P.W.G Minutes of the Meeting on 17 September 2020

Venue: Neo’s Sports Bar, Peyia and Zoom

Present:

Jennie Rook Bob Barker Linda (Bob’s visiting guest) Richard Powell Mike White Derek Whittle Dee Leigh June Megennis

Apologies: Gina Angeletta, Gill Ainsworth, Caroline Harman Smith, Nikki Burrows, Yvonne Ackrill

Greetings Scribes,

As always, we hope that you and your closest are healthy and safe.

A good meeting to start the autumn term and we welcomed Linda, a visiting writer from UK who belongs to Bob’s UK writing group.

Readings:

June, who has had her manuscript printed and bound into a file, read her synopsis and her prologue. She found that she had them the opposite way around and Bob explained the differences between a synopsis and a prologue. Derek and Linda also gave June advice, Linda having also written a synopsis for her novel and had struggled with it. June will share what she has done with Bob and together they’ll aim to help with getting it ready for pitching to publishers.

Rick: read his published walking tour of the Peyia coast, in this month’s Cyprus Living (pages 14-15), with photos. He has been asked by the magazine to enter another piece to be published in the November issue. Well done Rick. It’s always a proud moment to see your words in print.

Rick also mentioned he had sent pitches to publishers with his Roman Roads walking book, but so far with no joy. Rick also told the group about a competition which he has entered. It is offering a prize of $500 for writing a query letter. https://www.queryletter.com/contest , the closing date has passed but it’s good fun and practice to try writing one. Best of luck Rick.

Derek: Based on the holiday’s homework image prompt of a stake and a hammer: The Boardroom – a story set in a corporate CEO’s office during a marketing meeting. A fine attempt at a difficult prompt.

Mike: Based on the holiday’s homework image prompt of a stake and a hammer: The Lump of Steak and a hammer – another humorous story from the pub. Well done Mike. He also read ‘Computer Illiterate Personal statement’ which he wrote after getting angry about the need to use a PC for more and more things in life. Social media being a definite bug bear for Mike. Ironically, Mike also introduced the group to his author platform, that his son had helped build during the holiday period. The link to the site is: http://saucyshortsandotherstories.co.uk/

The group encouraged Mike to put his short stories into a book.

Coffee Break

Readings:

Linda: Sapphire – a beautiful story of looking back over her married life while on an island visit to Crete with her husband, for their Sapphire (45th) wedding anniversary.

Dee: Based on a previous week’s homework prompt:– ‘Bleary-eyed, I went downstairs for breakfast, the house was empty, even the furniture had gone….’ – an unusually dark story from Dee from the eyes of a dead man.

Jennie ended the meeting by announcing that she will step down this week from organising the meetings, taking the minutes and posting to the PWG website and social media, each week as she will be travelling from time to time, busy with her own online business and is completing her children’s book series, part 1.

Jennie explained what was required for someone to stand in as regular chair of the meetings, that there was a need for someone to take the minutes and send to John who is happy to keep posting to the website and social media.

Dee Leigh stepped forward and is happy to be the person to take the minutes and send to John. Jennie will liaise with Dee and pass on all necessary details. Thank you Dee.

John also asked Jennie to take a vote on who was still willing to use Zoom, if we go into Lockdown again. Rick and Bob were the only two willing, Linda also showed an interest in joining on Zoom. We will take another vote next week when more members are present and where we will decide who will be the chair of the meetings in future.

Jennie thanked Bob Barker for his help and advice in keeping the group running during John’s departure and the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. I (Jennie) really hope we can all pull together to keep the group going. I know many of you will give your support and I thank you all in advance. Homework prompt:

Just as your flight takes off, you discover a shocking note under your seat.

Write a story in any genre using the above line as your prompt. You can take the ‘shocking note’ to be sinister, happy news, a mystery puzzle or whatever and wherever your mind takes you.

Have fun with it and try to keep as close to 500 words as you can.

For those attending the call or meeting, please send your piece to Jennie to upload to the PWG Zoom Group, or any other you would like feedback on.

Next meeting will be on: Thursday 24th September at Neo’s Sports Bar and on Zoom.

For those interested and want to know more about Zoom, please go here for details: https://zoom.us/meetings

For those interested in joining our PWG Online Skype group, please email us your skype name to add you to the group.

Thanks to all who attended. Stay healthy, safe and happy writing.