This past Saturday I learned a lot about POV from the speaker at my writing group. But not the POV you’re thinking about…
Not only was Josh Berk the author of one YA mystery, The Dark Days of Hamburger Halpin, and in the process of writing another one for 
release in 2012 but he seemed perfectly willing to answer any question we asked. Truthfully, the questions were a little slow coming at first since we were star struck by the idea of having this type of author in our midst. We have speakers each month and have had authors before but I’m pretty sure Josh was our first “published by Alfred A. Knopf which by the way is a New York publisher” as our guest. It’s tough to lure New York published authors to our group for several reasons:
- We’re located in a small, small, small town–not home to many authors.
- We’re not even in close proximity to a city full of authors we could convince to visit our town.
- None of our members have a circle of author friends they could convince to come visit us.
- Our speaker’s fee is small.
So the people who book our speakers(not me)have creatively found speakers close to home. Recently, we had a cop come speak to us about police procedure which was really fascinating for those of us interested in mystery writing. We’ve had copywriters, travel writers, magazine article writers, self-published authors, poets, and more. But now we had someone who had made it to a New York publishing house book contract, something many of us aspire to.
Photo by Olaf Starorypinski
Remember it’s only one person’s opinion.
That agent, editor, critic, reviewer…whoever it is and whatever they say, even though it may feel like a pronouncement from the “publishing industry” really it’s just one person’s opinion.
See. it’s all POV!
Later, that weekend I decided to follow Josh on Twitter and read an interesting comment of his the day before his talk with us:
“Tomorrow I’m giving a writing talk for grown-ups. I’ve done tons of talks to teens lately, but this one scares me. I’M AFRAID OF GROWN-UPS.”
See, it’s all POV.
Paperback: 310 pages (also available as Kindle)
perhaps the box is sitting on the attic stairs, the strands are in the living room waiting to be plugged in and ‘checked’ or maybe you already have a reluctant family member perched on a ladder stretching toward the eaves. Yes, the holidays have arrived. Some things about the holidays we don’t like but there are plenty of things to look forward to and savor when they arrive. Cup of Comfort is looking for your favorite holiday memories. Send essays celebrating any holiday from Thanksgiving through New Year’s.
Firehouse Food
book series about music(with CDs included) I just had to pass it along to you. 
group to perform at their best–NObody “sits on the bench.” Everyone has to pull their weight or the whole group suffers. Creativity, especially in jazz groups is developed, honed and embraced. Who couldn’t use more creativity in their workforce? Creativity is what makes the difference and gives any company the cutting edge.
only said one word: dog. But that was OK because boys don’t talk as much as girls…right? Wrong! At his two year check-up my son’s pediatrician made an appointment with him to see a speech specialist. Hearing loss? No. Autism? No. Instead he was diagnosed with a slippery sort of disorder that he seemed unable to overcome from the onset–apraxia. Apraxia means you can understand other people and even know what you want to say but when you form the words they don’t come out the way you plan. Different people react to this challenge in different ways. In my son’s case he made the decision to simply stop talking.