Writers' Circle
Over the weekend I attended my first of the 31 annual Southern Appalachian Writers Cooperative meetings at the Highlander Center in Newmarket, TN.
It is always a little awkward at first, going into the midst of a group that have a long history together with each other, and a history of only minutes with the new guy on first arrival. But the estrangment lasted maybe a half hour, and if it is any sign of how things went, I stayed up til midnight both nights, not wanting to miss any of the conversation, BS, music or general swarping.
The center of the center is the center of the circle, around which some 30 rocking chairs house anybody that wants to share, lie, pontificate or read their poetry or other writing. No signup sheet, no preferential treatment, no applause, and constructive criticism if requested.
The group, as seems common, was dominated by poets. Even so, my little poetoid essays were well received, and I found some kindred tree-hugging spirits among the group.
Had a chance to talk with lots of folks about what I have written and hope to write. One future endeavor in the near term will be to make revisions to SRH (kind readers, please send typos and other bloopers you run across ASAP!) and prepare for second-edition books from an alternate source than the offset printing of the first run.
I'll be researching LightningSource to digitally print the next books, knowing there will be some concessions in the appearance of the books (tolerable and minor, I'm hoping) but with the advantages of my not having to deal with a half-room full of books, not having to hand deliver them to bookshelves in stores, and especially to the distribution avenues that will open up with a contract with LS.
I also talked with a few folks about the possibility of color plates in books, including the idea of doing a children's nature book that would include photos of the various insects, birds, salamanders and such with the take-home lessons of nature fact, land ethic, stewardship and knowing one's place in the world. Hmmm. Something to think about.
I've hastily put up a gallery of a few SAWC images and will be adding captions over the coming couple of days. I didn't have much success using the Powershot indoors, my fault, not the camera's.