BECOME A VIRTUAL TUTOR FOR CHILDREN IN FIRST, SECOND, AND THIRD GRADES
The Fort Bragg Unified School District invites all adults in our community to be virtual tutors for children in grades 1-3. To actively help our local teachers and families, use Google Meets to encourage a young child's reading skills. Sign up at the School District Office at 312 S. Lincoln. After free fingerprinting at the Police Department, you'll be assigned a student.
Call Anna Russell at 961-2850 (FBUSD) with questions.
The Fort Bragg Unified School District invites all adults in our community to be virtual tutors for children in grades 1-3. To actively help our local teachers and families, use Google Meets to encourage a young child's reading skills. Sign up at the School District Office at 312 S. Lincoln. After free fingerprinting at the Police Department, you'll be assigned a student.
Call Anna Russell at 961-2850 (FBUSD) with questions.
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COVID-19 UPDATE From our branch President:
Until further notice, WMC meetings will be held via Zoom on the third Sunday of the month at 3 p.m. There are more than two dozen free Xfinity WiFi hotspots in Fort Bragg. At wifi.xfinity.com, type in an address, city, state, or ZIP Code to find where to access the internet. 
This workshop will touch on the various elements of humor and give tips on achieving a comic voice in your work. For those who want to learn the basics of joke writing, handouts will be emailed ahead of the Zoom meeting. Those participating will be able to share their favorite joke.
E. B. White said, “Humor is like a frog. You can dissect it, but it tends to die on you.” Don’t let that warning scare you. Analyzing the reasons certain events make us laugh can help your writing. Shakespeare understood that life is funny at least as often as it is tragic. After every sad scene, he brings in the clowns. One sure way to make your writing more appealing is to add a carefully calculated dose of humor. — Joke Writing Reference & Worksheets-- Aron Lee Bowe is an artist, writer and designer of three graphic novels. Her writing has appeared both online and in print publications. Her memoir, Amazed & Elated, Depressed & Deflated won an Independent Publisher Medal for humor. Bowe won the Charles Schultz award and the first place humor prize from the National League of American Pen Women. www.aronleebowe.com Must register before each meeting to get the Zoom code New link to register will be in November 8th newsletter After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting. Please note that you do not have to have a zoom account. Once you register for the meeting, you’ll receive a link to use for the zoom meeting. You just click it. If you don’t have a mic and a camera on your computer, you’ll need to phone in. Phone numbers will also be sent with the Zoom link. 
BERKELEY POET MK CHEVEZ FEATURED VIRTUALLY AT POINT ARENA THIRD THURSDAY POETRY
The Arena Theater and Point Arena Third Thursday Poetry present a virtual Third Thursday Zoom Poetry reading at 7 p.m. on Thursday, November 19, 2020. This month features Berkeley Poet MK Chavez, with open mic to follow. To watch or participate as an open mic reader, please email blake@snakelyone.com. 
MCWC WINTER PUBLISHING SERIES
In response to requests for more publishing-related information, the Mendocino Coast Writer's Conference has created a series of three seminars focused on publishing. Saturday December 5th, 12 PM PST "Save the...Novel?" with Francesca Lia Block Saturday January 9th, 12 PM PST "Submitting Strategies" with Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo Saturday February 6th, 12 PM PST "Publishing with Small Presses" with Diana Arterian For more information and to register, please visit http://mcwc.org/winter-publishing-series. These events constitute an important fundraiser for MCWC this year as, like so many arts organizations during COVID-19, we face a significant budget shortfall. Every registration helps them continue creating meaningful, prestigious, and high-quality literary programming for our community. Your support is appreciated. NOVEMBER 15th 3:00
SHARON BOWERS aka ARON LEE BOWE Adding Humor to Your Writing 
OCTOBER
EKPHRASIS IX READINGS Link to the slideshow Link to the readings on YouTube Readings of the Ekphrasis pieces by art initiator and art responder writers while the artwork is displayed on screen. AVAILABLE INDEFINITELY ARTIST'S CO-OP VIRTUAL EXHIBITION https://www.artcoopmendocino.com/ekphrasis The Ekphrasis IX 2020 exhibition celebrates the forty member collaboration between the Artists Co-op of Mendocino and the Writers of the Mendocino Coast See a limited presentation of the artwork at the gallery in Mendocino near the intersection of Kasten and Albion Streets. Read the writing associated with the art online. The gallery is now open 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. and this year's Ekphrasis exhibit is in the gallery until November 2nd. CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS TO
DRAMA ANTHOLOGY WMC member Phil Zwerling and his colleague, Robert Moreira, are working on a Drama in the Time of CoVid-19 anthology to be published in 2022 by FlowerSong Press. They seek dramatic works: short plays, performance pieces, monologues, etc. that speak to the deaths, isolation, social, political, and economic upheaval that have followed in the wake of this pandemic. Go to the SUBMISSIONS PAGE for all the details. Send any questions to Philip Zwerling pzwerling@icloud.com. http://www.philipzwerling.com 
GOT A MINUTE?
