Welcome to the BEANERY ONLINE LITERARY MAGAZINE

     Welcome to the BEANERY ONLINE LITERARY MAGAZINE (BOLM), an online publication sponsored by the Beanery Writers Group in Latrobe, Pennsylvania.

     The BOLM is a magazine with multiple topics and genres, written by the writers group members and submitted by writers worldwide. The posts are created for your reading pleasure, and, sometimes, to challenge you. The Categories list, on the right side of this blog site, indicates both BW and Visitor contributors.

     Readers subscribing to the BOLM receive notice of writings as they are posted. To subscribe, look to the right of this sticky note to see  Email Subscription. Type your email address in the box. After you  receive an email from WordPress and confirm your subscription, you will start receiving notifications of each post as it is completed.

     Your email address will not be made public any time you contribute to this blog site.

     We invite you to submit writings to the BOLM. Send submissions to beanerywriters at yahoo.com with the word SUBMISSION in the subject line. New submitters should include a brief bio.

     BW members welcome any comments and/or input on this site. The comment box is at the end of each post.

      Happy reading! 

     Carolyn Cornell Holland, facilitator of the Beanery Writers Group

A Paranormal Mystery/Romance Crossover Workshop

BEANERY ONLINE LITERARY MAGAZINE

A PARANORMAL MYSTERY/ROMANCE

CROSSOVER WORKSHOP 

Kathleen Clark

     Eighteen eager and aspiring writers gathered at the Greensburg-Hempfield Library on Saturday, February 19, 2011 to participate in and learn about Writing Paranormal Mysteries with a Romance Crossover. The two and a half hour Workshop was led by Mary Ann Mogus and Barbara Miller, both local authors and instructors who have published novels and articles. Although the time frame permitted only a mini-overview of writing for both genres, attendees appetite for the genre was wetted.
     Participants of all ages interested in developing their writing technique signed up, including a fourteen-year-old Connellsville Junior High student. Three local writers groups were represented: Ligonier Valley Writers, Greensburg Writers Group and the Beanery Writers of Latrobe. Representing the Beanery Writers group were facilitator Carolyn Holland, Lois Kalata and Kathleen Clark.
     Writers were given two to five minute exercises to develop workable plots, characters and

A Beanery Writers Group Story in Photographs

BEANERY ONLINE LITERARY MAGAZINE

A BEANERY WRITERS GROUP STORY IN PHOTOGRAPHS

Dmitri

As the facilitator of the Beanery Writers Group, I’m often asked What goes on at the meetings? Dmitri, who had recently acquired a new camera, captured the essence of one meeting—by arranging some of his pictures to demonstrate what happens when there is a disagreement between members.

Well everything was going fine, until a point of dispute arose…

to which Bob adopted the You Wanna Box? point of view:

If I Were a Fly on the Wall…Finding a Writing Angle

BEANERY ONLINE LITERARY MAGAZINE

IF I WERE A FLY ON THE WALL…FINDING A WRITING ANGLE

     What can a fly tell us about finding an angle in writing?

     Some members of the Beanery Writers Group are having difficulty writing about structures—rather, some of us are. It’s not that we can’t write about a structure. It’s that we have a block that asks What is there to say about a structure? It’s an inanimate object!   

     One genre is descriptive writing. Simply describing.

     Yet we’ve all heard and said If only I could be a fly on the wall… We use that phrase when we anticipate something very interesting is about to occur at a site where we cannot be present…

     If only I were a fly on the wall…

• what

How to Write About (Historic) Buildings

BEANERY ONLINE LITERARY MAGAZINE

HOW TO WRITE ABOUT (HISTORIC) BUILDINGS

      The Beanery Writers Group (Southwestern Pennsylvania) members have an opportunity to visit and write about a Frank Lloyd Wright structure, in any genre the writer chooses. Once the idea was seeded, I realized that doing this would present a challenge to many of the group members, including myself. 

     We are preparing for this project by visiting and writing about local structures: two unusual restaurants, a historic building built in 1799 which is now a museum, a Catholic church Basilica, the county courthouse, etc. Because these excursions have proven how difficult it is to write about historic structures, I searched the ‘net for guidance. I discovered that there’s a scarcity of instructional material to glean from.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

     Buildings, like people, have stories to tell about their community’s and the nation’s past. Embedded in historic structures and landscapes are traces of past lives that are clues to how our ancestors lived, and how life today evolved. To write about them is to bring these traces to life.

     Historic structures, with a wealth of history, legend, and folklore on their doorstep, provide fertile material for factual and fictional writing. The writer’s imagination, inspired by the iconic locations, can run wild, using descriptive style and creating imaginative stories based on both fact and fiction.

     There are different approaches to writing about historic (or current day) structures.  

• Describe in detail a general overall view of the structure, a room, or an item(s) on display. Use all

Use of Quotations in Writing: Types of Quotations

BEANERY ONLINE LITERARY MAGAZINE

USE OF QUOTATIONS IN WRITING

Types of Quotations

     Quotations add interest and authority to a piece of written work.    

     There are two types of quotations, direct and indirect. Direct quotations use the exact language, either spoken or written, from a source outside of our own writing or speech, and must rest between a set of quotation marks. Nothing of the quote can be changed. Direct quotations are useful if the source material has particularly striking or notable language.

     Indirect quotations do not use the exact wording from the source. Indirect quotations rephrase or summarize the source’s words. As such, they do not require the use of quotation marks. There can be creativity when using indirect quotations. In my historical fiction writing, I’ve taken statements from letters and documents and converted them into natural conversation.

