Meeting May 26. 2019

Members made us aware of two websites where one can receive free writing courses: www.futurelearn.com and www.coursera.org.

Diane will be reading at the Orangeville Public Library's W.O.W. Storytelling series on Monday, June 17th at 1:00pm.

Writing Prompts

Island Adventures

1.      A medieval monk is making his way to an uncharted island that is rumored to harbour small people. The sailors who tell the story of the Island of the Fair Folk give warning that the ships that approach the island past the sentinel stones will be swallowed up in a fog and never return. The monk has convinced his superiors that he should go to minister to these small people and that it’s likely they are only short of stature and not fair folk at all. What he finds is beyond anything he ever imagined.

2.      A young couple is setting out to live their dream of sailing around the world, when a fierce storm strikes and beaches them on a small deserted island. While waiting for a rescue, they experience an unusual earthquake that makes everything appear as if it’s made of rubber. They find themselves cast into a different time when a merchant ship comes to rescue them.  

3.      A single professional woman is invited to a party by one of the company’s clients. The multi-billionaire owns an island off the coast of Cuba and is having the party to celebrate his recent victory of a hostile takeover of one of his rival’s companies. While attending the party, she discovers that the takeover was more hostile than she thought and that the client counted victory too soon.

4.      A band of pirates fleeing a fleet of the King’s ships come upon a small island hidden in the bay of a remote land. Thinking to wait out the ships until they pass, the pirates conceal their ship behind the island and make camp among the unusual trees, where there are a number of exotic looking fruits. Low on supplies and unable to go out to fish, the pirates chance eating the fruits and find themselves transformed.

5.      A group of novice ghost hunters seeking to establish themselves as serious professionals charter a boat to a small island in the Mediterranean Sea that was used at various times as an asylum, a prison and a quarantine colony for the Bubonic Plague. Rumours from the locals say the island is haunted by malicious spirits and has been abandoned for over a hundred years. No one has attempted to approach the island since the priests deemed it a gateway to Hell and forbid anyone in the neighbouring area to set foot on it lest they be damned. Lured by the prospect of fame and fortune, the ghost hunters ignore the warnings and find more than just spirits inhabiting the island.

OR

Use some of the elements of the above island stories to create your own Island Adventure!

Medieval monk/Priests

Ship/boat

Storm

Party/Celebration

Pirates/Sailors

Rivals 

Cartels

Secret/Hidden                        

Fairies

Time travel

Merchants

Fame/Fortune

Magical Plants   

Gateway

Colony

Ghosts/Spirits

Next Meeting is Sunday, June 9th, 1:30pm

Orangeville Public Library

Patricia will be leading

W.O.W. - Words the Orangeville Way, December 2, 2017

On Saturday, December 2nd, 2017, The Orangeville Public Library in partnership with The Headwaters Writers' Guild and local independent book store BookLore, held the third annual W.O.W. celebrating award winning authors Nicolas Billon and Michael Redhill.

Harry Posner, Dufferin County's first Poet Laureate and member of the Headwaters Writer's Guild, hosted the event with a special introduction by HWG member and USA Today bestselling author Diane Bator. Diane spoke about her experience with the Headwaters Writers' Guild and how the group has helped her to publish several novels. She went on to introduce our two guest authors Nicolas Billon and Michael Redhill. A panel discussion then took place moderated by Harry Posner followed by an audience Q&A.

Nicholas Billon, Harry Posner, Michael Redhill

On Finding Inspiration

Nicolas Billon: Reading. A question from something I have read.

Michael Redhill: My muse is spending time in a room and just waiting until something catches.

Writing Process

N.B.: I Write from 9-6. I try not to write outside these hours but sometimes the brain doesn't turn off. I don't always do an outline.

M.R.: Writing process consists of peaks and valleys. I respond when it is flowing in the right direction. Writing accrues in layers. In comparison to sculpting - Michelangelo chipped away at the rock until David appeared.