See the current schedule. Mendocino Theatre Company's One-Minute Radio Theatre is a two-minute spot broadcast bi-weekly on KZYX. Collaborate by submitting an original one-minute radio play. All voices to be heard! Plays can be in English or Spanish. No fee for submission nor cash award if your play is chosen; all actors and directors give their time free of charge. Submit your one-minute play* (app. 150-170 words, for 1-3 actors) in the body of an email (no attachments) to mtc@mcn.org with the subject MTC One-Minute Play: [Title of your play]. Include your full name, contact information, and a brief, 50-word bio. You may submit as many one-minute plays as you wish, but only one submission per email, please. *NB: Play may not contain the "seven dirty words", which are prohibited by the FCC. Play must be totally original and the author's own work. 
Online Poetry
Workshop for Youth Professional poets from throughout California offer creative poetry writing lessons for youth and families. Lessons are free to everyone and require no prep. This online workshop is growing and lessons will continue to be added throughout the pandemic. Click to start writing! GUALALA COMMUNITY WRITING PROJECT
Mark Gross has started a writing initiative, KGUA Writers, in Gualala in collaboration with Peggy Berryhill's KGUA-FM, 88.3 radio program at 9:00 a.m. on Monday mornings. There is a Facebook Group Page KGUA Writers, and a website The Town That Started Writing. This week's prompt for written submission of 200-250 words and recorded pieces of 1 to 2:30 minutes length by November 6, midnight. Send as a new message to KGUAWriters@gmail.com. "We are 30 songs into the 46 song playlist. Still time to write until deadline BUT: Just send the song title so it can be included into our special playlist of the moment. You also do not have to write a piece this week to be included. just the title and artist, please. no need to send the recording send your selection to kguawriters@gmail.com. just the title and artist. no need to send the recording. All contributors will be acknowledged. See details on our KGUA Writers page. POETRY
Rhythm Running River 1st & 3rd Sunday 2-4 p.m. on KZYX public radio To listen live: https://www.kzyx.org/ For playlists: http://www.outfarpress.com/rrr.html To receive emails from Dan Roberts with links to listen or download: outfarpress@saber.net FORT BRAGG LIBRARY
FIRST THURSDAY OPEN MIC POETRY 7 P.M. Use this link https://us02web.zoom.us/j/9748647159 Readers should limit themselves to eight minutes, for one to four poems. 
In this issue, Mendocino Coast memoirist and WMC member, Alena Guest, surveys the coast's rich writing scene, with profiles of six recently published writers (including herself) and reviews of their divergent, captivating literary offerings.
It also features Gallery Bookshop and our branch of the California Writers Club. WRITING OPPORTUNITY:
VAN DAMME STATE PARK Volunteers at the Little River Museum have collected pictures and historical accounts that augment the rich history of what ultimately became the park. Members of our branch of the California Writers Club have an opportunity to use these source materials to write a nonfiction book and other monographs. Email the WritersMendocinoCoast@GMail.com for details. 
MEMBER'S COPIES OF ANTHOLOGY, RED SKY
have all been mailed, including those pre-ordered. If members haven't received their copy, please email WritersMendocinoCoast@GMail.com Fran Schwartz has an inventory of cartridges for printers and fax machines no longer in use.
Click here: for the list and email her. 
