Don't want to cover up any brand new posts so I'll put this here.

I have my own writing group for women, finally. Yeah! We're the North Shore Scribes. I have a room at the public library near where I work. First meeting in May. I have one member so far, but spoke to a woman who lives in my building and writes tonight. She may join. My press release is in one local paper in the calendar already (I only sent it out Friday). Another paper, a weekly that covers several communities, is putting it in their calendar section and the editor expressed an interest in doing a feature story about it. I only need a few more members and I have 4-5 weeks to find them.

Louisa, that is good news. Let us know if you get any results from the PR in the paper. I'd love to know.

Way to go, you move quickly and are very determined. I bet your group will be a great one!

Louisa!!! WOW!!! You had an idea and a wish..and boom..there you are!!! Great! Gives us all hope!!!

Please keep us informed!!!

That happened quickly. What an inspiration you are. Got an idea, shared it here at BWS, and you're up and running. Keep us posted.

Thanks. Yes, it did happen fast. At least it seems like it did, but I've been talking about it for a while now. I just finally acted on it. It should be a fun adventure.

That's great the way you accomplished this so readily. Funny, my group was called the "Devonshire Scribes" because I lived on Devonshire. Very good for you getting this together!

Congratulations Louisa! I love being in writing groups, they allow you to share your writings and help others.

I'm sure you'll find as many as you need. People are mostly shy about sharing their writing, but once they put themselves into a group, magic usually happens. Keep us posted.

Congrats on acting on soemthing you've been talking about for a long time. Maybe that will motivate some of us to do the same! Which gives me an idea for another topic.

Thank you all for your encouragement and support. Today I got an email from a group that meets on Thursday nights at the same library. I had originally inquired about this group and emailed them. I got no reply. I found out it is a fiction novel writing group and mostly men. Now, I hear from them. Anyway, a man emailed me apologizing for not seeing my email sooner and invited me to join or stop by tomorrow night to find out if their group would be beneficial to me or not. If I can, I think I will. Although I writer little fiction, it's a good chance to network and meet other local writers. According to this man, they are a small established group that has caught the attention of some nationally known authors. The curiosity is killing me. I'll let you know if I go.

I went to this group and was pleasantly surprised. There were 4 of them - 3 men, 1 woman. One of the men knew me from my newspaper writing days as he is one of the writers/reporters for that same paper. It's not just a fiction group. They all seem like pretty good writers and I think it is a nice group. Now, the question is, what do I do? I think I would like to join their group. I really cannot commit to a weekly meeting though, but they seem flexible. My own group is not actually off the ground yet. I don't know if I can handle two groups. I do still want to go forward with my own group. If that doesn't pan out, I can fall back on this one. I think I will try to go to this one in the meantime. The other group I was invited to join that is not that close to home is not up and running yet, but we are keeping in touch. Now I have groups everywhere.

Louisa, don't give up the plans for your group. You've already put in the time getting it off the ground so you should continue and see how it plays out.

As for the other group -- attend for now, if you like it. It's always good to see the particulars of what works in a writing group, and what you might prefer to do differently.

Good luck!

You're right Meredith. I put a lot into getting it going. It's not even really going yet. I am now starting to get responses to my press releases though. I do want to see where this will lead.

It's great to have choices. Well Louisa based on your eagerness to start/join a group, I have joined the Barnes and Noble weekly writing group. It helped me to know what my goal is: to create vignettes from the content of TEARs, and to create poems from the prose. It helps me to have a goal versus thinking, wha wha what will I write about? I know from experience that sometimes what you start writing about is not at all what you end up wriint about! This BN group has been burning my brain waves urging me to go for several YEARS and I am finally going to do it. No excuses. Thanks for the impetus! When we share here, we never know who else will be positively affected. Let us know what route you take.

That is so nice to hear Princess. I have missed a structured group so much. And yes, we often start out writing about one thing and end up doing something else entirely. Good luck with your new group too.

Congratulations Louisa. You know when it rains it pours. I agree that you should keep developing your group. It sometimes takes awhile but the rewards are so worth bringing others to the table to work together writing. The best part is as it grows you get to know the members individually and it helps form the basis of friendships and a group that works well together.

