“There is something magic about early darkness. The day has not ended yet and still there are headlights and streetlights and even some holiday lights starting to spring alive. It makes me feel all twinkly inside.”
Our Last Meeting of 2020– Saturday, November 21
Our Featured Speaker this month will be Laura Ritz of the Durango Wordsmith. Laura will be addressing SEO strategies for the Writer, and will cover:
-Three basic elements of an SEO strategy
-How Google views your webpages
-How to conduct SEO key phrase research
-How to craft landing pages and blogs that Google loves
If you’re like me (and I know I am) you’ll want to tune in on 21st, 9AM and learn a few things.
Roundtables Return
The Roundtables will be returning in November. Be sure to update to the latest version of Zoom to allow yourself to navigate between roundtables on your own.
To update type zoom.us/download in your browser and hit enter. After that you are ready to go.
Good information from our friends at Mountain & Plains
Mountains & Plains has wrapped up its 2020https://zoom.us/download Fallcon and is already its 2021 event for Oct 6-9 at Renaissance Denver Stapleton.
Also, MPIBA is letting CIPA members that the 31st Annual Reading the West Books Awards is now open now through January 15, 2021 for your submission. There have been two new categories added: Poetry and Debut Adult Fiction.
To learn more or enter: https://www.mountainsplains.org/reading-the-west-nominations
Wondering How to Start that Next Book
Here’s a trick I have recently learned and have been using to complete Draft 3 of current novel-in-progress. It is Jenny Nash’s Inside Outline, and I find it quite helpful.
First plan your by writing brief synopses of its “Bridge” scenes. Bridge scenes are the main turning point scenes of your novel. If you think of a suspension bridge, these are the supports that read of the bridge hangs from.
Start with the Critical seven to eight scenes of your novel. Start with the first and ask yourself 1) What is the scene’s action (what’s happening on the Outside) and 2) why does it matter (what’s happening inside your character).
Then write Because of that…
And repeat the process, writing the outside action and inside emotion for the next bridge scene.
Here’s an example. Opening scene: Pretty Priscilla receives a telegram. She has inherited a million dollars from a distant relative in Cambridge, MA and only needs to travel to Cambridge to claim it (Outside Action-her reading, discussing, and gushing about the telegram). The only catch is she needs to travel alone (Internal emotion: she’s a bit scared of going to meet strangers, even if they are family.
2nd Scene: Priscilla arrives at Logan Airport but no one comes to meet her as she was promised. Until a child shows up and says “You’re to come with me.” (Outside). Priscilla is a bit apprehensive of the wan, sickly child who dresses like a street waif. How could he be anyone who might lead her to one million bucks (Inside).
Once the Bridge scenes are completed, then fill in the gaps using the same method only focusing on what becomes the opening scene and the 2nd Bridge scene, etc, etc.
The great thing about this tool is you can use on as wide or granular level as you would like. When I am stuck within a scene asking myself how I want it to unfold, I keep it mapping it asking Here’s what happened and because of that here’s what should logically happen next.
Try it. Let me know if you’d like CIPA to dig into the Inside Outline method at a future CIPA meeting.
Have a Writeous holiday season,
Jim Ringel
President