National Novel Writing Month – 50,000 words in 30 days (picture of a table at Milk Wood by Lizzie Gudkov)
NANOWRIMO AT MILK WOOD
We are excited to announce that we’ll be hosting a selection of online workshops again this year. Click on the links below to participate at the specific time. These workshops are held in Second Life®.
All scheduled events take place online at the Milk Wood Writing Group area (unless otherwise stated) or in the writing room at Book Island (Sundays at 12 noon PT). All are welcome to join us.
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Writing Workshops & Write-Ins
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What’s NaNoWriMo and how do I join?
Hosted by Harriet Gausman
Tuesday 29th October, 2019
8am PT / 11am ET / 3pm GMT
Want to know what all this NaNoWriMo nonsense is? Well, join us at 8am and we’ll run through the details and provide you with some great resources to make the challenge easier. We’ll share some plot storyboard and character development resources in readiness for November, and we’ll begin to plot in a timed writing session.
About Harri
In 2007, Harri conceded her élan vital to pixels and created the atmospheric Milk Wood, inspired by the Dylan Thomas radio drama, Under Milk Wood. Over the years, the sim has become a literary home to many artists and continues to offer a range of writing and reading events, providing opportunities for writers to cultivate their craft, develop literary poise, and establish a strong artistic voice. Harri is experienced at planning and hosting online events, and applies a unique approach to promoting and supporting writers. She is a NaNoWriMo veteran.
Click here to be taken to the online event.
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Huck’s Cube of NaNo – this year with added Brexit
Hosted by Huckleberry Hax
Thursday 31st October, 2019
1pm PT / 4pm ET / 8pm GMT
It’s National Novel Writing Month again! Prepare yourself for pep talks! If there’s one thing aspiring novelists can rely on in the month of November (besides sleep deprivation and bleeding fingertips) it’s other writers delivering their ‘top tips’ for getting 50,000 words written in the space of 30 days. Huckleberry Hax has absolutely no intention of deviating from this formula (chiefly because it makes him feel for an hour like a real, grown-up writer), and will be once again delivering his ‘Cube of Nano’ talk at Milk Wood as novelists assume the crouch position, ready for the starter’s gun. Why ‘cube’? Because he has six tips, and six without the framework of a cool geometric shape sounds like it really ought to be edited down to five – BUT WE DON’T EDIT DURING NANOWRIMO!
Join us for an hour in voice on 31st October at 1pm SLT. Please come voice-enabled so you can hear Huck talk. Every person who types the line ‘When is it starting?’ five minutes into the talk *will* be given lines to write.
About Huck
Huckleberry Hax writes virtual reality novels, many of which are set in Second Life® (the best known of which is ‘AFK’). He has completed NaNoWriMo eight times.
Click here to be taken to the online event.
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NaNoWriMo Kick-Off Party & Halloween Hunt
Hosted by Harriet Gausman and DJ Grease Coakes
Treats donated by BeeBee Bekkers and Raina Anatra
Thursday 31st October, 2019
2pm PT / 5pm ET / 9pm GMT
A chance for you to meet your fellow Wrimos, pick up the resource box and titler, chat about your NaNoWriMo ideas, and dance to Grease’s 80s groove. Our dress theme this year is ‘Wicked Fairy Tales’, so be creative. We’ll be looking for originality and flair. Best outfit wins a prize of 2,000 Lindens and a month’s free stall rental.
The Halloween Hunt follows the party, so get your goodie bags ready.
Event held online at the Fiesta Bar.
About Grease
Grease has DJed for the Ark and AX, and many SLB parties. They’re currently working on the Summer of Trance furry story.
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Mastering MS Word for Novel Writers: Building Your Manuscript in MS Word
Hosted by BeeBee Bekkers
Friday 1st November, 2019
8am PT / 11am ET / 3pm GMT
Frustrated with MS Word? Peace is possible! Learn how to create custom templates and paragraph styles that you will use over and over again, as well as tips that will let you take control of your growing manuscript.
About BeeBee
Over a long career in business communications, BeeBee used MS Word to produce clean, highly adaptable documents for publishers for both print and digital publication.
Click here to be taken to the online event.
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World-Building 101
Hosted by Doyle Slen
Friday 1st November, 2019
10am PT / 1pm ET / 5pm GMT
World-building can be a nerve-wracking exercise. Cultures of the current era, ruins of bygone times and characters swirl together to make a stinking peat bog of your mind. How do you keep everything from boiling over like some Shakespearean witch’s cauldron?
