Attendance: Milton, Sylvia, Jim, Rose. Apologies: Ann, Nic

Fun Palace: Milton explained more about the Fun Palace event on 5th October. Idea’s so far:

• Recruitment of new members
• Readings/performances
• Playlets
  • Get the audience to participate
• Writing tasks:
  • Add a 100 word paragraph to build a story
  • Write a story in 15 minutes
• Display some of our stories and poems

What is needed is who wants to join in, what they want to do, how long they need and what times will they be at the event. Please reply here or email Milton so a program for the day can be created.

Sylvia’s idea of printing the program to hand out so people knew when to pop back was a good one.

Library closure: The Library will be closed for two weeks, 31st August to 14th September (see full details here) and so we will have to find an alternative venue for our 3rd September meeting. The Gateway and Fairfield & Howley Community Centre were suggested. Milton will try and organise this.

Readings:

• Rose read her story ‘Reparation” from the task set for the last meeting but had no time to read
• Milton’s daughter is getting married on 31st August and he read his ‘Father of the bride’ speech set as a fairy tail, happy to have the opportunity to practice it
• Sylvia was inspired from the last meeting’s contributions from Ann and Milton to put pen to paper of her experience in meeting Princess Anne whilst working for Scope in 1972 (then known as the Spastics Society). Her story “My Fifteen Minutes of Fame” was backed up with a 37 year-old edition of the Society’s news letter which covered the special event with the young Sylvia making into one of the photographs.
• Jim read his excellent poem ‘Maggie and Joe’ which he originally performed at the Lowry Theatre in 2003 with Joan Collins sat in the audience.
• Rose asked for advice on setting out a script having written two Acts of a new play. Everyone agreed that she was on the right track and insisted on preforming it. It was great fun and all agreed that we should perform it at the Fun Palace with hopefully the audience taking over the characters for a subsequent Act.

Political Correctness: An interesting discussion of ‘political correctness’ through the ages finished off yet another enjoyable morning with the Wonky Writers.

Task for the next meeting: Write a piece of dialogue – I’ll publish a separate post to explain further.

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Attendance:

• Wendy Molineux – Strategic Library Manager (Chair)
• Matthew – LiveWire Community Librarian
• Brian – Wire Writers & Wonky Writers
• John – Wire Writers and Stockton Heath Writing Group**
• Carol – Wire Writers and Stockton Heath Writing Group
• Mike – Stockton Heath Writing Group
• Liz – Stockton Heath Writing Group
• Milton – Wonky Writers
• Jim – Wonky Writers

**John was the initiator of this first meeting and it was agreed that he would be Wendy’s main point of contact

Introductions were made and John distributed a objectives and ideas print-out for discussion, which was appreciated by the chair

Wendy summarised the changes being made as part of the reorganisation at the end of August including:

• The library will be closed for two weeks, 31st August to 14th September
• Bringing together the museum and the library including alignment of opening hours
• New layout of the library
• Increasing opportunity for family time by opening on Sat 10am-4pm and Sun 10am-3pm
• Widening the offering to schools and opening for corporate events resulting in the library being closed to the public on Mondays and Tuesdays
• Community groups will continue to be welcomed on Mondays and Tuesdays although specific space cannot be guaranteed. Gaining access for these groups is still being discussed and Wendy will advise those in attendance when a plan has been finalised.

Wendy confirmed that there would be opportunities for the groups to display and sell works at the library. A merchandise cabinet is planned, prices need to be agreed but the Orford cabinet charges £5.00 a week to hire and 10% of sales going to LiveWire. Those with published work showed a positive interest in this.

Wendy confirmed that budgets were unfortunately not available to pay for published work to be added to their stock. However, donations of work would be greatly appreciated and it’s very possible a separate lending area for local authors would be created.

Wendy advised the meeting that a ‘Friends of Warrington Library’ was being set up by Janice (who last year retired from the Local history section)

Wendy was interested in hearing from any poets who would like to get involved in events. There is a poetry group who have been meeting on the first Friday of the month, 7-9pm for around 15 years and a poetry event is being organised on Saturday 14th September 11am – 1pm. Please let Wendy or Milton know if your interested in reading at the event. Everyone is, of course, welcome to come along and listen.

