Writer Crews

I went to a Larry Brooks seminar at the Willamette Writers Conference. He was really good at explaining "pantsers", those of us who sit down to write without an outline and just go for it (Organic Writing)- as oppossed to the mega planners that have every plot point outlined before they write a thing. I was a panstser. My characters came to me in a dream, I began to write the scene I imagined then went back to write the beginning and middle. Problem was, I had eye color changes for my main character by mid-book, then I had to figure out what color I really really wanted, and go do a "Find" for every color and word 'eye' - which wasted too much of my valueable writing time. Then of course, as a pantser - if I have a better idea - I change as I go and then have to sift through 300 pages to make sure everything else still flows. Much harder to do all of this 'editing' as a pantser. Larry helped me move to be a pantser in the draft, or a synopsi...

Wasted away in California for the summer, dried out my Portland skin. Oh, yes, and had my 20 year High School Reunion... that was more fun than I had ever imagined it could be. We had a very rare class, we all got along. Small town. The Willamette Writer's Conference was the best place to go as an aspiring writer. I met tons of author's, beginning like myself, and some well-known author's as well, along with editor's, agents, screenwriters... what an inspiring group to feed off of. How great to have a nice conversation with Hallie Ephron over breakfast before realizing that I was out of my league and shouldn't borrow her cloth napkin! She was SO nice. And then I met many odd one's in the group too - they were fun to hear pitch. I kept hearing the same theme as I heard when I began teaching, "It's a lot of work and you have to love it." Just passing the bar after the conference ended, I would pick up on different conversations as I passed tables...