Take a deep breath and sip that brew slowly. Mind the eyeball floating to the side. World-building is fun and can be profitable if you’ve a mind to go in that direction. Join Doyle for World-Building 101. Bring your own black cats and broomsticks.
About Doyle
Would-be novelist, with somewhere over one million words scribbled down in several as yet unpublished, or even unedited novels. Too busy writing to do that edit and rewrite stuff. Began building a world in 1983 as needed for a tabletop RPG game. Started writing everything down after finding his way into Second Life® in 2011. Found his way to Milk Wood in 2013 and has made it his writing home ever since.
Click here to be taken to the online event.
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Poetry for Novelists
Hosted by Zoetrope Ocelot
Monday 4th November, 2019
8am PT / 11am ET / 4pm GMT
Sprints are good training practice for distance runners. Poems are good for novelists.
The Poetry for Novelists workshop will provide you with an assortment of poetry exercises. Playing with poetry can give you unexpected insights and inspirations, and even provide you with some material to use directly in your novel.
Join us at 8am on November 4 for this workshop that’s like literary cross-training to help you win your novel marathon.
About Zoe
Zoetrope Ocelot is a whimsical being who has suffered greatly and survived to fling nonsense poetry in the faces of evildoers. They are now afraid: very afraid. While continuing to write poetry, Zoe is currently hard at work on a second novel: working title, Crime and Pun. (Her first novel was devoured by worms in the compost bin.)
Click here to be taken to the online event.
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The Art of Annoying Librarians: Research for Novelists
Hosted by Finn Bookmite
Wednesday 6th November, 2019
8am PT / 11am ET / 4pm GMT
What goes into researching an historical novel? How do you find out about all those annoying corners of life not covered by the textbooks? Is the internet to be trusted? When did people start wearing underpants? Is research more fun than anything else? Join Finn Bookmite at 8am to discuss the perils and pitfalls of writing historical novels.
About Finn
Finn Bookmite is in RL Fiona Forsyth, author of a series set in first century BCE Rome. The first novel “Rome’s End” has just been published. In RL Fiona spent 25 years teaching Latin and Greek at a boys’ British public school, so now is especially enjoying researching stuff because it’s fun, as opposed to “it’s on the exam syllabus”. Ancient Rome has always been an interest, mainly because the Romans were so fascinatingly horrible.
Click here to be taken to the online event.
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The Short Story Game
Hosted by Emz Maizie
Thursday 7th November, 2019
8am PT / 11am ET / 4pm GMT
How to sub, where to sub, what to expect, and how to track those short gems you’ve been cultivating.
About Emz
Emerian Rich (Emz Mazie) is a writer, artist, voice actress, speaker, and editor. She writes the Night’s Knights vampire series, is the horror host for the internationally renowned podcast HorrorAddicts.net, and Publisher at HorrorAddicts.net Press. She also writes romance and is Editorial Director for SEARCH Magazine. You can find out more about her at emzbox.com.
Click here to be taken to the online event.
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Vision Pages for Writers: Journal your writing dreams to life
Hosted by Raina Anatra
Friday 8th November, 2019
8am PT / 11am ET / 4pm GMT
As a writer, you’re already skilled at using your words to reach others, but what if you could use your writing to help yourself?
What if you could improve your writing process and enjoy writing a lot more?
What if you could zoom ahead with your writing projects with greater ease?
What if you could do all this in just a few minutes a day?
Writing vision pages can help you do all of this and more!
Join us to learn more about writing vision pages, a simple, fun journaling practice that helps you manifest your writing dreams using the power of your imagination!
About Raina
Raina Anatra (aka Barbara Jacksha) is the author/creator of the Vision Pages series, which includes “Vision Pages for Creative Writers with Daring Dreams: a vision journal for imagining your dreams to life.” Her fiction, nonfiction and poetry have appeared in a variety of publications, including Smokelong Quarterly, Beloit Fiction Journal, The Summerset Review, Per Contra, Mad Hatter’s Review, and the W.W. Norton anthology Flash Fiction Forward. Barbara’s work has received multiple nominations for the Pushcart Prize. She was also a co-founder/co-editor of the literary journal Cezanne’s Carrot and an editor at the online journal flashquake.
Click here to be taken to the online event.
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Constructing Dialogue
Hosted by Ercila Robbins
Saturday 9th November, 2019
8am PT / 11am ET / 4pm GMT
Some of the discussion points:
• Rules versus Guidelines.
