FWA Aventura Writers Group

Our next meeting will be held at 2 p.m. on Saturday, January 13.

AGENDA:

1. Mini-workshop: From Self-Publishing to Publishing Success by Jeff Rivera.

Jeff Rivera, author of the forthcoming novel, FOREVER MY LADY went from Self-Published to Published when Warner Books purchased the rights to his novel. Mr. Rivera will discuss how to use self-publishing as a tool to landing a contract with a major publisher.

2. Status report: will discuss our work-in-progress, future plans, share our concerns and success stories.

3. Schedule readings for the next critique meeting: let me know if you want to present your work at the January 27th meeting

Questions? Concernns? Contact me at m_most@yahoo.com

Mary Mostsinsker

Happy Holidays!


Great news - begining January 2007, the Aventura Writers Group will meet twice a month on the second and forth Saturdays. The first meeting of the month will be a speaker/educational meeting. The second one will be a critique meeting. Both meetings will be held from 2 pm to 4 pm at North Miami Beach Library located on the corner of NE 164th Street & 16 Ave in North Miami Beach.

Here is our preliminary schedule for January and February:

January 13 & 27
February 10 & 24

This schedule was confirmed with the library, but they reserve the rights to change it. Keep checking this blog for any changes.

If you have a speaker in mind or want to make a presentation to the group on January 13 or February 10, please send me email with your or the speaker's name and a brief description of the presentation. Remember, our motto is "Writers help writers".

Re: critique meetings. Here is a proposed procedure (please feel free to send me your comments):

1. You must either send me email with your request or notify me at the speaker meeting that you want to present your Work-In-Progress (WIP) or manuscript at the next meeting.

2. If you want feedback on the entire manuscript:

- bring the five first pages and read it to the group
- based on the genre, someone will volunteer to critique it. You may either bring 2-3 copies with you or propose at the meeting how to pass the manuscript to the reviewer(s). Some people might prefer an electronic copy. Based on size of the manuscript, we will set up a timeframe for feedback. The author & reviewer(s) will decide how they will communicate.

I'll try to obtain a standard review form prior to January 27.

3. If you have WIP and want your peers feed back about a specific chapter, you will bring 10 or so copies and read it at the meeting and receive feedback right away.

This is very important that you notify me in advance that I could set up an appropriate schedule.

Feel free to contact me at m_most@yahoo.com before December 24th or after January 4th. I'll be spending Holidays and my son's birthday with his family on St Thomas, US Virgin Islands.

I hope you all'll have a wonderful and safe Holidays.

Mary

I'm very proud to have such a talented group. During the last two months, three of our members received the following awards:

David Pereda - 2006 Florida Writers Association Royal Palm Awards (2nd place) for his unpublished manuscript "Beyond Midnight in America"

Mary Greenwood - DIY (Do It Yourself) Book Award for her book "How to Negotiate Like A Pro"

Alan Grossman - 2006 St Louis Short Story Contest (quaterfinalist) for his short story "9/11 Lovers' Lament"

Please join me in congratulating them and wishing them the best. You may do it in person. Come and join our group at 2 pm on Saturday, December 9th at North Miami Beach Public Library, 1601 NE 164th St., NMB