~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

      For the purpose of illustrating this post, I will use a controversy concerning a 1790s character in both my historic journal article and my historic romance novel, Madame Rosalie Bacler de Leval.

     While in the United States escaping the French Revolution, she attempted to become a land speculator by negotiating with Gen. Henry Knox, Col. William Duer, and Knox’s agent, Gen. Henry Jackson, to purchase of a large tract of land in Downeast Maine. To illustrate the ways quotes are used, I will take one controversial issue: was Madame married or not before she emigrated from France? Since there is no actual documentation of her marriage in France, either side of the argument can be supported by circumstantial “evidence” gleaned from outside sources.

~~~~~~~~~~~~    

DIRECT QUOTATIONS

     “Madame Leval, who was a mistress of Calonne’s and

Blogsite or a Website: What’s the difference?

BEANERY ONLINE LITERARY MAGAZINE

BLOGSITE OR WEBSITE: WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE?

    What’s the difference between a blogsite and a website?

     This question was raised at the Beanery Writers Group (Latrobe, PA) meeting in early May. It is a significant question, because the group’s unique project is publishing the Beanery Online Literary Magazine (www.beanerywriters.wordpress.com ).

     Being computer illiterate, I had to plead ignorance of the answer. I held the impression that blogs were easier and cost less.

     To answer the question, I plugged it into the search engine.

     Examining various sites made me feel better about being unable to define the differences. …since the differences have become increasingly blurred for many bloggers and users*— the difference…is steadily vanishing. These channels are definitely converging.*** there are shades of gray.##

     Initially blogs, a condensation of the word “weblog,” were viewed as a web log or online diary… a place where a blogger can generate a log of interesting personal comment and intimate details and information about a particular niche subject or topic * Today, although many blogs continue to be personal ramblings about daily life,…that is only one aspect of the blogosphere – and a fairly trivial one at that.***Currently, blogs range

Tips on How to Write

BEANERY ONLINE LITERARY MAGAZINE

TIPS ON HOW TO WRITE

     The first two newspapers I worked for basically took the articles I submitted and published them “as was.” Errors, incoherencies, and all.

     Then I met Paul Heyworth, editor of the Fay-West section of the Greensburg Tribune-Review (PA). Having recently moved to Connellsville, Pennsylvania, I hadn’t been motivated to approach the newspaper about writing for them until I signed up for a conference on gangs. In my previous community, where I headed a family support program and was a pastor’s spouse, I had often submitted articles to two newspapers on conferences and seminars I attended. I believe it’s called “multi-tasking.”

     I set up an appointment to speak with Paul—I believe it was an “interview.” He told me to bring in several clips. When I arrived, he used speed-reading to evaluate them before asking me how many articles a week I was planning to submit. I only intended, at that point, to write the one.

     After getting by that bump in the interview, Paul told me he expected me to be in the news office when the articles were edited.

     In a very early submission, he questioned a word I used.

     “Don’t you think that word is too large for Fayette County readers?”

     I said that I was a county resident who read the paper, that not all readers were unable to understand that word. Not all readers were uneducated.

     “Besides, don’t you think that some readers will look the word up in a dictionary and learn something?”

     After that, I made certain there was one challenging word in each article I submitted. These words were never removed.

~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

     This is a roundabout way for me to introduce a post I read: 11 Smart Tips for Brilliant Writing. And in using “larger” words, I violated Tip number

Deborah Nelson: Pulitzer Prize Winning Journalist

CAROLYN’S COMPOSITIONS

DEBORAH NELSON: PULITZER PRIZE WINNING JOURNALIST

Carolyn C. Holland

 ANNOUNCEMENT:

Deborah Nelson is speaking in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania

~~~~~~ 

Investigative Journalism in a Democracy

Friday, February 5^th

7:30 to 9:30 p. m.

Open to the public. No fee

Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Ligonier Valley

Rt. 3 east of Ligonier

~~~~~~ 

Still Untitled Lecture

Thursday, February 4^th

7:00 p. m.

Open to the public. No fee

University of Pittsburgh at Greensburg

Revisit this site for updated information

 ~~~~~~

     Deborah Nelson, co-winner of the 1997 Pulitzer Prize for Investigative Reporting for a report on abuses in HUD’s Indian housing program (Seattle Times), also worked on two other Pulitzer-winning projects: the deadly accident record of the Harrier jump jet (Los Angeles Times), and the children who died while in Washington D. C.’s child welfare system.

     In autumn 2006, Nelson opted to leave her newspaper job, the Washington investigative editor for the Los Angeles Times, in order to take a faculty position at the Merrill College of Journalism, University of Maryland. She had spent thirty years

Memoir Writing Can Elicit Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome

BEANERY ONLINE LITERARY MAGAZINE

ANNOUNCEMENT:

TO RECEIVE E-MAIL NOTIFICATION

OF NEW POSTS ON THE BEANERY ONLINE LITERARY MAGAZINE

Subscribe today!

(to subscribe see upper right hand post on this site)

MEMOIR WRITING CAN ELICIT POST TRAUMATIC STRESS SYNDROME

Carolyn C. Holland

     When you present someone with the harsh information on child abuse and domestic violence, whether in groups, educational settings, or individually, there is a risk: the information can trigger emotions from the hearer’s past. Occasionally someone will have a melt-down. It comes with the territory. It is to be expected.

     Many people who know me are aware that I have a background working with