Turning Moments to Memories: A Summer Now Gone, But A Wonderful Fall Ahead

By Guild Director B.J. Hollars

I’ve been putting off writing this for a while now.  Not due to a lack of enthusiasm, but due to too much of it.  When I think back on the summer residencies at Cirenaica, I immediately become so overwhelmed by my sugary-sweet sentimentality, that any attempt to write about it will surely test the readers’ gag reflexes.  (Yes, it was that great.)

The truth is, I often feel like I’m the luckiest guy in the world.  Though I’m no longer in a life position that allows me to travel to partake in too many writing residencies (two kids have made that a challenge), I am in a position to help provide such opportunities for others.  And the benefit to me, of course, is that I get to enjoy the residencies in my own backyard at Cirenaica.  I come, I go, I learn, I eat.  Then, I repeat it all the following week.

This past summer taught me all sorts of writing-related lessons.  But of equal importance, the summer residencies also reaffirmed for me the power of community.  Whether we were singing camp songs around the flames, playing a “best out of 11” never-ending ping-pong tournament, or reuniting with our high schools principals in an entirely new setting (well, I guess that last one only applies to me), every moment at Cirenaica became a fond memory, something I never want to forget.  Some of the summer’s best moments occurred spontaneously: when writer-in-residence Max Garland helped us celebrate Henry David Thoreau’s 200th birthday with a birthday cake, or when participant Ken Szymanski found the perfect structure to his essay just an hour before the public reading.  And there were plenty of others, too: assistant arts administrator Geoff Carter belting out a new song to conclude the evening, or Brent Halverson sharing his latest ice cream recipes.  Every day when I drove to Cirenaica, I always knew I’d leave with a new friend, a new insight, and a renewed motivation to keep writing.  And this proved true every day.  

Looking ahead, the Guild’s got all kinds of equally exciting programming on the horizon.  From the release of Barstow & Grand on October 26 at 7PM at The Local Store (more on that next newsletter!) to our second annual Winter Writers Residency at The Oxbow Hotel (more on that later, too!), rest assured, we’ve got you covered.  Which is to say nothing of our amazing craft talks headed your way, including UWEC instructor and poet Katie Vagnino’s talk, “Pitch Perfect: Navigating the World of Freelance Writing” (The Local Store / Oct. 12 / 7PM) and Madison-based poet Matthew Guenette’s “The Poetics of Voice: Crafting the Persona Poem” (The Local Store / Nov. 9 / 7PM).  And let’s not forget our annual fundraiser, “Suppertime in Lake Wobegon” (featuring A Prairie Home Companion writer Holly Harden and the food of chef Brent Halverson!) which takes place on September 16 at 6PM at Forage.  Ticket sales end September 13. Purchase yours today by clicking here! 

Last but not least, I’m pleased to announce that the Guild now has an advisory board!  This board will do much to ensure that our diverse range of programs continues to flourish.  Already, the board’s many insights have proven invaluable.  Get ready for the Guild to grow!

Wishing you many wonderful words in the coming month.

Until next time, 
BJ Hollars

From the Mouths of Writers 2: Was there a specific book that led you to write?

Compiled by Jeana Conder

A couple of months ago I set out on the task of asking local writers to answer a series of eight questions I compiled.  The responses I received are now creating our newest series, “From the Mouth of Writers.”  We hope that this series allows upcoming writers to gain knowledge from others with the same passion.  This month’s question: Was there a specific book that led you to write?

Allyson Loomis

It will surprise you when I say that no, there wasn’t a specific book.  Honestly, my interest in writing evolved from a childhood obsession with song lyrics. I was a weirdo child of the 1970s who could not get enough of Cole Porter. This evolved into a love of theater and dramatic dialogue.  I first wrote plays.  I wrote many bad plays.  I wasn't really wasn’t electrified by fiction until quite late in the game, though I read fiction quite a bit.  

Sandra Lindow

I wanted to be a writer when I two and I saw my mother writing a letter.  I tried to copy her cursive but became frustrated because it didn’t look right, I loved the books and the idea of communicating ideas on paper.  By the time I was in second grade in a one room school house in Clark County, Wisconsin, I knew I wanted to be an English teacher and a writer.  Books that inspired me were primarily poetry like Dr. Seuss’s McElligot’s Pool, which I recognize now to be a Taoist classic about the connectedness of all things.

