July Speaker Wrap-Up and Member News – This month’s speaker was Pamela Taylor from Texas who gave us two workshops. One about DIY editing and the other was a great group exercise called Authenticity vs. Creativity in Contemporary and Historical Settings. The first training session went over some of the more common problem areas that writers have and should be award of to keep a look out for when they do their own editing. Giving a ‘clean’ manuscript over to a professional editor will save her/him time and you money.

The second workshop was an interactive class session where Pamela gave us a grid on various genres and we free-associated what we thought was important for writers in those storylines. Great exercise and very helpful for both newbies and those who have published a few stories already.

Quick Bio Information on Pamela
Like many authors, I started writing fiction just to find out if I could do it,” says award-winning author Pamela Taylor. She now has an 8-volume series to her credit with two more books under contract with her publisher. In addition to creating her own stories, she is a freelance editor with experience in multiple fiction genres. “I can’t do horror,” she admits, but the titles in her portfolio include Romance, Fantasy, Women’s Fiction, Middle Grade, Suspense, Historical Fiction, and more.

Places to Connect with Pamela
https://pamela-taylor.com
https://editing4you.com
https://www.instagram.com/pjtauthor/

DIY Editing Part I: Cleaning up Your Manuscript Synopsis
Join author and editor Pamela Taylor to improve your skills for editing your own manuscript. Learn how to spot common pitfalls and problem areas and what to do about them. You’ll also get access to some fun tutorials that will help you think like an editor and provide more examples to help you spot issues in your own work. Leave with new insight on how to clean up your own manuscript and save yourself some money when you engage your professional editor for that final copy edit.

Authenticity vs. Creativity in Contemporary and Historical Settings Synopsis
It’s fiction, after all, so we get to take some artistic liberties, right? Of course. But we can’t forget Oscar Wilde’s admonition: “Man can believe the impossible, but man can never believe the improbable.” Substitute “readers” in that quote and you’ve got the storyteller’s dilemma, whether your novel is set in modern times or in the past. In this workshop, we’ll explore the right balance between being slavishly authentic and creating the imagined world of your story.

MEMBERS ONLY WEBSITE

We are still developing the Members Only website. One of the items we will be adding to that space are workshop related materials that is giving to the participants. Most lecturers offer handouts, links to other material, etc. The webmistress will post the information for future reference for members who could not attend on that site.

We are also working on getting the video of each of the lectures edited and uploaded to the private section of our YouTube Channel. You will be able to view these from the Member’s only site as well.

Congratulations to our Members this Month

Leah Miles – 2023 Maggie Pre-Published Award Finalist in the Romantic Suspense Category for her story Father Identified

Kari Lemor – 2023 NERFA Winner in the Mainstream Romance category with her story Perfect Silence

Pegeen Brent – Honorable Mention in the Writers of the Future 2nd Quarter 2023 contest with her story: By Hands

The NERFA Winners Have Been Announced

We wanted to say a big “CONGRATULATIONS” to the winners of the National Excellence in Romance Fiction Award winners this year. You can find the list on our NERFA website – CLICK HERE – From the above paragraph you can see that we had a member of the First Coast Romance Writers as a winner. Whoo Hoo! And to all of those who participating in this year’s contest THANK YOU SO MUCH. Please try again next year.

If you have any questions about becoming a member of our group or any of the upcoming workshops please use our CONTACT US form and someone will get back to you as soon as possible.