JANUARY 19TH, 2022

 Sarasota Writers Group

Our meeting began a six-thirty pm after a lively networking period. Our fearless leader Rod DiGruttolo was unavoidably absent and Ernie Ovitz filled in.

Thirteen members were present and eleven wanted to read, so we began with first on the sign-in sheet, Bill Elam, reading from his Old Man stories. Bill says he thinks he needs one or two more chapters to finish this long-time work in progress. Bill has a great story going and we hope he gets there.

Linda Grischy and her husband have wealth of experience in the property rental business and she has written a book to offer words of wisdom to prospective landlords. She read from her chapter describing the risks associated with tenants with pets. While she was quick to explain that there are many good tenants that have pets, those that are irresponsible can be a costly nightmare for property owners. Her writing was well done and informative.

Bruce Haedrich read an essay titled The Gift. In it he shared his recollections of a gift from his mother, a framed print of Rudyard Kipling’s poem If-. He brought his treasure and let us all see the framed work, one he had taken with him throughout life.

John Heacon read a short work on the relationship between fathers and sons. A lively discussion followed.

Ian Schagen read from his science fiction piece. His protagonist Andraus is drawn to a hidden world where strange beings reveal his destiny.

James Kelly continued with his story of Army life in the Old West. Joshua graduates from West Point while his father looks on.

Peter Frickel penned a fun piece My Neighbors Cat he followed with one humbly titled Me: his thoughts and reflections on a train trip to Paris and his lovely companion who greats him there. As he has done so many times before, Peter set the literary standard in our group.

After a break we continued are readings with Don Westerfield sharing two of his poems: The Human Race and The Road We Travel; wisdom from the man from Indiana we all enjoyed.

Anne Moore passed on her opportunity to read, but shared her appreciation for our writers. Her research project is underway looking to capture the story of women reaching their seventieth year.

Dennis Cathcart has been working on his memoir and the story of his life’s adventures finding reptiles and rare plants from around the world. He wants his readers to understand that his book is a whole lot more than one about snakes. We couldn’t agree more after hearing many of Dennis’ adventure stories. Tonight he read his preface titled About this Book.

Richard Cope read another of his tales of Toby the hound dog from his fictional Bean County, Tennessee. He began by reminding us that this coming Sunday, January 23, is National Pie Day. We should have known what to expect, there was a pie contest going on in Bean County. All was going well until Toby showed up. What a hoot! The group encouraged Richard to publish his Toby stories.

The discussion turned to marketing and Bill Elam shared his experience creating and marketing “targeted” print images to professionals through their associations. His point was that we as authors can do the same if our goal is making money from our writing. A lively discussion followed. Susan Haley was on the list to read next, but she said she was enjoying the marketing discussion too much, and so the discussion continued until nine pm when the meeting adjourned.

Susan Haley is on our list to read first at our next meeting.

For the group,

Ernie Ovitz