Molly Patterson

I'm not sure there was one book that led me into writing--I seem to remember from a very young age wanting to write stories. But I do know that I read Maya Angelou's I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings when I was in elementary school (not as a school assignment, of course! Probably not recommended reading for young children...) and it opened up a new world for me. I specifically remember reading a scene of the narrator as a young child wetting herself in her church clothes, and the mortification she felt was rendered so powerfully that I felt embarrassed for her. That sense of empathy between reader and character has stuck with me. It's still what I strive for. 

Bruce Taylor

It was reading more than any specific book. I read early, anything\everything I could get my hands on. I read fast but not very accurately, unless the situation requires it. Sometimes I think for a writer misreading can be as important as reading.

Jon Loomis

I don’t know about a single specific book, but I think it probably helped that my house was full of books when I was a kid.  I loved e.e. cummings and P.G. Wodehouse, for example.  So, guys with initials.  I still read Wodehouse, especially the Jeeves and Wooster stories.    

Marsha Qualey

A specific book that led me into writing young adult fiction, or more accurately, was a green light for me when I first considered writing YA: Homecoming, by Cynthia Voight. I had submitted a short story to Seventeen Magazine (it used to have a terrific fiction department; not sure about now) and it was rejected by an editor who encouraged me to turn the story into a young adult novel. I had no knowledge of YA novels at that time (late 80s) and the first one I then read was Homecoming. I knew right away I was in the right place.

Sandra McKinney

I loved reading biographies & auto-biographies as a child. I believe the power of "true story" was my inspiration for writing.

Jay Gilbertson

Yes. The really bad ones. The poorly written ones. YOU know the ones. Years ago, and I’ve been reading since electricity, I read one too many crappy published books and figured, dang, if this junk got published, what in the world have I got to worry about? Well, that started this whole crazy adventure and I haven’t stopped yet. And, hopefully, my writing has gotten better. Hopefully.

Nickolas Butler

I consider "Sometimes a Great Notion" by Ken Kesey to be my favorite literary masterpiece, but the work of Jim Harrison was very influential when I was first deciding to pursue writing as a craft, or vocation.  Also: Tony Earley's "Jim the Boy", Tom Franklin's "Poachers", and Annie Proulx's "The Shipping News".

Cathy Sultan

No, it was my personal experiences living in Beirut during its civil war that led me to start writing and to be more specific it was my son who asked me to write about our fifteen years in Lebanon from ’69 to ’84 that led me to learn to write.

Brett Beach

In college, I picked up Michael Byer’s short story collection The Coast of Good Intentions. Before, I had read short stories, probably the ones that everyone reads in high school: “A Rose For Miss Emily” and “Roman Fever” and “Hills Like White Elephants” and…well, others that didn’t stick. A thing that troubles me is the insistence that the “classics” must be appreciated, especially by seventeen year olds. I am a well-read, curious sort of fellow, and I promise, I just didn’t understand Faulkner or Welty or Wharton or Fitzgerald, and especially not Hemingway. Eventually, appreciation came, but at first?—nope.

Byer’s collection though, did what all good writing does: in each story, it was as if a hand were reaching out to guide me along. Here is the world, the book said. Here is a place. Do you see it? Do you smell it? Do you hear it?

In the collection’s first story, about a lonely, retired teacher slowly beginning a relationship with a woman he knew years before, Byer writes, “I was drunk but not drunk enough to say what I wanted, that we don’t live our lives so much as come to them, as different people and things collect around us.” The line struck me then, as it does now, as a perfect example of writing’s magic, which is to put into words the very thing I didn’t realize needed to be said.

Oh, I remember thinking as my heart broke, and I longed with impatience to know which people and which things would gather around me as I grew old: I want to do that.

Dear Writer - September 2017

The Guild is thrilled to feature a brand new monthly column!

Here’s how it works: each issue, a local writer will offer a question pertaining to the writing life.  Then, our anonymous columnist (who we affectionately call “Writer”!) will attempt to respond.  The answers won’t always be perfect, but they’ll always be heartfelt.  And they’ll always be meant to bring our community a bit closer.

---

Dear Writer,

I’ve been thinking about writing you for awhile now, but I was always afraid I’d never quite be able to briefly put my question into words.  You see, my problem’s pretty complicated, but it’s also one shared by a lot of us.  After some serious soul-searching, I think I’ve managed to boil it down to a single question.  Here goes: why does my writing suck?

