GIVE THANKS TO THE MUSE

At Wednesday’s Meeting, Annette Wristen joined Jason, Lorelie, Jim, Ellie and me for a lively homage to The Muse. We welcome Annette to the group and hope she’s able to attend as often as possible. She says she likes to write fan fiction, which is fiction based on classic fiction that is no longer copyrighted.

Ellie was going to read us a 200 word piece from a prompt for a CBC contest about two people in an elevator that stops on the 32nd floor, and these two people don’t like each other. Unfortunately, Ellie forgot to bring her piece of writing. But she did read her poem “Not Under Yet” which is about a Grandfather telling us he needs to go and help his grandson, the son of divorced parents, who now owns land and has taken up farming. The voice in this poem definitely seemed to be an old timer who had things figured out.

Annette read next, a short story based on a dream she had that she may extend to become a novel. Called “A Taste Of Wormwood” it shows us a man who is a hired killer who loves the thrill of it and the shot glass he always keeps as a memento of each kill. Then he meets a beautiful woman he has an instant connection with and wants to see again. But the instructions for his next kill designate her as the victim and he is conflicted. At the end we only see her body floating in a pool while he goes for his victory drink, but we don’t know for sure that she is dead.

Jim read us Chapter 34 of “Coventry Ghosts”, Book II. Sara the kitten is doing research at the library and takes issue with the library’s ghost who tries to banish her. Instead she changes shape into a huge elephant and casts him up into space. While doing her research she is later ambushed by a number of Umbra ghosts. Trying to save herself, she creates a nova that becomes a black hole and sucks in the ghosts, but she’s sucked into Drakko, too, the unwilling victim of her own power.

Jason read to us something he had written for his online blog. The piece was “What Is A Lilita?” As I understand it, Lilitas are humanlike beings that eat human flesh and drink blood. The males prey on female humans and the female Lilitas prey on male humans. If they have intercourse with a human and produce offspring, the offspring will be a vampire. Good to know. Any further definition of race relationships is always helpful. 

Neither Lorelei nor I had any writing of our own to read. She did say she had read the book I had loaned to her, “How To Write Your Life Story” and got a lot of ideas out of it.

I handed out something I had copied from the book “How To Tell A Story”. It was a one paragraph explanation of story structure (plotting) that is universal for about 90% of stories read or films watched. It’s a nice little reminder of where to go when you are stuck after the opening chapters in your Great Canadian Novel. And I found it interesting when Jim told me that he found it amazing I wrote “Fire” as an engaging mystery that kept him turning pages without killing any characters.

I have spent a lot of time the past few weeks working on the Ram’s Head website, or rather collecting, editing and forwarding material to Sonny (my son) to update the site at www.ramsheadwriters.ca As he is very busy, I can’t say for sure when updates will be completed, but I’m sure he will get it done between being a busy husband, father and lieutenant colonel in the military. Unfortunately, he probably doesn’t have anyone he can delegate this task to, and he has never been around long enough to teach me how to do it. But then, it’s always good to have some reason for his mother to contact him, right?

And for those who were present at Wednesday’s Meeting, rest assured Honey has repaired the kitchen chair that broke. My hero!

Next Meeting will be Wednesday, October 16th at 7:00 p.m. here at my place. Really hope to see you then. In the meantime, have a Happy Thanksgiving everyone and don’t forget to thank The Muse, too!

LISA A. HATTON
Author
Published eBooks available at Kobo Books:
FIRE: http://kobobooks.com/search/search.html?q=9780991739615
LOVE FOUND: http://kobobooks.com/search/search.html?q=9780991739608