littlesmackerel

People who live in Melbourne will be able to attend an event on Monday 12th August, 6.30 pm at Readings Bookshop, Acland Street, St Kilda. I will be ‘in conversation’ with Peter Craven, discussing the writing of Lily Campbell’s Secret. Members of my writing group, Elwood Writers elwoodwriters.com  will be there too, to give insights into the way members of a writing group can support each other.

The Readings Carlton book launch

Elwood Writers meets together every second Tuesday and we have been doing this for over 10 years. Some keys to our success may be that the group is small: just four people — so there is always time to discuss everyone’s work. We work on somewhat different genres: short stories, memoir, poetry, and I focus on longer fiction. Our meetings run for about three hours with a formal agenda that also allows time for a bit of general chat. The formal agenda enables everyone to have some time devoted to their writing, which we usually circulate by email before the meeting. The agenda also ensures that we don’t overlook matters such as planning for events such as soirees or preparing material for our forthcoming anthology.

The group was invaluable as a support for me while I was writing Lily Campbell’s Secret. Everyone was intimately acquainted with the characters, they knew the general story line. I could try out ideas, always knowing that the advice I received was well informed.

We will discuss some of these things on Monday 12th August — if you live in Melbourne, I do hope you will be able to come.