Sincerely,
Boohoo Me

---

Dear Boohoo,

Once upon a time, back when I was an undergraduate and the words were easy, I wrote a story about a boy who fell in love with a girl in chemistry class.  Upon reading my final product, I immediately knew one thing for sure: my story was awesome!  In fact, it was probably in the top ten best stories ever written in the English language.  It had everything: love, drama, and even a nice extended metaphor related to human “chemistry” and the scientific version.  Yes, it was one for the ages, and when it was picked up by a magazine a few months later, I was hardly surprised.

Fast forward a couple of months, whereupon rereading it, a few new facts came to light.  First, my story was not awesome.  In fact, I’d wager to guess it’s probably in the top ten worst stories ever written in the English language. Yes, on the surface it had everything—love, drama, and more!—but all that story had was surface.  Which is another way of saying: it had about as much depth as a puddle.  The characters were flat, the plot was contrived, and my extended metaphor couldn’t have been more transparent if I’d tacked on a title like, “Chemistry, like Love Chemistry, Get It?”

Anyway, I guess most of my readers got it—all four of them.  While that tenth-tier now-defunct online magazine had seen fit to publish the piece, I sleep easier knowing that story’s pretty well hidden in the bowels of the internet.  Though not hidden enough for my liking.

I won’t sit here and tell you that your writing doesn’t suck.  Not because I don’t want to (I do!), but because it would be disingenuous to make an assessment based solely on the caliber of the writing revealed in your question to me.  What I can tell you is that many writers worth their salt are stricken with similar bouts of self-doubt.  To my mind, that’s a good thing.  A “writer” who thinks he churns out pure gold is a “writer” who I can only refer to as a “writer” in quotation marks.  True writers (note the lack of quotation marks) understand that the struggle is part of the process.  And that the longest, hardest struggles often end with the greatest sense of accomplishment.

Which is to say: if you think your writing sucks, you’re in good company.  The best company.  

Now back to the keys, my friend,
Writer

Solving for ‘X’ and ‘Y’: Finding Identity at Cirenaica

By Erin Stevens

Two weeks before arriving at Cirenaica, I was having what I’d like to call an identity crisis. It had been two months or so since I’d been able to sit down at my laptop or notebook and write something of substance. Any ideas that had sounded promising in my head only seemed to fizzle out after a page or two一 or worse, after the first paragraph. 

If this sounds like your average bout of writer’s block, it’s a little more than that. It wasn’t just that I couldn’t get the words to come out—I wasn’t finding time to even try to write. I’d gotten out of my routine of getting up early and writing, instead found myself hitting the snooze button every morning (sometimes hitting it twice). When I’d get home from work, I’d opt for a book or Netflix, something that didn’t require the brainpower I’d already been using for the past eight hours. 

At the end of all this, I started having a recurring thought: what if I’m not a writer anymore? And considering that I started writing when I was in middle school, the next thought was, who am I if I’m not a writer anymore? 

When I got to Cirenaica for the Young Adult fiction writers residency, I was excited, but I also felt a little bit like a fraud. Do I even belong here right now? I wondered. 

About three hours later that first night, after reconnecting with old friends and eating my third plate of guacamole, Marsha Qualey, our fearless leader and writer-in-residence for the weekend, taught us the secret formula for writing a Young Adult novel or middle grade series: 

‘X’ + ‘Y’ = identity

In the equation, ‘x’ stands for power that either a character does or doesn’t have, while ‘y’ represents belonging. Both of these components contribute to a character’s identity. 

What struck me about this was that we were talking about fictional characters, but this equation could easily apply to me and my identity as a writer. While I had the power to write and to not hit the snooze button, I was choosing to give what power I had to the fatigue and laziness I feel after a long work day or week. Likewise, while the Twin Cities boasts many bookstores, publishing companies, and even a literary center, in the three years I’ve lived here, I haven’t been able to find a local writing community to help push me and keep me accountable; there was no sense of belonging. 

Should I have been allowing a lack of community to keep me from writing? Maybe not, but what the Chippewa Valley Writers Guild has taught me is that a writer is only as strong as the community that supports them. Without people to talk to about my writing, without learning from and being inspired by the creativity of others, it all felt a little pointless. 

As the weekend progressed, it turned out that Cirenaica was great for helping me solve this equation. Eager to make the most of my weekends and the four hours of quiet writing time each morning, I found myself setting my alarm much earlier than I normally would on a weekend一 and I didn’t hit the snooze button once! I’d enjoy my coffee and breakfast on the deck, and then tuck myself away in the library/loft area of the cabin to write. The writing time almost hit a reset button, and I felt myself regaining control (or power). Without even realizing it, I’d solved for x. 