• Placement: When to use the best lines.
• Purpose: What I really meant to say was…. expositionary, advances a plot, develops a character, foreshadows an event, creates an emotion, sets a tone.
• Style: On sounding natural and authentic. Colloquialisms, idioms, accents, clichés, “foreign” words.
• Subtext: What your character says versus what your character means.
• Lying: The big, the little, the half-truth. Creating tension and mystery.
• Playing Chess: Dialogue as a means of establishing character relationships. Mind games. Banter. Attempts at dominance. Power plays.
• Authenticity: How to sound real without being boring.
• Ums, errrrrrs, and other interruptions.
• Telephone calls.
About Ercila
Retired criminal attorney and author of five crime novels – and more in the works. Ercila is also a former journalist and newspaper editor, and a published poet. She is a mother, grandmother, and veteran.
Click here to be taken to the online event.
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Descriptor Overflow, and Reining It In
Hosted by Luna Branwen
Monday 11th November, 2019
8am PT / 11am ET / 4pm GMT
• Would descriptors be poetic if a rhythm they did bring, and
were tightened up and bundled with colored ribbon and white string?
• Giving consideration to a free-flowing way to choose, and select, and utilize
the words that best describe a character to bring him, or her, to life.
• Giving thought to examples of overkill, and of keeping it simple.
• Giving free rein to intuition, and then to reining it in.
About Luna
Luna Branwen is a life-long, avid reader and writer; a poetry enthusiast, a lover of language, of words, and of story! With a background in humanities and anthropology, and a student of creative writing, she finds that Second Life® has provided mirrors, windows, and doors for exploring imagination and story, and for taking poetry fully to heart and rejoicing in it!
She is currently working on a book of fiction, to which she refers as a storybook.
Click here to be taken to the online event.
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Worlds within Worlds – A Constructor’s Guide
Hosted by Nathaniel Ballard
Tuesday 12th November, 2019
8am PT / 11am ET / 4pm GMT
World building – it’s not just for the likes of Middle Earth or a Galaxy far, far away. Even your cosy mystery in lower Manhattan is going to need some places to happen. And, your collapse of the Galactic Empire is going to need, well, a galaxy to collapse in. It can be a daunting prospect, but it needn’t be. You just need to determine the scope by looking at your story (or stories) and deciding what it needs. Come along and hear my thoughts and experiences on the subject.
About Nathaniel
Nathaniel Ballard has been occupying various fictional worlds in his head for as long as he can remember, but the doctor assures him it isn’t life-threatening. From table-top RPG games to various Second Life® sims; from very short stories scribbled down in the space of a 15 minute Dash to complex tales of magic and rivalries in faerie, full of characters only marginally doing his bidding, he has had to construct places for this to happen and sometimes, even enjoys it.
Click here to be taken to the online event.
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Point of View
Hosted by Aoife Lorefield
Thursday 14th November, 2019
8am PT / 11am ET / 4pm GMT
Aoife will revisit Point of View, a topic she struggled with in her novel and enjoys exploring. What is PoV anyway and why does it matter? Can’t we just write our story? It turns out PoV is an important part of the story! There are multiple options and pitfalls. Come learn a few!
About Aoife
Aoife is a writer and educator who has published essays, poems, articles, and a novel. She has more novels in the works and hopes to make significant progress on one of them this year.
Click here to be taken to the online event.
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Breaking through the Block
Hosted by Rayne Bowdit
Friday 15th November, 2019
8am PT / 11am ET / 4pm GMT
Rayne will lead the discussion on the often feared (but never fatal) Writer’s Block and how we can overcome it. The workshop will be followed by a ten-minute writing sprint.
Some of the discussion points:
• What is Block?
• Plans and how they can go awry
• Pantsers and Planners
Techniques to overcome Block:
• Making time and guarding it like a bulldog
• Sound tracks
• Change of scene
• Working with groups
• Talking it through
• Cleansing the palate
About Rayne
Rayne Bowdit has been a RL writer for over 4 years. She has self-published 30 books in a variety of genres. Better known for her romance fiction, most of her books have reached the number one slot on I-tunes and other sellers. She and her partner, Rennyparish Resident, run their own writer’s group at Omega and have been impressed with the amazing writers they have met and watched grow.
Click here to be taken to the online event.
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Characters: What are they like!
