Program:

1. Introductions
2. Your Great News: Who queried? Got accepted? Published? Signed with an Agent?
3. Discussion: Seven Ways to Create a Killer Opening Line for Your Novel, by Brian A. Klems;
   https://www.writersdigest.com/online-editor/7-ways-to-create-a-killer-opening-line-for-your-novel; The First Five Lines, by Donald Maass; https://writerunboxed.com/2019/05/01/the-first-five-lines
4. Discussion: Writing Advice from Matt Stone & Trey Parker (re the lines in between)
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vGUNqq3jVLg
5. Discussion: Writing Closing Lines in Novels; https://www.novel-writing-help.com/writing-closing-lines.html; Three Tips on How to End a Story; https://blog.reedsy.com/how-to-end-a-story
6. Discussion: Examples of First Lines, Last Lines, and Lines In Between

Marketing:

Announcements:

Upcoming Events, Conferences and Workshops:

Is it about time for a Wordherders social?

Previous Meeting:

Last time, we had three outstanding items. First, I was trying to recall the murder mystery set in the south for Timothy Holland. It is Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, by John Berendt. Not, as was stuck in my head, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, by Mark Haddon.

Second, we discussed having Word read your work back to you as a way of proofing and to listen to sentence structure, but I couldn’t remember how to do it. Select the “Review” tab, and then “Read Aloud” in the Speech group on the ribbon. Voila!

Third, we discussed using the grammar checker in Word to estimate reading level, but again I couldn’t remember how. Select the “Review” tab, and “Check Document” under the Proofing Group on the ribbon. Word provides a pop-up box called “Readability Statistics” that gives you counts by words, characters, paragraphs, and sentences; averages of sentences per paragraph, words per sentence, and characters per word; and for readibility, Flesch Reading Ease, Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level, and % of passive sentences.

Next Meeting:

6/10/2019