Abilene Writers Guild Meeting Minutes
November 16, 2006
Center for Contemporary Arts
Ginny Greene called the meeting to order at 7:00 p.m. Minutes from the last meeting were approved.
Financial Report:
Current balance: $2,094.54 Membership: 86
Announcements
- CPS gifts that were not brought to the meeting can be dropped off at Judge Barbara Rollins's office on the 5th floor of the Taylor County Courthouse. Deadline for gifts is Friday, December 8th.
- The Center for Contemporary Arts will be installing a new security system in January. More information will follow.
Brags and Sags
- Brandon Davis is on the lookout for ways to expand his newspaper column. Some possibilities are opening up for inclusion in other area papers. He also might be able to move into a weekly column even though he would not receive additional pay at this time. One of his recent articles accumulated the 5th most number of hits for articles read online. Congratulations!
- Karen Witemeyer has two new items in print. One of her children's Bible stories, No Fun Being Sick, appeared in the November 2006 issue of Clubhouse, Jr. magazine. Also, her article, God Said No, that started as an AWG contest entry is now in print as part of an anthology presented by Crosswalk.com entitled Praise Reports: Inspiring Real-Life Stories of How God Answers Prayer.
- Pat Mehaffey shared a sag to encourage everyone to follow the guidelines when entering contests. She had submitted six stories to the AWG annual contest, but turned them in early, before the appropriate date. They ended up lost and never got to a judge. Always follow the directions!
- Jim Johnson found an editor who happens to be the son of an author he admires in a literary chat room. This editor agreed to work with Jim at the price of $3 per page for his next book.
- Stewart Caffey has created a beautiful brochure chronicling the history of the First United Methodist Church.
- Nancy Masters is celebrating her clean office after the end of the annual contest and workshop.
- John Matthews is working on a proposal after receiving a positive response from a query letter. He has never had a proposal rejected, so he is excited about his prospects.
New Business
- In order to help spell Jim Johnson at the door, we are looking for volunteers to sign up to be a greeter at one or two monthly meetings. This position will entail greeting people as they arrive and locking up the door at 7:15 p.m. Jim will continue to close up the building after the meetings. Please sign up to help.
- Entries for the rattlesnake contest were due tonight. The winner will be announced in the December newsletter.
- Monthly contests will start back up in January. Karen Witemeyer is the new monthly contest coordinator. Entries will still be due on the 10th of each month. We will be doing themes this year instead of categories. January's theme is New Beginnings. Start writing now. First place wins $25. A complete list of themes for the year will be posted in the newsletter.
- Deadline for the December newsletter is December 7th.
Program
Stan Chapman of Chapman Book Bindery shared bookmaking secrets with us. His shop is a rare trade bindery that specializes in small edition printings, for those customers who are looking to produce from 1 to 1000 copies of a book instead of tens of thousands like the larger, automated companies.
The secret to keeping costs down in printing your books is to do your own pre-press work. Instead of turning in your project as a Word document, convert it into a PDF file. This is the format the printer needs. Also, have you entire manuscript in a single document. Type setting is expensive.
Smythe sewn binding are the best quality because they are extremely durable and the pages lay flat when the books are opened. Glue bindings work fine for paperbacks, but they will not stand up over time and a great deal of use.
Hardcover books are more profitable than softcover. There is little extra expense in producing them, but people are accustomed to paying more for hardcover books so you can mark up your asking price significantly.
Marketing is the key to success for print on demand publishing. You can have the greatest book in the world, but unless you market it well, no one will read it.
Minutes respectfully submitted by:
Karen Witemeyer on behalf of Sharon Ellison, AWG Secretary