Hosted by Colin Bell
Tuesday 19th November, 2019
8am PT / 11am ET / 4pm GMT
Who are your characters? Have you met them? Would you recognise them if you saw them in the street? If so, can you let the reader in on the secret? Come along and try some writing exercises and make friends or enemies with your creations. Hope to see you there.
About Colin
Colin Bell was born in a Franciscan convent in Surrey but grew up in Sussex, UK. Everything he’s done; he did for the first time in Brighton.
His poetry collection Remembering Blue was published in 2019 by Ward Wood Publishing.
His two novels are set in Brighton:
Stephen Dearsley’s Summer of Love (Ward Wood Publishing, 2013) long-listed for the Polari Prize 2014.
Blue Notes, Still Frames, (Ward Wood Publishing, 2016),
Formerly a producer-director of arts documentaries and then Executive Producer, Music and Arts, he made arts programmes for ITV, BBC, Channel Four, and for broadcasters in the USA (WNET and Disney), in Japan (NHK) and Germany (WDR). His television credits include Celebration, God Bless America, My Generation, Menuhin’s Children and It Was Twenty Years Ago Today. He has been nominated for two Royal Television Society awards,
His poetry has been published in the UK and the USA by Cinnamon Press, Soaring Penguin Press, Muse-Pie Press, Bittersweet, Kind of A Hurricane Press and The Blotter. He has been nominated in the USA for the 2016 and 2019 Pushcart Prize. The American publisher, Musepie Press will feature him as its new Featured International Poet in 2020. Many of his Fibonacci poems have been published in The Fib Review and have been set to music by American composer, Tim Risher, in a song cycle for tenor and piano, Fibonacci Poems (2017).
Click here to be taken to the online event.
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Say what?: Dialogue Basics
Hosted by Keykey Underwood
Thursday 21st November, 2019
8am PT / 11am ET / 4pm GMT
Say what? A quick course on dialogue basics. Learn to use dialogue to reveal character, develop relationships and to find meaning in the silence between the lines. It’s not what you say, but how you say it.
About Keykey
Keykey Underwood has been a member of the Second Life® writing community for twelve years. Her alter ego, Patricia Averbach, is the former director of The Chautauqua Writers Center in Chautauqua, New York. Her debut novel, Painting Bridges, (Bottom Dog Press, 2013) was praised by Michelle Ross, book critic for the Cleveland Plain Dealer, as “an introspective, intelligent and moving novel.” Her poetry chapbook, Missing Persons, (Ward Wood Publishing, 2013) was cited by Times of London Literary Supplement (November, 2014) as one of the best small collections of the year. Her second novel, Resurrecting Rain, is scheduled for released by Golden Antelope Press February, 2020.
Click here to be taken to the online event.
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From MS Word to World – getting your manuscript ready for digital publishing
Hosted by BeeBee Bekkers
Friday 29th November, 2019
8am PT / 11am ET / 4pm GMT
What you don’t see can hurt you – and your MS Word manuscript is full of things you can’t see but which will cause problems – even fatal problems – when you attempt to convert your file to ebook format. Learn how to make your file squeaky clean.
About BeeBee
Over a long career in business communications, BeeBee used MS Word to produce clean, highly adaptable documents for publishers for both print and digital publication.
Click here to be taken to the online event.
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Write-ins
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Monday – Sunday at 8am PT / 11am ET / 4pm GMT. Additional sprint at Book Island every Sunday at 12 noon PT.
Every Monday – Friday at 6am PT / 9am ET / 2pm GMT.
The session begins with a prompt, and a timer is set for fifteen or thirty minutes. Participants then write feverishly for the allotted time, using the word (or picture) as inspiration. The key is to disengage your inner editor and write freely. As well as being useful for sketching out notes and scenes before November, and for kick-starting your writing sessions during the month, these sprints are a fun way to increase your word count. For those attending the 6am sessions, there will also be an opportunity for you to receive a brief critique from fellow writers. Sessions are held throughout November at Milk Wood (unless otherwise stated).
Click here to be taken to the online event.
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Word Scrimmage
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Random word wars held during November. Most battles begin on the hour and last for 30 minutes. Look out for the start and end notices from Milk Wood Wrimos. Feel free to start your own scrimmage by posting an alert in group chat, or hitting the Dash Bell (found on the hill behind the writing camp) to alert others on the sim that a battle is about to commence.
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Check out our website for articles from published authors, and pep talks from previous NaNoWriMo winners: http://www.virtualwriters.org
