GSHW Blog

February 12th meeting of the Garden State Horror Writers: Creating Believable Characters

The GSHW monthly meeting will feature guest speaker author Jack Ketchum. Jack will speak on developing strong, believable and fleshed-out characters within the spatial confines of a short story.

The event takes place Saturday, February 12th at the East Brunswick Library, 2 Jean Walling Civic Center, East Brunswick, NJ 08816-3529. The business meeting starts at 11 am, followed by the workshop at noon.

Jack Ketchum is the author of eleven novels, including The Lost, The Girl Next Door, Red, and Offspring, all of which had been made into films. His short story The Box won a 1994 Bram Stoker Award from the HWA, his story Gone won again in 2000 — and in 2003 he won Stokers for both best collection for Peaceable Kingdom and best long fiction for Closing Time.

The GSHW is a multi-genre group catering to writers from all walks of life. The group has hosted presentations by authors such as Elizabeth Bear, Gregory Frost, and F. Paul Wilson. Membership is $35.00 per year. For information about the group call 732-276-7531 or visit www.gshw.net.

November  6th meeting of the Garden State Horror Writers: “Surviving the Revision Process” with W.H. Horner.

Editor, publisher and writer W.H. Horner will speak at the November 6th meeting of the Garden State Horror Writers on “Surviving the Revision Process.” There are two major pitfalls in the revision process: one can ignore this crucial step, believing that one’s words cannot be improved upon, or one can obsess over it and never complete the project at hand. As an editor and writing teacher, W. H. Horner has coached many authors and budding writers, helping them to produce initial drafts and then to go back over their work and polish it to the best of their ability. As an occasional writer, he has done the same with his own work.

Mr. Horner will share tips and strategies to help writers move beyond the mental blocks that hold them back from completing initial drafts, as well as ways to work with rough prose to produce publishable material. Anecdotes from his years of experience will illustrate those skill sets at
work.

The event takes place Saturday, November 6th at the East Brunswick Library, 12 Jean Walling Civic Center, East Brunswick, NJ 08816-3529. The business meeting starts at 11 am, followed by the talk at noon. Non-members welcome. Admission is free.

W. H. Horner is publisher and editor-in-chief of Fantasist Enterprises, an independent press specializing in illustrated fantasy and horror. His latest anthology is Blood & Devotion: Tales of Epic Fantasy. William is adjunct faculty with Seton Hill University’s MFA program in Writing Popular Fiction and with Wilmington University’s English department. He is also the founder and director of the First Writes, a writing group that meets in Wilmington, Delaware. For more about William, please visit www.whhorner.com, and to learn about Fantasist Enterprises, please go to www.fantasistent.com.

Ellen Datlow will speak at the October meeting of the Garden State Horror Writers on how to “Impress an Editor” and sell fiction in today’s volatile publishing industry.

Ms. Datlow, recently honored by the World Science Fiction Society with a Hugo award, has edited more than fifty anthologies of short fiction, and is co-editor of the long-running Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror series. Her latest anthology, Poe: 19 New Tales Inspired by Edgar Allan Poe, won the Shirley Jackson Award, and has been nominated for a World Fantasy Award. You can find out more about her books at her website, www.datlow.com.

The event takes place Saturday, October 9th at the East Brunswick Library, 12 Jean Walling Civic Center, East Brunswick, NJ 08816-3529. The business meeting starts at 11 am, followed by the talk at noon. Non-members welcome. Admission is free.

The GSHW is a multi-genre group catering to writers from all walks of life. The group has hosted presentations by authors such as Elizabeth Bear, Gregory Frost, and F. Paul Wilson. Membership is $35.00 per year. For information about the group call 732-276-7531 or visit www.gshw.net.

September 11th meeting of the Garden State Horror Writers

Danielle Ackley-McPhail, author and editor, will give a talk on the making of an anthology.

Award-winning author Danielle Ackley-McPhail has worked both sides of the publishing industry for over fifteen years. Her works include the urban fantasies, Yesterday’s Dreams, Tomorrow’s Memories, and The Halfling’s Court: A Bad-Ass Faerie Tale. She has edited the Bad-Ass Faeries anthology series, and Dragon’s Lure, and has contributed to numerous other anthologies and collections, including Dark Furies, Breach the Hull, So It Begins, Space Pirates, Barbarians at the Jumpgate, and New Blood. For more information, visit her website at http://www.sidhenadaire.com/index.htm.

