READING AND WRITING

Summer in Montana provides little time for the popular “beach read” novels. Instead, during our action-packed summers, I find myself re-reading Night of the Grizzlies, Christine Carbo’s The Wild Inside, and various touristy hiking books. With recent cold mornings and the “termination dust” of snow on mountain tops signaling the end of summer, Montanans know the cold days of winter are ahead. Maybe a good blizzard can help us hibernate and accomplish goals with a surge of writing, and reading those novels on the “to read” list.

The annual Flathead River Writers’ Conference during the last week of September is one way to energize creative urges. Among ten speakers at the 25th Silver Anniversary conference, Lavonne Mueller, playwright and the recipient of many writing awards and grants, (including National Endowment for the Arts, Fulbright and Guggenheim), will present a workshop for attendees. If you like to travel, develop your writer’s biography with her help, and apply for grants in the coming year that could take you around the world to write in exotic locations.

If you are considering a fast track to completing your next novel, or your first, consider taking the Novel Challenge course at FVCC with award winning author and MMW member, Kathy Dunnehoff. She’ll guide you through completing your first draft in one month. Her course is a take-off on Nanowrimo – the annual National Novel Writing Month each November.

Whatever your plans, each day provides the opportunity to begin a new book, a new chapter, a new scene in your life. People speak of “writers’ block,” being stymied and unable to proceed. This is something I’ve never experienced, but recently I found an interesting and tasty red wine you could sip while reading a book next to a roaring fire while dreaming up your next storyline.