Not that I didn’t love NaNoWriBlo, but this is my working appellation for our grand literary undertaking. All of us still in? Good. Let us get down to brass tacks.

Our main goal will be for us all to help each other complete a book. “Book” will mean something different to each of us, no doubt, but that’s kind of our organizing principle. In getting to that point, we’re going to write other things, and talk about writing, and edit each other’s writing, and so on, so that even if you don’t complete a book at the end of all this, you will hopefully have gotten a lot out of it (if nothing else, booze and good conversation). I think it will be important to have a core group that goes from start to finish, but I’m open to having people join or depart our little circle at any time.

The good residents of the Florida Flophouse (Heart of Dupont, Chez Bloge, Boundary Hall) have offered us the use of their home for our inaugural meeting, and for that I thank them. Please get in touch with Catherine or Kriston, or myself, if you need directions. Actually, I’ll probably send out an Evite once we’ve got things finalized. It seems that the evening of January 10th, a Wednesday, is agreeable, but feel free to let us know in the comments if that (or any of this) doesn’t work for you. Time is TBD, but I’m guessing we’ll start between 7 and 8. I’m going to provide beer for us all; if you’d like something else, feel free to bring it with you.

I’d like for everyone to bring some of their writing. I would prefer that we all complete the exercise I’m about to suggest, but if you can’t then it’s quite acceptable to bring something you’ve already got written. The exercise, courtesy of Mr. Capps, is this: Pick a font. Use the font for the title of the story, which should be formatted in that font. Then write a story “about” that font. No word or style requirements, but please have an excerpt of about 250 words or so ready to read aloud.

I don’t think we’ll meet more often than once per month, and since that’s going to limit our talking time together, I’m going to set up a group blog for the workshop. We’ll use that to post a sample each week on which we can all comment, along with other discussion topics, including matters of style and technique, authors and their works, and general strategies.

All right. That’s my plan; now let me know what you think. And I certainly hope you’re all as excited as I am. Excelsior.