KELLEY HOUSE CALENDAR
Call for Writers There are so many stories yet to tell, and they welcome your voice. Articles are 400 to 700 words and can be paired with photos or illustrations usually discovered in their database of 10,000 images. Call the Kelley House curator, Karen McGrath, at 707/937-5791 or email her at curator@kelleyhousemuseum.org. 
Drop in to the library site for the list of recently added books and reviews by WMC member Priscilla Comen.
B R A N C H N E W S
STATEWIDE ANTHOLOGY NOW AVAILABLE The High Desert Branch of the California Writers Club collected and compiled fictional stories of pandemics, real or imagined, and has now published its state-wide anthology, SURVIVAL: Tales of Pandemic, which is available at amazon.com as of November 1, 2020. This volume of tales written by members of the century-old California Writers Club is the first anthology of its kind published by the High Desert Branch. NOW MORE THAN EVER
FROM CALIFORNIA WRITERS CLUB BRANCHES WORKSHOPS AND PRESENTATIONS VIA ZOOM CWC Berkeley - No current newsletter Presentation Nov. 15th "Get Known Everywhere: Exposure for Authors" Central Coast Writers - Nov. '20 Newsletter Discussion Nov. 17th Alka Joshi The Henna Artist Free Coastal Dunes CWC - No current newsletter East Sierra Ridge Writers - No current newsletter CWC Fremont Area Writers - Aug '20 Newsletter High Desert CWC - Sept '20 Newsletter Inland Empire CWC - Nov '20 Newsletter Presentation Nov. 28th "The Importance of Structure" Cal Writers Long Beach - No current newsletter CWC Marin - No current newsletter Nov. 15th live from Tokyo "Take the Show on the Road: Travel Writing (Nonfiction and Fiction)" $5 CWC-Mount Diablo - Nov '20 Newsletter Presentation Nov. 14th "Mastering Plot Twists" Napa Valley Writers - Oct. '20 Newsletter North State Writers - Sept '20 Newsletter Cal Writers Orange County - No current newsletter Redwood Writers - Oct. '20 Newsletter Sacramento Writers - Nov. '20 Newsletter Presentation Nov. 21st "Get Known Everywhere Using Publicity: For Authors San Fernando Valley Writers - Nov. '20 Newsletter CWC SF Peninsula - Oct. '20 Newsletter Latest info on Meetup Presentation Nov. 14th "Author Skills: Self-Publishing with Kobo Writing Life" Presentation Nov. 21st "Get Known Everywhere: Publicity for Authors" San Joaquin Valley Writers - No current newsletter South Bay Writers - Nov. '20 Newsletter Tri-Valley Writers - Oct '20 Newsletter Presentation Nov. 21st "Writing Historical Fiction for a Modern Reader" Writers of Kern - Nov'20 Newsletter Presentation Nov. 21st "The Goldfish That Barked: Seven Actions to Distinguish Yourself for Success" This calendar last updated Nov. 13th |
WE ALL HAVE OPINIONS — WOULD YOU PLEASE SHARE YOURS ABOUT YOUR WRITER'S CLUB?
Answer a few questions and express your opinions in this survey. Thanks. IT'S HERE — DON'T YOU WISH YOU WERE IN IT?
The next submission window will be announced in August 2021 
WELCOME TO THE
CALIFORNIA WRITERS CLUB - FOUNDED in 1909 - The Mendocino Coast branch is proud to share in this legacy. Our intention is to expand the network and provide publishing opportunities for writers. 
