Another Workshop, Another Success
I conducted another 2 hour autobiographical writing workshop and they loved it! I’d donated this to the Uniteraian Universalist auction held several months ago for our congregation. It was at our friend Doris’s house. Our other friend Kathi, who only comes to visit once a year, was completely surprised: she had no idea we were doing this, and I even doubly suprised her by saying I was meeting with a client and had to go out for awhile when in fact I went to Doris’s house to prepare.
I keep getting very positive feedback on the workshops and my ability as a facilitator. My third (or fourth or fifth) act is going very well.
The First In-Person Workshop of 2025
And yet, he persisted
This is the space at Bucks on Bridge Coffee Shop in Lambertville where I can now do in-person workshops! The collective Soupcon took it over and I joined. This is going to be a busy and exciting year for me. This was today’s 2 hour guided autobiography introductory workshop. They liked me (they really liked me)! But seriously, I learn so much from doing this, and it’s a privilege to have people share their lives in this process.
Updated Workshop Schedule Through May
All times are eastern (New Jersey)
Register at the links belowNEW FOR 2025!
IN-PERSON WORKSHOPS IN LAMBERTVILLE
NEW HOPE ADULT WRITERS GROUP
CLINTON ADULT WRITERS GROUPFRIDAY FEBRUARY 7
Guided Autobiography 2-Hour Complimentary Introduction (free)
9:00 am – 11:00 am
Location: Soupcon at Bucks on Bridge
25 Bridge Street, Lambertville, NJ
Please specify the workshop or group in your subject line!
RSVP (LIMIT 8)EVERY 2ND AND 4TH TUESDAY
Adult Writers Group
6:00 – 7:00 pm
Location: New Hope Free Library
93 W. Ferry Street, New Hope, PA
Please specify the workshop or group in your subject line!
RSVPIt’s Alive! ‘Fatal Mistake: A Harry Hell Novella’ Audiobook Free and Fierce, Narrated by Wondervox
Audio PlayerCHAPTERS 1-10
Audio PlayerCHAPTERS 11 – 20
Audio PlayerCHAPTERS 21 – 32
NOTE: This audiobook was made using a synthetic male voice (AI). If you don’t like that or it troubles you, skip it! No professional audiobook narrators were harmed in the production of this audiobook, since I can’t afford to hire them anymore. This is for people who enjoy the story regardless, and for me because … writing is hard work.
Narration provided by Wondervox.
I am so excited to bring one of my favorite stories to life for your listening pleasure… a novella, actually, that had an incredibly long gestation in the recesses of my imagination. I’d put it off as an audio option because the voice technology I use wasn’t quite good enough. Now I think it sounds terrific. Yes, it’s AI/synthetic voice. I would never pretend otherwise. So fasten your headphones, and let’s get this dark, dark party started.
About Fatal Mistake: A Harry Hell Novella
Buy the eBook Direct and Save!The year is closer than you think. The world has collapsed under the weight of its own insatiable needs, leaving shattered cities where those who still have anything fight to keep it that way, and those who don’t are a constant threat. It’s a danger that must be contained through a tightly controlled society where everyone is observed and everything is kept in its place. Harry Hellerman and his twin brother, Elliot, enter this world three minutes apart. By the time they’re teenagers, they’ve been surrendered to Control to be molded into the perfect assassins. A boy named Harry Hellerman enters, and a man named Harry Hell emerges: a killing machine of the highest order.
Clinton (NJ) Library Writers Group Begins
Actually, we can
(Photo: Clinton, NJ, library writers’ group)
Among the many talismans spread around my work (sacred) space is a simple wooden block with the words, ‘Actually I Can’ on it. It’s been a reminder every day that life isn’t over till they put a small hand mirror under your nose to make sure you’re dead. Until then, as Saul Bellow said (and Anne Sexton quoted in her Pulitzer Prize winning book of poetry ‘Live or Die’), “Live or die, but don’t poison everything.”
I’m living as fully as I can. The photo is the Clinton New Jersey Library adult writers group I just started facilitating last night. I don’t call them students. I prefer ‘participants’ for everything I’m doing. I even said last night, “I’m not a teacher. I’m a facilitator.” I want to facilitate other people’s creativity and desire to express themselves. That’s what I hope to be and do. This past year (2024) the universe showed me a different road to take if I was willing to let go of some of the baked-in ideas I had about who I am and what I can do.
I love to teach (I’ll allow myself to use the word in this context). I love sharing my 50+ years of experience and skill. And I love being good at it! My favorite part of book readings was the conversation with the audience afterward. People kept telling me I had a talent for talking to people, that I become animated and enthused speaking about writing, and they were right.
