November is National Novel Writing Month
Are you up for a writing challenge? The website http://www.nanowrimo.org/eng/whatisnano is promoting November as national novel writing month. That is… you write a 50,000 word novel between November 1st and November 30th! Sound impossible? They don’t expect quality, just quantity. Get the words, unedited and unpolished, on a page, 50,000 of them and submit. In 2009 165,000 people worldwide joined the challenge and 30,000 officially finished.
Check out the website. It’s not for everyone, but maybe this is the motivation you need to get started. Think about it for next year.
Congratulations to Robert Butkus and Gwen Enquist on the launch of their new books!
Robert Butkus’ book titled Godless Religion:Finding the Profound rests on experiences that we all have had, experiences that are profound and full of wonder and awe. Think of a stunningly beautiful sunset, hundreds of stars spread across endless space, the Big Bang beginning of the universe, a Beethoven symphony, facing the inevitability of one’s own death. Part 1 of the book Godless Religion maintains that profound experiences like these are holy enough to form the basis of a religion without a belief in god. Part 2 considers various ideas of an impersonal god, and argues that they too should be left aside while retaining this religion of the profound. It ends by pointing out that Richard Dawkins’ rejection of the word religion in his The God Delusion is flawed and that a godless religion is in fact possible. Part 3 offers a godless justification for morality based on the tendency of humans to cooperate and care for each other. The book ends with consoling thoughts about our dying in a godless universe.
Robert Butkus has a Ph. D. in philosophy and has taught at institutions across Canada from St. John’s in the east to Victoria in the west, Waterloo in the south and Prince George in the north, as well as in Beijing and Tokyo. After 20 years as a college administrator including brief assignments in Thailand, India and the Caribbean, he retired to the West Coast of Canada where he contemplates the ocean, snow-capped mountains, philosophy and religion. He also creates haiga. Godless Religion will be launched at the Powell River Public Library on November 25 at 7 pm, an evening of readings and refreshments. It is available at Breakwater Books.
Gwen Enquist’s new release, Beginnings, is a sequel in what is becoming the Bonnard family series. All the characters from Phone Calls After are back and caught up in the drama of contemporary life. Beginnings picks up the family’s life one year after the accident that killed Mathew. Beginnings looks at the challenges of a homeless family, tackles transformative issues and explores what it is that makes a family whole.
Gwen Enquist is a graduate of the University of Toronto and the University of British Columbia. She has retired from a 35 year career in nursing.
All titles are available at Breakwater Books and at egwen@shaw.ca. .
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Party Season is Here!
The Powell River Writers’ Conference invites all members and would-be writers to their Christmas party on Wednesday December 15 at the Blue Mountain club house at 6 pm. This is a pot-luck dinner with fun to follow. Each member is encouraged to bring a non-member guest who is, or might be, a budding writer. All members who pay their $10 2011 dues and sign up their guest have their name in a draw for an exciting prize.
The theme for games, food, prizes or dress-up if you want to is “Twelve Days of Christmas.” Confirm you’re attending then get in on the trivia for more great prizes. Call either Barb: 604-485-2732 or Donna: 604-487-9591 or email: prwriters@shaw.ca
Do you have a writer in your family who’s hard to buy for?
Then consider purchasing a spring 2011 conference package for a Christmas or birthday present. You will be giving the gift that keeps on giving for years to come. With his book Adventures in Solitude on the BC #1 list in the its first month out, Grant Lawrence has one of our presenters has much to share with us. Sylvia Taylor, will be teaching “The A-Z of Working With Agents and Editors” in one of the Master Classes. Anthony Dalton will also be part of the Master Class workshops, title TBA. A BC poet/TBA will complete the roster of outstanding teachers. The 8th annual conference promises to be bigger and better as it takes it to the next level.
Registration details online or call Barb for details: 604-485-2732
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Fall 2010 Writing Contest Winners!
