Fifty Shades of Tay” anthology. Rosie had provided three options, one in relation to a child’s first day at school, the second was a play on words inspired by the Don Michele restaurant; and the third was inspired by her recent experience of the 25 mile kilt walk from St Andrews to Monifieth. Rosie was grateful for the comments and suggestions and agreed to work on them some more.
The discussions also provoked conversation about what the criteria will be for the 50 shades pamphlet, both in terms of content and format. It was agreed to discuss this in more detail at our next meeting.
Craig and David C had also submitted a couple of 50 worders, Craig’s about the Dundonian obsession with weather watching; and David’s a Francophile take on McGonagall’s Silvery Tay. Both were very well received and definite includees for the anthology!
It was another enjoyable meeting with varied and encouraging discussion as always.