CONTENTS

Writers' Night In - Monday, September 20
The Upcoming Delegate Assembly
Why I Like Flash Fiction
Grants Available to Low-Income Writers
If You Missed "Stop the Rejections!" Watch It Here
Kudos
Spread Your News on the Update, Our Website, and Our Facebook Page!
Upcoming Events
WRITERS' NIGHT IN
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 20 @ 5:30-6:30 P.M.
VIA ZOOM

At some point over the last year and a half, you might have been brushing your teeth some morning and thought, “Sure wish I’d bought Zoom stock back in ’19.”

A company many of us had never heard of before lockdown became as much a part of our lives as electric scooters and gluten-free everything. Then for a moment it seemed we were about to turn off the screens and resume something like “normal” life, but the Delta variant said, “Not so fast, Bucky.”

So for now our “Writer’s Night In” will continue to be virtual. But on the plus side, that gives folks who don’t live in the Boston area a chance to participate. If you’re a member in Western Mass, or Maine or New Hampshire who’d like to come for a chat and chew please join us. Tell us about your new book, or that great classic film you just watched,
or how much you love (or don’t love) your editor.

Please feel free to invite writer friends who aren’t (yet) members of the Writers Union.

And if you’re coming from outside Boston, you don’t even have to hop into the car.

Heck…You don’t even have to wear pants…

To request a Zoom invite please click here or email Charles Coe.

Hope to (virtually) see you there.
Your NWU-Boston Steering Committee

Questions? Click here.
WHAT WE LEARNED ABOUT THE UPCOMING DELEGATE ASSEMBLY
by Barbara Beckwith


Our August all-member Zoom featured guest speaker NWU VP David Hill, who gave us a lively and informative overview of the Delegate Assembly, followed by an equally lively Q&A.
 
Our chapter’s four delegates will deliberate with those of 11 other chapters over a variety of issues, most crucially a review of our union’s disaffiliation with the UAW and new service agreement with the Graphic Communication Conference of the Teamsters Union.
 
Our elected delegates -- Jeanne Cosmos, John McDaid, Barbara Mende, and Willie Wideman Pleasants -- will participate in evaluating that agreement at the October 21-23 DA, and in deciding whether to continue with GCC or not.
 
David reported that the NWU has been weathering the pandemic, and is financially stable and actively advocating for writers’ rights. He praised our chapter for being consistently active and a model for other chapters.
 
Thanks to the meeting’s Zoom format, members from Maine and Rhode Island were able to participate. About 25% of Boston Chapter members live outside Massachusetts and another 50% live in Massachusetts but too far to easily attend in-person Boston/Cambridge meetings. We may be tired of zoom, but it allows ALL our members to join our events, including the DA, which all members can “attend” via zoom. Save the dates! We should have Zoom links in the next Update.
 
Thanks to Dave, who took time off from caring for his kids, and from promoting his new book: The Vapors: A Southern Family, the New York Mob, and the Rise and Fall of Hot Springs, America’s Forgotten Capital of Vice (Farrar, Straus & Giroux., 2020). Publishers Weekly gave it a starred review: “Expertly interweaving family memoir, Arkansas politics, and Mafia lore, Hill packs the story full of colorful characters and hair-raising events. This novelistic history hits the jackpot.”
WHY I LIKE FLASH FICTION
by Shannon O'Connor
What is flash fiction? It’s just what it sounds like: fiction under one thousand words. But how does a writer create a story with a beginning and a middle and an end in such a short space? I write flash fiction; I also write novels and poetry, but I like flash because it’s quick, and it fits into my busy life right now.
 
I don’t write as much poetry as I used to, because I find it tiresome. I don’t have time to sit down and write a novel since I work and I do other things. But I can write a flash fiction piece in a half an hour before work, or on the weekends. I can create a story between five hundred and a thousand words that is a whole world.
 
I usually write the piece, then I let it marinate for a few days. I let it sit, and see what I think of it later. Then I go back and trim the meat, cut out excess fat, and try to find the perfect word for every sentence. I find this difficult to do with longer fiction. When a piece is brief, there’s more room for sculpting and shaping.
 