There was a great positive enthusiasm from all the writing groups and LiveWire to collaborate in planned events and for the writing groups to approach the library with ideas for events. If proposed events were tied into the library’s event-initiatives, that would be a great plus. To this end, Wendy will email the attendees the current initiatives. Other planned events:

• Saturday 5th Oct: Fun Palace. Local community groups and talent show casing their skills with demonstrations, talks and workshops. Wonky Writers confirmed that they will be there and there was a positive desire for the other groups to join in.
• Saturday 9th November: Medieval and Viking Day
• Future plan for a Warrington Literary Festival. Wendy is working on getting ideas and building an outline plan for such a festival. She is shortly to meet with Liverpool library services to discuss their successful festival. There will obviously be great opportunities for the writing groups to participate in this.

Milton suggested that LiveWire, through Wendy should be aware of the groups enthusiasm to join in with events and invite us to be involved if appropriate. He was confident that the groups could come up with specifically appropriate stories for events such as the Medieval and Viking Day.

Wendy offered to look into a single poster advertising the various writing groups.

Although a date for a next meeting was not agreed, there was consensus that a regular meeting of this group, perhaps quarterly, would be beneficial. This will be reviewed after the dust of the reorganisation has settled.

Meeting closed

Note: If you have ideas on collaboration with the other writing groups, the library and/or the community, please feel free to add a comment here. Ideas for the Fun Palace also appreciated.

Attendance: Milton, Ann (part), Collin, Sylvia, Jim, Rose, Brian

We arrived on Tuesday to find Wire Writers halfway through their meeting. Wire Writers meet the first Tuesday of the month 10-12noon. It was good to meet the four who were there: Brian (our Brian), Carol, John and Fiona. It was agreed that meeting together was a positive experience and everyone was happy for the two groups to come together for the joint hour 11-12noon when our Tuesday coincides with theirs. This will happen on 3rd Sept and 1st Oct. A note will be made on the events page if its going to be a part shared meeting.

After listening to a couple of the Wire Writer’s work the following were read by the Wonky Writers:

• Milton: His reading/performance of the first part of his new story ‘Frank’. Brian commented on how much his story telling ability was improving.
• Jim: ‘Unlucky for Some’ Great story with typical Jim wit
• Sylvia: ‘Powerless II (Sharon’s Story)’ This was a continuation of last week’s Powerless trilogy part I that was enjoyed so much, she re-read it for those who missed it
• Ann: ‘God Save the Queen’ (work in progress) a powerful story of friendship and family, inspired by how much the Queen’s coronation was still a vivid memory for her.

Milton told the group how much he enjoyed the Stealing Thunder story telling event with amazing story tellers, great fun and a lot learnt including that he had a lot to learn.

Nic had asked, via Milton, about adult writing classes at Priestly. A number of the group had been on such courses and all found them extremely helpful and enjoyable. Brian felt that the quality of the lecturer played a big part in it’s benefit. The last, and excellent lecturer at Priestly had moved on so he couldn’t comment on the new set up. Overall conclusion…. go for it Nic!

Milton briefed everyone on the meeting he had with Wendy Molineux. It was agreed that we should participation in the Library’s ‘Fun Palace’ day on 5th October.

There is to be a meeting tomorrow, 7th Aug, to look at how all the writing groups within the borough can collaborate together, along with Live Wire Libraries, for the benefit of each other and the community. Milton and hopefully Jim will attend for us, Brian will be there on behalf of Wire Writers.

On Monday 29th July I had a meeting to follow up discussions on the impact of the library reorganisation with Wendy and the Head Assistant Librarian of Warrington, . Unfortunately Ann and Brian were unable to make it so it was just the three of us.

The great news is that given the nature and benefit of our group Live Wire Warrington are happy for us to continue to meet as we do now, free of charge. They will always find space for us but, as is now, a specific space cannot be guaranteed as Corporate and school bookings will take priority. Access will have to be by knocking on the library door but we can review key access if this becomes problematic.

• Wendy also invited us to participate in their Fun Palace weekend in October
• They have my email address to add to their database for future Library initiatives
• They were given all our details, including our website address and have already added us to their own website!

I’ll give more details at the next meeting

Attendance: Milton (part), Ann (part), Collin, Sylvia, Jim, Rose, Brian

Good meeting with everyone joining in with their ‘setting the scene’ task set at the last meeting, great to see the commitment.