The event takes place Saturday, September 11th at the East Brunswick Library, 2 Jean Walling Civic Center, East Brunswick, NJ 08816-3529. The business meeting starts at 11 am, followed by the workshop at noon. Non-members welcome. Admission is free.

The GSHW is a multi-genre group catering to writers from all walks of life. The group has hosted presentations by authors such as Elizabeth Bear, Gregory Frost, and F. Paul Wilson. Membership is $35.00 per year. For information about the group call 732-276-7531 or visit www.gshw.net.

July 10th meeting of the Garden State Horror Writers

The GSHW will be hosting a workshop for new and experienced writers “Preventing Writer’s Block - Simple Exercises to Keep Writing”, given by award-winning New Jersey writer, Mike Penncavage.

The event takes place Saturday, July 10th at the East Brunswick Library, 2 Jean Walling Civic Center, East Brunswick, NJ 08816-3529. The business meeting starts at 11 am, followed by the workshop at noon. All materials will be provided. Non-members welcome. Admission is free.

Michael Penncavage’s story, “The Cost of Doing Business” originally appeared in Thuglit, Issue 24 and won a 2008 Derringer Award for best mystery. He has been an Associate Editor for Space and Time Magazine as well as the Editor of the horror/suspense anthology, Tales From a Darker State. His stories have appeared in numerous magazines and anthologies from 3 different countries including Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine in the USA, Here and Now in England and Crime Factory in Australia. Mike is a member of The Mystery Writers of America, The Horror Writers of America, and The Garden State Horror Writers.

The GSHW is a multi-genre group catering to writers from all walks of life. The group has hosted presentations by authors such as Elizabeth Bear, Gregory Frost, and F. Paul Wilson. Membership is $35.00 per year. For information about the group call 732-276-7531 or visit www.gshw.net.

June 12th meeting of the Garden State Horror Writers

Neil Clarke, editor and publisher of Clarkesworld magazine, will give a talk entitled “E: The Inevitable Future of Genre Fiction”.

Clarkesworld is a monthly online magazine featuring fantasy and science fiction stories. Stories are collected into yearly athologies, which are available at the website: www.clarkesworldmagazine.com

The event takes place Saturday, June 12th at the East Brunswick Library, 12 Jean Walling Civic Center, East Brunswick, NJ 08816-3529. The business meeting starts at 11 am, followed by the talk at noon. Non-members welcome. Admission is free.

The GSHW is a multi-genre group catering to writers from all walks of life.  The group has hosted presentations by authors such as Elizabeth Bear, Gregory Frost, and F. Paul Wilson.  Membership is $35.00 per year.  For information about the group call 732-276-7531 or visit www.gshw.net.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

May 8th meeting of the Garden State Horror Writers

“Fantasy — How Subversive Can you Make It?” A talk by Hugo award-winning author John Grant.
John Grant is author of some seventy books, of which about twenty-five are fiction, including novels like The World, The Hundredfold Problem, The Far-Enough Window and most recently (2008) The Dragons of Manhattan and Leaving Fortusa. His book-length fiction Dragonhenge, illustrated by Bob Eggleton, was shortlisted for a Hugo Award in 2003; its successor was The Stardragons. His first story collection, Take No Prisoners, appeared in 2004. His anthology New Writings in the Fantastic was shortlisted for a British Fantasy Award. His novella The City in These Pages has recently appeared from PS Publishing.
As John Grant he has received two Hugo Awards, the World Fantasy Award, the Locus Award, and a number of other international literary awards. Under his real name, Paul Barnett, he has written a few books (like the space operas Strider’s Galaxy and Strider’s Universe) and for a number of years ran the world-famous fantasy-artbook imprint Paper Tiger, for this work earning a Chesley Award and a nomination for the World Fantasy Award. You can find out more at http://www.johngrantpaulbarnett.com/
The event takes place Saturday, May 8th at the East Brunswick Library, 12 Jean Walling Civic Center, East Brunswick, NJ 08816-3529. The business meeting starts at 11 am, followed by the talk at noon. Non-members welcome. Admission is free.