As a Cirenaica returnee, I knew I could count on two things: gaining about twenty pounds because the food is so damn good, and finding belonging and community. Cirenaica reconnected me with old friends and connected me with new ones. We all came from different backgrounds, but our passion for writing was the common denominator that bonded all of us together. That bond led to positive, productive and constructive workshop sessions. It also led to friendships and commitment to keep one another accountable long after the weekend was over. And as if that wasn’t enough, on the final night of the residency, 11 of us read our work to a full house, with members of the community and Cirenaica alums coming out to show their support. 

If that doesn’t provide someone with a sense of belonging, then I don’t know what does, but for me this did the trick. This solved for y. 

Before I knew it, the weekend was over. We were packing our bags and loading up our cars, ready to head back to our regular lives. While I’d felt that I’d grown made a lot of progress as a writer, and I’d learned so much from Marsha and the other writers at the retreat, I worried if it would all be lost when I went back to work on that Tuesday, and when I had family and friends wanting to make plans. When the words wouldn’t flow, and I didn’t have four hours of dedicated writing time to wait for them. Would I slip back into my self-doubt as a writer?

Maybe at some point I will, but with only a few weeks passing since I last saw the YA writing crew, I’ve been more committed to my writing than I have been in the last year. And when I sense my confidence in my writing identity wavering, I’ll think about big paper writing exercises and positive, constructive workshops. I’ll think about sitting around a fire, sharing stories while the fireflies winked from within the woods. I’ll think about hot coffee enjoyed outside on a cool July morning, while talking with fellow writers about the endless possibilities for writers.

I’ll think of the community that always finds a way to reinforce my identity. 

Until next summer, Cirenaica. 

#Cirenaica2017 #MandatoryHashtag #Hashtag #RecoveringGuacamoleAddictThanksToBrent

(School) Year-End Review

Where Are We?

By B.J. Hollars

As another academic year winds down—dorms turning to ghost towns, school hallways buffed and shined and silenced—I wanted to take a moment to reflect on a few of the Guild’s major accomplishments since its founding in February 2016; specifically, related to our economic and cultural impact in the Chippewa Valley and beyond. We have much to be proud of, and we have you to thank!

Economically speaking, by summer’s end the CVWG will have provided our region with approximately $33,000 in economic impact, the result of hosting a total of 12 residencies, 11 of which were held (or will be held) at Cirenaica, as well as one residency which took place at The Ox Bow Hotel last February. Now, to be clear, this does not mean our coffers are full.  Far from it!  Rather, this is the amount of money that has cycled through our community as a result of our efforts to bring high-impact writing opportunities to the community. Simply put, what began as a humble organization has now become a significant contributor to our local economy, and we couldn’t be prouder. 

Culturally speaking, the CVWG continues to provide an array of high-impact opportunities throughout the region. One way in which we fulfill this mission is through our craft talk series. Currently we’ve hosted 13 craft talks—all of which are free and open to the public. These talks have featured an array of writers and editors, from Michael Perry, Nickolas Butler and Allyson Loomis, to literary agent Erik Hane, Barstow and Grand editor Eric Rasmussen, and Julian Emerson, Dan Lyksett and Eric Lindquist from The Leader-Telegram, among many others. Next September we’re pleased to host Holly Harden, a former writer for Garrison Keillor’s A Prairie Home Companion. In addition to these regular events, we’ve also hosted several new initiatives, including two “Poetry & Popcorn” events in partnership with Chippewa Valley Technical College, a “Joy to the Word” holiday reading for the community, as well as a live production of War of the Worlds which—thanks to UW-Eau Claire Foundation support—was later broadcast on Blugold Radio. I’m thrilled to announce that as a result of this latter partnership, the Eau Claire Community Foundation has generously awarded Blugold Radio and the CVWG a grant to allow us future collaborations as well.

Though there’s much to be excited about, perhaps our most notable contribution over the past year is the creation of a new publication, Barstow & Grand, which seeks to provide additional publication and professionalization opportunities for writers in our region. Writer and Memorial High School English teacher Eric Rasmussen serves as editor-in-chief, overseeing a team of 9 editors, all of whom bring a unique skillset and perspective to the editorial process. We’re grateful for the Eau Claire Regional Arts Council’s generosity in funding our inaugural issue, and we’re excited to share it with you next October.

In closing, a humble thank you for all you do to support the Guild.  Please take a moment to click here and check out our amazing sponsors, who have been vital in our organization’s success.  Additionally, to help our community grow, feel free to make a donation in the amount that’s right for you by clicking here.  If we all give a little, no one has to give a lot.