Advice for Beginning Authors

M.R.: Seek out a local writing group like the Headwaters Writers' Guild.

N.B.: Your mother is a good person to sell your writing to. She will always read it. She will always buy it. Have patience. Everyone's first draft is shit. You will be writing and rewriting.

On Books & Bookstores being killed by E-books

M.R.: I think they are bouncing back now. There is a lot of pleasure to be had by the physical object. I'm not that worried.

N.B.: I'm not that worried either. We've been talking about the death of books for about a decade.

M.R.: There are more people reading poetry more than ever.

Speaking About Their Books

Nicolas Billon: Butcher is currently in development for a future film. Can't say much without giving anything away.

The language spoken in Butcher is Levinian which does not exist. In Greek tragedies violence never occurs on stage. In order to hide the violence when someone is describing the violence he needed to use a language no one can understand.

The conflict is invented though the Balkan Wars and Rwanda Genocide are alluded to.

Themes: Revenge, justice and forgiveness.

"You can have justice or you can have peace but you can't have both." - Martin Luther King, Jr.

Butcher seeks out whether that quote is true. Revenge is easy to understand. We have all felt it. Justice is more abstract. Your identity can be tied up in an emotion or a drive. The idea of identity and complexity of idea is woven throughout the play.

I cannot predict an audience and their reaction. If the audience walks away with questions I think that is a good thing.

Harry Posner: When you are writing a play do you think along the lines that it would be turned into a film?

N.B.: No. I feel if a play is adapted into a film I feel it has failed. Rewriting for a film is beginning from scratch.

Nicolas Billon went on to read from "Greenland" from the Fault Lines series.

Harry Posner to Michael Redhill: What does the Giller mean for a writer? (Michael Redhill having very recently won the 2017 Soctiabank Giller prize).

M.R.: I don't know yet. It was only 2 weeks ago. It doesn't seem real yet. I was stunned when my name was called. It was weird.

Harry Posner asked Michael Redhill to discuss the winning book "Bellevue Square".

M.R.: A woman hears she has a doppelganger hanging around Toronto's Kensington Market, a place of many sub-cultures. (On where the idea came from): I just sat in the park watching the people and wondered what it would be like for me to see "me" walk into the park. The book is about a woman who walks out and sees someone sucking up her reality.

Harry Posner: What was your process?

M.R.: I don't work with outlines. I would be stymied by sticking to the path. I wasn't sure where this book was going to end up. I knew there had to be confrontation between these two characters.

Harry: Did you know it would affect the reader?

M.R.: No. The original draft was 60 pages. I cut it down to 30.

Harry:  The book moves around between multiple genres.

M.R.: Keeping the reader wrong-footed was what I had in mind.

Harry: What was the most challenging aspect of writing the book?

M.R.: I started writing it in 2010. I wrote a book I wanted to read. I wanted it to be strange and difficult. This is the first book in a triptic. The next book is called "Modern Ghosts".

Michael Redhill went on to read from "Modern Ghosts".

Audience Question: Did you know when you were writing that you were writing a triptic?

N.B.: No.

M.R.: I wrote the first one, put it in a drawer. While writing the second one I heard the first one calling me.

~~~

BookLore had the authors' books on hand for purchase and the authors took the time to meet and sign books.

The Headwaters Writers' Guild and M.J. Moores had a table set up of their books for sale.

M.J. Moores; Judy Zarowny, Patricia Gallant, Harry Posner, Diane Bator,

Sonja Wolter, Clare McCarthy representing The Headwaters Writers' Guild.

Diane Bator (HWG), Darla Fraser (Chief Librarian, Orangeville Public Library),

Michael Redhill, Harry Posner, Nicolas Billon, and Lauren Tilly (Program & Research Coordinator, Orangeville Public Library)

A huge crowd was on hand.

Another successful author event held by The Orangeville Public Library. The Headwaters Writers' Guild was honoured to be a part of it and look forward to next year's event.