The annual fall writing contest with the theme “Centennial” ended Nov.5/10. We are proud to announce first prize went to Gwen Thompson from Saanichton. Second prize was won by Heidi Sullivan of Powell River. Honourable mentions: Joan Mahaffy and Christa de Beaupre. Congratulations to the winners and all who participated. The winning entry is listed online under fall writing contest.
Stay tuned for a fun contest for the spring 2011 conference. You could win registration valued at $130.
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The CHPPPR Cometh
The Community Heritage Publishing Project Powell River will center around the acquisition of an Espresso Book Machine (EBM), also known as “an ATM for books.” CHPPPR plans to raise $150,000 to purchase the machine by the end of the school year.
The EBM manufactures quality trade paperbacks in a few minutes each, just like those in bookstores. The EBM makes two kinds: up to three million books from its own catalogue, or any book plugged into it in PDF, provided it has a b/w interior and does not exceed certain sizes.
When a book is bought from the EBM catalogue, the royalty and profit due the publisher and author is automatically tracked back to them by the EBM. When a book is published locally through the EBM, the EBM owner can give the publisher a wholesale price on a flat fee per book, eliminating—for the first time in history—the economics of scale for the publisher.
Local publishers can “permission” books through the EBM, connected to Ingram’s, the world’s biggest book distributor, thus achieving instant distribution wherever EBMs are located.
As the EBM proliferates around the world, both the need to warehouse and ship books, and the habit of printing more books than actually needed, will dwindle—the EBM takes a giant step towards a green publishing industry.
The difference between the cost of making a book on the EBM and the SRP (Suggested Retail Price) leaves enough room for a wholesale cost structure with levels to benefit non-profits, institutions, small presses and self-published entities.
For the first time, local writers, families and organisations will have access to publishing real books for just a few hundred dollars, rather than the thousands now required by other publishing and manufacturing methods.
Best of all? The EBM system protects writers’ and publishers’ rights and gives them better profits.
What does the EBM mean for Powell River?
- Powell River organizations will be able to record our history in the form of books that are never out of print.
Some out-of-print books of community importance can easily be re-published
Sliammon can capture its language and culture in print in a permanent form
Employment in writing, editing, and publishing will increase.
Institutions can publish their own journals and theses.
Organisations may be able to obtain more grants as they will be in a position to publish results in book form.
- Work will come in from a network of independent bookstores and publishers and institutions, as our EBM will be the only one within reasonable distance for some time—in this interval we will seize the opportunity to become a book town.
Shipping costs will shrink.
- People who now use Amazon and other online sources for books will search our EBM first.
Research materials will become more available and economical.
- Our Writers Conference, Youth Peace-Poetry Competition, Whoop Dee-Do and similar initiatives may become destination events.
Local bookstores will expand their inventory by 3 million books without spending a cent or wasting a tree.
Students will find new meaning in learning how to write, edit and publish. Establishing a book culture will engage the public with literature in new ways. Training in writing, publishing, and book manufacture can develop into programs at school and university.
What can CHPPPR do for Powell River?
- Bolster Powell River’s status as a cultural capital of Canada.
- Enhance Powell River’s attractiveness to families.
- Arouse interest in the local manufacture of specialty papers and cover stock.
- Strengthen the presence and voices of groups like Sliammon, our elders, francophones, and many others.
CHPPPR is already hard at work on Karen Southern’s massive three-volume history of heritage housing in Townsite. The Pack Press has produced one poetry book, glasstown, using an EBM and is about to publish a memoir, Ponderings, and a poetry collection, Parallel: forty-nine poets speak to Obama, by the same method, using an out-of-town EBM. Motley Crew House of Nanaimo has published several books on the EBM, generation of thistles, Bitters, and How to Keep a Human, on the machine. You can see the published books at Powell River’s local bookstores, and get an idea of how the EBM might work for your project.
Project Manager Eva van Loon will be seeking in earnest to raise the needed funds for our very own EBM beginning in January. At least initially, CHPPPR, hosted by the PR Educational Services Society, will be housed at Oceanview School. Many hands make light work: contact the Manager with your ideas, queries, or requests at mettalaw@gmail.com. Volunteers welcome to this exciting project!
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