The GSHW is a multi-genre group catering to writers from all walks of life.  The group has hosted presentations by authors such as Elizabeth Bear, Gregory Frost, and F. Paul Wilson.  Membership is $35.00 per year.  For information about the group call 732-276-7531 or visit www.gshw.net.

“Writing a Story in Six Easy Pieces” workshop for new and experienced writers.

The GSHW will present a workshop run by Writers of the Future Award winning author Pat Lundrigan. The workshop will feature exercises and activities to turn an idea into a story in six easy steps.

Pat Lundrigan was the first place winner in the first quarter of the 2007 L. Ron Hubbard Writers of the Future contest, an international contest judged by professional writers. His story appeared in the Writers of the Future, Volume XXIV anthology, the showcase for the contest, with illustrations from winners of the Illustrators of the Future contest. In 2009, Pat won second place in the Jim Baen Memorial Writing Contest, sponsored by Baen Books and the National Space Society to honor the memory of editor and publisher Jim Baen.

The event takes place Saturday, April 10th at the East Brunswick Library, 12 Jean Walling Civic Center, East Brunswick, NJ 08816-3529. The business meeting starts at 11 am, followed by the workshop at noon. All materials will be provided. Non-members welcome. Admission is free.

The GSHW is a multi-genre group catering to writers from all walks of life.  The group has hosted presentations by authors such as Elizabeth Bear, Gregory Frost, and F. Paul Wilson.  Membership is $35.00 per year.  For information about the group call 732-276-7531 or visit www.gshw.net.

It Came From the Slush Pile! A Q&A session with best-selling anthology editor, John Joseph Adams At the EAST BRUNSWICK LIBRARY, 2 Jean Walling Civic Center, East Brunswick, NJ 08816 (tel: 732-390-6950).

John Joseph Adams is the editor of many bestselling anthologies, such as Wastelands, The Living Dead (a World Fantasy Award finalist), By Blood We Live, Federations, and The Improbable Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. Barnes & Noble.com named him ―the reigning king of the anthology world,‖ and his books have been named in numerous best of the year lists. He is also the fiction editor of the forthcoming science fiction magazine Lightspeed, and co-host of The Geek‘s Guide to the Galaxy podcast.

The events is scheduled to occur at the next Garden State Horror Writers meeting (OCT 10) located at  the East Brunswick Library, 12 Jean Walling Civic Center, East Brunswick, NJ 08816-3529. The business meeting starts at 11 am, followed by the guest speaker at noon. Non-members welcome. Admission is free.

The GSHW is a multi-genre writers group catering to the needs of writers from all walks of life. Recently, the group hosted presentations by authors such as Pat Lundrigan, Elizabeth Bear, Lawrence C. Connelly, and Robert Dunbar. Membership is $35.00 per year. For information about the group, email president@ghsw.net or visit www.gshw.net.

Writing the Short Story (Without Making Every Mistake There Is)

Dina A. Leacock, who writes under the name Diane Arrelle, has sold more than 100 short stories to anthologies and magazines. She has two published books, Just A Drop In The Cup, a collection of flash fiction and short-short stories and Elements Of The Short Story. She is proud to be a founding member as well as a past president of the Garden State Horror Writers as well as a past president of the Philadelphia Writers’ Conference. She lives on the edge of the Pine Barrens (home of the Jersey Devil) in South Jersey with her husband, two sons and cat.

Visit her website at: http://www.dinaleacock.com

 The events is scheduled to occur at the next Garden State Horror Writers meeting (January 9, 2010) located at  the East Brunswick Library, 12 Jean Walling Civic Center, East Brunswick, NJ 08816-3529. The business meeting starts at 11 am, followed by the guest speaker at noon. Non-members welcome. Admission is free.

The GSHW is a multi-genre writers group catering to the needs of writers from all walks of life. Recently, the group hosted presentations by authors such as Pat Lundrigan, Elizabeth Bear, Lawrence C. Connelly, and Robert Dunbar. Membership is $35.00 per year. For information about the group, call 908-528-3074 or visit www.gshw.net.