I'd also continue visiting the other group and see how the dynamics work there. You might get some great ideas for your group.

Good luck in all of it.

I have had several inquiries about my writing group. The press releases paid off. I have 3 definite and 4 possibilities who have not yet confirmed. If I get one or two of them, I would have a good group. May 17th is almost here. That is the first meeting. I'm leaving for vacation Saturday morning.

Have fun on your vacation Louisa. You lucky gal, you! And the writing group sounds like it is shaping up nicely. Do you have an agenda for the first meeting?

Looking forward to hearing about your trip...
Also, I think it's fantastic that you reached out to begin something you are intereseted in being involved with. You go girl.

Have a wonderful time Louisa on your vacation. The group will grow fast once word gets out by each of the members. I personally prefer not too large a group, have been in both kind and the smaller one is always more intense and far more informative. Just a thought!

Hi Everyone and thanks for your comments. I had a great vacation. The weather was awesome at night and hot during the day. I did go in the pool though, which was nice. the heat got to me a couple of times. But, they were filming something to do with Disney's High School Reunion and the part they were filming was of Nick LaShea. (I'm not sure if that's how you spell it.) I got some great shots of him. I'm like the paparazzi with my camera.

I was going for a small writing group, Chatty. But, I will take what I can get to start since some people may drop out. I had yet another inquiry when I got home today. She wants to join, but asked if she could do so for the next meeting. She will be away on the 17th. Another woman emailed me about a poetry reading at a local college in June that will have some fairly well-known poets (at least around here I guess) reading. she said I should go and bring my friends and that it will be a great opportunity to meet some other women writers. I will try to make that. This seems to be turning out to be a great idea.

JJ, I don't have an agenda yet, but I guess I'd better come up with one in a hurry. At first, I didn't give that much thought as I didn't know I would get such response. I am going to send out an email tomorrow to let the interested ones know I am back and see if I can find out for sure who/how many are really going to show up. I will see what kind of mix I have as to level of writers. I know I have one or two very experienced writers and some beginners. I think I will ask those who plan to attend the first meeting to bring something they have written. Maybe I will ask if they want to send it ahead of time if they want to. I may pass out some writing prompts for those who need an idea of what to writ about and would like to do "homework."

Any ideas?

Hmm...well you could begin with finding out what everyone's expectations are for the group. And then maybe they could define their own goals for their writing, the long term ones. An exercise could be for everyone to brainstorm on outlines for steps to meet the goals.

I would think the first meeting would be more about "meet and greet" and getting to know what everyone expects to gain from the group. Their thoughts could spark the theme or agenda for the next meeting. Just a thought....

Louisa what we do in our writing group EVERY week, is as many peoiple read 4 pages of their writing for critique. We are kind but honest and it is imperative that people keep the rule of 'kindness' to who ever is reading. People become very negative when people are cruel and unthinking and drop out of the group. If you want to read, you must supply the group with a cpy of the pages of your work to read along with you and mark if they choose to. These are all handed back to the reader when the critiquing is done. Our members sigh their sheets as well. Some people ask for character information, or story info as per fiction and nonfiction differences, The converasations are endless sometimes. Good luck and just have fun.

I also think you should see what the expectations are first. This will give you an idea of wehre to go next.

Have you Googled starting a writing critique group? HEre's a link to an article that might help:

http://www.mylot.com/nr/viewframe.aspx?i...l&type=Blog

I posted and lost it. Must have forgotten to hit the button. Anyway, thanks for your ideas. I will try that google site, Dotsie. I hadn't thought of that. The group I was in for over three years, did the reading and critiqueing and it was a weekly meeting. But, it was more of a class than a group. It was rather unique. I don't want this one to be a class. (We don't have a teacher anyway) I would like it to help and encourage newer writers and give more experienced ones a chance to share their writing experiences with each other and with the new writers. We can all learn from each other.