Ann updated the meeting on progress with discussions on the reorganisation of the library. They can make a room available on Tuesdays when the Library will only be open to private groups, mainly school parties, however this will be £16 per hour and it has been made clear that this is not viable for our group. A Monday reading group was also represented at the last meeting with the Library and after over 30 years they feel that this will be the end for them.

The library management have agreed to consider this feedback and update us at the next meeting on Monday 29th July. It does seem though that the Library’s plans are a foregone conclusion. There was agreement that for the established group, Tuesdays are convenient and we should continue our push for continuation of free access.

Brian continued his book extracts into Chapter 2

Agreed that the task for the next meeting will be to bring the ‘scene setting’ and ‘describing a character’ tasks together into one piece, this may be by using one or both pieces of the previous tasks or a completely new piece.

The group is really becoming well established and with the great mix of age and experience we’re living up to our name. It was agreed to re-connect with the original ‘Read Now Write Now’ course attendants to let them know and hopefully increase our numbers.

From Rose:

The Royal Court in Liverpool have two writing workshops coming up, 24th September and 19th November, cost £5.

Stage Write is a programme that has been set up to support new theatre writing.Submissions are invited on a rolling basis with no deadlines and no fees. They are interested in plots, outlines and full scripts

These can be submitted complete or just a couple of scenes.

Interested, contact: stagewrite@royalcourtliverpool.com

Apologies for the late write up and hence the brevity:

Attendance: Milton (part), Ann, Collin, Sylvia, Jim, Rose, Brian, Allan

• Stories and passages were shared on the theme of ‘Character’
• Ann shared the news there was a proposal, from September, to close the library on Monday and Tuesday for private groups but open on Sundays. There will be meetings to review the plans and it’s hoped that representatives from Wonky Writers will be able to attend. The Warrington Guardian’s related article can be found here
• Ann highlighted the monthly short story feature in Prima magazine which pays £100 for those published.
• Theme for next week ‘Setting the Scene’

Apologies received from Alan, Nic and Collin. So just four of us, Milton, Sylvia, Brian and Jim.

Noted that we may have low numbers over the summer holidays so maybe we should check who’s available for the following meeting

There was a problem in finding suitable space as the computer room was being used and people sitting at the desk for the first hour. Apparently the library staff were unaware that we had a booking. Milton to email Anne

Milton gave feedback on the talk given by the author Edward Docx in Bramhall

Sylvia shared her short story about the last leaf on the tree as part of an interesting discussion on political correctness and stereotyping in our writing.

Brian read his rewritten part of his book where the lovers were shot on the bridge in ‘snipers alley’, very moving.

Brian shared his short stories published in a booklet raising money for the Warrington homeless charity, Room at the Inn. They were very poetic. Brian also brought a number of writing books with tasks that we could try

Milton read the first page of “When Harry Met Pippa” Milton wants to use this true story to practice building characters.

Brian had trouble downloading shared stories on his phone. He’ll try his PC and let Milton know. Jim would prefer to have important blog content emailed to him. Milton to do this for Jim.

Sylvia and Milton are going to te Stockton Heath Festival story telling event, Milton hopes to have the opportunity to talk.

Agreed that we would try and bring in a short piece next week on describing a character. To focus the mind the suggestion was an elderly relative.

Mary A Gorman says: June 17, 2019 at 9:26 am Edit

Hi all thought this may be of interest to some of you
How To Write A Book In An Hour with prize-winning author EDWARD DOCX
Tickets – £12 (includes a copy of Ed’s latest novel Let Go My Hand)
Date: Friday 21st June Time: 7:30pm
Venue: Simply Books, Bramhall, Cheshire
Info:
Do you have a story you would like to tell? Do you have lots of good ideas that you would like to craft into something more substantial? Join us for an hour of insight, advice and practical tips from prize-winning author Ed Docx.
Ed has written four novels and is a winner of The Geoffrey Faber prize. He reviews fiction for The Guardian and has been teaching the Guardian masterclass for fiction for the last seven years. So why not come along and get some practical advice and inspiration? Best case, turns out you’re the next JK Rowling. Worst case you’ve had an interesting evening with fellow book lovers with some fascinating insights into the world of creative writing!