Any story that’s long can be shorter. How many words does a writer need to use? Henry David Thoreau said, “Simplify, Simplify.” He wasn’t talking about flash fiction, but he had the right idea.

(Ed. note: See a link to a piece of Shannon's flash fiction under Kudos.)
GRANTS AVAILABLE TO LOW-INCOME WRITERS
TO ATTEND CONFERENCES OR WORKSHOPS
 
The Boston Chapter Steering Committee is offering $100 grants to up to five NWU members in good standing. These grants are available to those who face challenging financial circumstances and would like to attend a writing conference or workshop, or to take advantage of some other professional development opportunity.
 
If you would like to apply, or would like more information, please contact Steering Committee member Willie Wideman Pleasants.
IF YOU MISSED OUR ZOOM CONFERENCE
"STOP THE REJECTIONS!
LET SELF-PUBLISHING BE AN OPTION"
WATCH THE RECORDING
 
The July Zoom program (viewable in three 20-minute segments on youtube) was an unequivocal success - a great show with lots of hard facts. Co-Chair Jeanne Cosmos was impressed by “the tips, the experiences, the questions and commentary – and the terrific vibe."

Presenters Tim Sheard (Hard Ball Press), Ken Wachsberger (You've Got the Time: How to Write and Publish That Book in You), and Willie Wideman Pleasants (Authors Without Borders) consider self-publishing as a viable choice -- not just a fallback if you’re rejected by agents and publishers, but a way to control all aspects of the publishing process. Great suggestions for affordable editors (developmental or copyeditors), cover designers, printers, and ways to market your book -- and yourself as author -- before and after it comes out.
If you missed it or want to review it, you can do it here:

Advocating for the Environment: How to Gather Your Power and Take Action by SUSAN INCHES is now available at bookstores and online. It is published by North Atlantic Books and distributed by Penguin. Read more about it here.

Shannon O'Connor's flash fiction piece, "The Toilet in the Gare de Lyon, Paris," has been published in Oddball Magazine.

Please send any news of a publication, award, or writing-related appearance that has already happened to editor Barbara Mende. (A piece on your own blog or website doesn't qualify.) Send 50 words or less, plus your name and a link to the publication, event, or website where readers can find more info about you or the happening. Don't send notices of work that will be published in the future. Do send news of future events, but see the "Upcoming Events" block for that.
USE THE UPDATE. OUR WEBSITE, AND OUR FACEBOOK PAGE TO SPREAD YOUR NEWS

Are you speaking or reading from your work in the near future? Do you want to publicize an event that writers would be interested in zooming in to? Can you provide a service, such as editing or indexing or publicity, for your fellow union members? Do you just want to introduce yourself to the NWU membership?

Our Boston Chapter website, which you can reach at 
nwu.org/chapters/boston/ or www.nwuboston.org, is here for you to use. Not only that, but if you send us an announcement of a specific event by the second Monday of each month, we'll try to include it in these updates.

Please send us news of any upcoming events that you'd like us to publicize, along with Zoom links or PDF posters if you have them. If you'd like to promote your services, plug your latest book, tell us about something writing-related that happened to you, or post anything else you can think of, we'll try to give it a place on the website.

Be sure to like the NWUBoston Facebook page, and visit it often.

And we'd love to hear from you if you'd like to contribute to these updates. Do you have information or a viewpoint on some phase of writing or publishing - that you'd like to pass along? Do you have tips that you'd like to share with your fellow writers? Send them in! And don't forget, if you've published something or participated in an event or made an appearance, we'll post in under Kudos.

Send all your news for the Update and website to your webmaster.

SEND US NEWS OF YOUR UPCOMING READINGS, BOOK LAUNCHES, OR OTHER PUBLIC APPEARANCES. WE'LL TRY TO HELP YOU RAISE A CROWD.
Co-Chairs: Barbara Beckwith and Jeanne Cosmos
Editor and Webmaster: Barbara Mende