First meeting is Saturday. I am so excited. There will be at least 4 of us at the first meeting. I have two others who are joining next month as they couldn't make it this time. I also have two who might show up. One is the woman who was starting that other group that I almost joined. Hers never got off the ground and she plans to come to mine when she can. The other is my good friend and mentor who ran the class/group I was in and missed so much. She wants to come to my group sometime when she can. Most are experienced writers.

I have a brief agenda, sign-in sheet for email addresses, etc., a list of questions to help determine what the group wants to do for future meetings and a list of writing prompts for those who want it.

Should be fun. I didn't expect this much of a response. There could be walk-ins who just show up too. I do have a poster at the library and it has been in several newspapers.

Louisa, how fun to see your dream come to fruition. Keep us posted on how the first meeting goes.

It sounds like to me that you've covered your bases and are very organized. Way to go, and I'm like Dotsie in that I'll be anxious to hear how it goes. Break a leg!

Thanks. I'm up to five now if they all show up. I'll let you know how it goes.

Louisa, way to go! Keep us informed of how the meeting went.

Did I say I expected 4 people besides myself? 11 showed up! 7 that didn't let me know they were coming. I'm better at PR than I knew. The room only holds 8 comfortably around the table. We had to pull chairs in from the library. I was overwhelmed at the size of the group since I had no idea there would be that many people. It's great, but it was scary. One person kept sort of taking over and that was hard and she was loud. She wouldn't let me close the door so I was afraid we would get kicked out any minute. But, it's a diverse group with a lot of talented writers in it and some who know about publishing. I only hope we didn't scare the new writers away. Some want to write memoirs, some do creative fiction and two write horror even. Three have experience writing for newspapers. One is putting historical information together about the Italian families who came to the town after the war. I have to look for another place to hold the summer meetings since the library is closed on Saturdays. The age group is mixed as well. One woman is an artist and writes children's books that she also illustrates. So we are off and running. We made so much noise, we will probably be run out of town. I thought about having the summer meetings here on the patio, but I could have as many as 14 people at the next meeting. Not so sure I want to do that. I figured on only 5-7 people which would have been okay. Some will not continue, I'm sure, but I have a few more who want to join. Word gets around now, there could be more. I have a few other options to look into. I never imagined this much of a response. Picture 12 women in one tiny room. 12 women writers in one tiny room. I'm waiting for feedback from them via email, which I asked for.I hope I don't regret asking.

Louisa, this is so wonderful! All groups have people added and subtracted with time, but you're off to a great start! I'm so proud of you.

Sounds like a good mix for you and your group. I would definitely think about the "loud, look at me" person and give that some thought. All the more reason to have a structured, yet flexible meeting each time. What about announcing at the beginning of each meeting that you are all on a time limit and so it is imperative that you each get a turn to speak, keep to the agenda, and if you give the signal (holding up a wristwatch, or something) then that person needs to close what their saying so you can move on. Just a thought. I would nip that in the bud.

I also think that time will take care of the overflow. There are so many people who attach this romantic idea to being a writer but once they find out how much work it really is, they go, "Ah...I didn't sign up for all of this!" and they bow out...so I would bet your group dwindles a little...enough to make it comfortable for you.

Good job, Louisa!

So far, I've been getting great feedback. Those who have responded to my global "guideline" email, have thanked me for starting this group and want to return.

I had a conversation on the phone with the exuberant one. she called to encourage me to continue the group and to let me know she can make the next meeting. I did mention that we need a "little more order."

I have had one drop out already though. She is looking for a more serious writing group. It's fine because I think she could have been trouble. She talked about this group splitting into smaller groups, but said it would be tricky choosing who goes where. That I did nip in the bud. I told her that if people want to form their own groups that is fine, but it would be their choice, not mine and that someone in their group would have to plan the meetings, etc. and use a different name. I made it clear they would not be part of my group and that I will NOT run two groups. She then said I was right and that it would all work out. Next day, (after my global warning email , she quit. She did it nicely and thanked me, but she's out. But, I'm okay with it. I have a couple others who want to join. I also have someone from a newspaper who wants to do a feature on this. I'd love to have that, but the publicity could get me even MORE people. Who knew