It invigorates me. It challenges me. It humbles me (as much as I’m willing to be humbled), and it reminds me that I have something to offer even now.
Let go, let goodness, and don’t be afraid of being someone new … that person, with those talents and gifts, was there all along.
What’s Old Is New: Tumblr, Photosharing, and the End of Meta
If you’re like me, and there are millions of us, you simply cannot reconcile yourself to staying on Meta (Facebook, Instagram and Threads). And while there is no Faceook shaming here – I understand how spectacularly Meta has been in making itself seem indispesable to our lives – it is dead to me. I, too, thought for years that I had to stay for family and friends, but the reality for a long time was that I only saw posts from about a dozen people, and very few ever “liked” mine or engaged with me in any meaningful way. Facebook wants us to pay for that by “boosting” posts. Uh, no.
I somehow made it 50 years without Facebook, and guess what? I haven’t missed it for five minutes. There is something deeply illusory about social media, and the people who create it know this.
Given that I enjoy dispensing pearls to swine and other creatures I value for their intelligence (pigs are really smart), I’m on Bluesky, and I have reactived my Tumble for photos. If you didn’t know, Tumbler has been around since 2009, but it’s not really microbloggng. It serves peole whose attention span is longer than an influencer’s. I’ll use it for photos only for now, since I have … a website! Enjoy!
– Mark
Workshop Schedule Starting in January
Workshops are currently 2 hours via Zoom unless marked ‘in person’
All times are eastern (New Jersey) – 2 Hours
Register at the links belowNEW FOR 2025!
IN-PERSON WORKSHOPS IN LAMBERTVILLE
NEW HOPE ADULT WRITERS GROUP
CLINTON ADULT WRITERS GROUPFRIDAY FEBRUARY 7
Guided Autobiography 2-Hour Complimentary Introduction (free)
9:00 am – 11:00 am
Location: Soupcon at Bucks on Bridge
25 Bridge Street, Lambertville, NJ
Please specify the workshop or group in your subject line!
RSVP (LIMIT 8)EVERY 2ND AND 4TH TUESDAY
Adult Writers Group
6:00 – 7:00 pm
Location: New Hope Free Library
93 W. Ferry Street, New Hope, PA
Please specify the workshop or group in your subject line!
RSVP – JANUARY MEETINGS ARE 1/7 AND 1/28 Space is limitedWEDNSDAY JANUARY 29
Last Wednesday of every month
Adult Writers Group
6:00 – 7:00 pm
65 Halstead St, Clinton, Clinton, NJ
Please specify the workshop or group in your subject line!
RSVPTHERE’S MORE! THREE WORKSHOPS COMING IN MAY
HUNTERDON NJ COUNTY MAIN LIBARY
CLINTON, NJ LIBRARY
BRISTOL PA LIBRARY)
SUBSCRIBE FOR UPDATES, SCHEDULES AND MORE!*** FRIDAY REBRUARY 7 ***
Guided Autobiography 2-Hour Complimentary Introduction (free)
9:00 AM – 11:00 AM IN PERSON
Bucks on Bridge/Soupcon 25 Bridge Street, Lambertville, NJ
RSVP5 Week Guided Autobiography ($100)
Every Wednesday in April 10:00 AM – 12:00 PM
Via Zoom
REGISTERYou can see workshop descriptions at YourWritePath.com, address any questions to YourWritePath AT Outlook. com.
Your Write Path Podcast: A Conversation with Ann Aptaker, Award Winning Author of the Cantor Gold Series
Audio PlayerFasten your headphones for another MWA-NY member interview. Ann Aptaker is the author of the Cantor Gold series, featuring the irrepressible Cantor Gold, art smuggler and rebel living on the edges in late-1940s New York City. The series currently includes Criminal Gold, Tarnished Gold, Genuine Gold, Flesh and Gold, and Murder and Gold.
Ann is a Lambda Literary Award (The Lammy) and multiple Goldie Award winner for her popular novels. A native New Yorker, she has earned a reputation as a respected exhibition designer and curator of art during her career in museums and galleries. Exhibitions Ann has curated have garnered favorable reviews in the New York Times, Art in America, American Art Review, and other publications.
Her short stories and essays have appeared in several major anthologies and in other crime and mystery fiction publications and journals. In addition to curating and designing art exhibitions and writing crime stories, Ann is also an art writer and was adjunct professor of art history at the New York Institute of Technology.
I had the pleasure of finally meeting Ann at the MWA-NY annual Holiday Revels gathering in New York City this past December, and I couldn’t wait to speak to her again for this interview.
Are you a MWA-NY member? Would you be interested in an interview for this feature? Contact interviews AT mwany.org for information. – Mark McNease/Comms Team