MENDOCINO WRITERS MEET
ONLINE ON THE THIRD SUNDAY 3:00 Members Receive Invitations Public May Email a Request WritersMendocinoCoast@Gmail.com
Writers of the Mendocino Coast
PO Box 762 Fort Bragg, CA 95437 The CALIFORNIA WRITERS CLUB is a 501(c) (3) educational nonprofit dedicated to educating members and the public-at-large in the craft of writing and in the marketing of their work. California Writers Club: https://calwriters.org/ CWC Northern Branches: http://cwcnorcalwriters.org/ NorCal Events: http://cwcnorcalwriters.org/events/ SUBSCRIBE TO OUR MONTHLY NEWSLETTER
Email WritersMendocinoCoast@GMail.com We will never sell or share your email address. MEMBERSHIP
NEW MEMBERS $65 includes $20 initiation fee. More information on the website's Membership page. YEARLY RENEWAL is $45. $25 for dual memberships when a member of another CWC branch. Membership includes a copy of the club's recent anthology, copies of our state organization's Literary Review magazine, space for member biographies, and opportunities to see your writing in: -The annual anthology -The Literary Review published by our parent, California Writers Club. More info at www.calwriters.org -The yearly collaboration, Ekphrasis, with the Artists Co-op of Mendocino -The annual SmatchUp blind matching of two writers on a theme, each writing a single page. SPONSORED MEMBERSHIPS
Financial aid is available for membership WritersMendocinoCoast@GMail.com WMC member Clare Zwerling is interested in joining or forming a poetry group—ClareBercot@iCloud.com
M E M B E R N E W S
Writing newly published, receives a nomination or award, or other notable exposure? Please send a short announcement to writersmendocinocoast@gmail.com 
Freeing Finch, inspired by Ginny's friend, Dr. Kate Rohr, is now available in paperback, and locally available at Gallery Bookshop in Mendocino.
From WMC member Ginny Rorby, the author of Hurt Go Happy, winner of ALA's Schneider Family Book Award, comes Freeing Finch, the inspiring story of a transgender girl and a stray dog who overcome adversity to find love, home, and a place to belong. Voted one of the 10 of the Best LGBTQ+ Middle Grade Books That Celebrate Pride. Finch just wants to find a place where she feels like she is understood. After being abandoned by her father and losing her mother to cancer, she spends most of her time alone. As a trans girl, she has a strained relationship with her stepfather and is afraid to open up to kids at school. Finch's only friend, Maddy, is her next-door neighbor, an older woman who runs a wildlife rescue out of her home. Though everything is resolved . . . in the end, it is a tenderly written book about belonging, kindness and love. "I don't pretend to be a literary critic but recognize when a book is fantastic. The handling of the trans issue as just another challenge in life that's no more or less significant than all the others, is superb. Love, loved it."—Kathryn Rohr, MD, featured in The Washington Post's "Truth and Transgender at 70" "No matter their gender identity, young readers will identify with Finch's struggle to find the relationships she needs to heal her grief and to be who she knows she is in a sometimes scary world. Finch discovers, in her struggle to find the support she needs after her loving mother dies, that forcing the connections we think we need can make us miss the special ones we already have. Finch's story is Higher Power of Lucky meets Shiloh."—Tim Capehart, children's librarian and head of youth services at Dayton Metro Library, author of Shadowangel and Summer Stranger than Fiction, and three-time Newbery Medal selection committee member . 
WMC member windflower has a poem and photograph published in the October issue of Tiny Seed Journal, in the category Through the Eyes of Nature.
WMC member Ron Morita's article "Fear and Loathing in Rancho Navarro" in the October 7th Anderson Valley Advertiser is a news story and commentary about the cannabis controversy in Anderson Valley.
WMC member Karen Lewis has announced a new poetry chapbook, Peace Maps, now available from Finishing Line Press. These poems span a wide geography, places she's lived, traveled, or imagined. Themes include motherhood, deep ecology, love, loss, endurance, unity, hope.
"Poets are like cartographers" says Karen K. Lewis in Peace Maps. Through landscapes plagued by violence, drought, and plastic trash, "Fragments of poems remain, like tourniquets [ ] to mend our fatal hemorrhage / of despair." She maps each poem to a specific place on earth, not only with discreet latitude and longitude coordinates, but also with love for the beings, human, animal and vegetable, that make a home there, and for the land itself. ~ Maureen Eppstein, author of Horizon Line and Earthward Order Peace Maps from Finishing Line Press Her poem "Chaco Canyon" appears in the 2021 Women Artists Datebook from Syracuse Cultural Workers. Karen is available to customize a virtual writing workshop for one or small groups of any age. klewis@mcn.org ROLLING RECAP OF MONTHLY MEETINGS
See Archives tab above for details
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Welcome to opportunities to publish your writing, whether or not you live on the Mendocino Coast.