And with that, our newsletter signs off for the summer. Of course, we encourage you to check our website and social media platforms regularly to stay current on exciting opportunities taking place all summer long!

Most important of all, we wish you a wonderful summer of words.  Revel in them, relish them, and write them.

Be inspired.  Inspire others.

That’s Not Within My Practice

By Sarah Jayne Johnson

Around four months ago, I decided that I didn’t hate myself enough and began my journey into hot yoga. Perhaps you are unfamiliar with this flop sweat observance, and if that is the case allow me to explain; it’s yoga done in a room hot enough for the floor to open into heaven’s gates. If my calculations are correct, the room is kept at 900 degrees Fahrenheit and at one point they hold a lit match under your nose while calling you a maggot (okay, maybe I hyperbolize…but maybe…I don’t…) If you are looking for a spiritual journey of mind and body coming together as one, or a “self-help” saga into how to fully allow yourself to meditate then friend, you have lifted your hind leg upon the wrong tree.

I was first referred to hot yoga by my therapist, something I am very open about. If you have never seen a therapist and are able to do so, I highly recommend it. Having an unbiased person look intimately into your life and give an opinion that isn’t your mom saying, “you are better than the competition” or you best friend saying, “I’m sure you are just over qualified” is an cathartic experience. Their offices also smell great and usually have those essential oil diffusers that probably don’t really do anything other than make you think “Wow…I am relaxed”.

The first time I went to hot yoga I was nervous for a few choice reasons, the greatest one being “What if I yack all over my mat and then my upchuck sits there boiling in the Texan heat?” Luckily, no such tragedy ensued. In fact, after getting past the physical discomfort of doing movements in the core of the sun, I was starting to feel a little more confident. I wasn’t the best by any means, but I wasn’t falling over. It was then that a movement came along during which the instructor said, “If it is within your practice to do spider, please do so now” and out of the corner of my eye I saw a lean, tan, brightly dressed woman calmly prop her body into what I can only describe as sitting pretzel style in the air. I was overcome with inadequacy, self-comparison and (obviously) a looming dehydration.

After we had all “Namaste’d” and I quietly peeled myself from the floor to retrieve my things, I wondered how that was supposed to make me feel better. My limbs were burning (literally), my heart was pounding and I felt like Linus from Peanuts dragging my ripe mat next to my riper, fly attracting body. It was only the next day as every muscle from my big toe to my ear lobe throbbed in pain, did I recognize why it was important for me to witness a trapeze artist in hot yoga; it is okay if something is not within your practice.

As a creative writing major in college, I was forced to write in styles that I was (am) dreadful at. Styles like Science Fiction, Fantasy, Murder Mystery (okay fine, I didn’t have to write a murder mystery, but I guarantee it would be no dice), styles I watched others flourish at as I wrote self-deprecating notes on the back cover of my notebook. However eventually, I realized that the point of writing (as with many things) is not to be good at every single component of it, but rather to be outstanding at portions of it. Another perhaps, even greater point of writing (as with say, pulled pork) is to appreciate it for what it is and not overthink it. I learned not to compare my writing capabilities to others’ and to instead establish my own practices and procedures. I listened and appreciated others’ stories of far off lands and scientific something or others and I am sure they (reluctantly) listened to and appreciated my stories of grocery shopping and family gatherings. Just as I am not able to suspend my body in the air like a parrot, I am not able to write every kind of story there is to write; and that’s okay.

I still go to hot yoga. I still watch the woman levitate in the air and fly around the room like a ghost and wonder “how does she do that?” The difference is that now, I look at her with a sense of appreciation and respect instead of a sense of envy or disdain. I think of how perhaps she can’t play the jaw harp as well as I can, or eat green olives in large, undisclosed quantities. I respect her for her abilities and I like to think she (especially the jaw harp) respects me for mine.

I think it is important to write (and live) for yourself and hope others find relatability in the parts they can’t do themselves. You will not write the next Harry Potter, so stop trying. The wizards won, the owls went home and Harry is drinking spiked punch in Tahiti. I will continue to write about my trials and tribulations, whether they are hot yoga or hot ham and cheeses, I WILL BE HEARD! And I encourage every writer to do the same, because I want to read what is within your practice.

Eau Claire Alumni Publishes her First Book of Poetry: girls their tongues

By Jeana Conder 

Abigail Zimmer, alumni from UW-Eau Claire, has just published her first full length book of poetry, girls their tongues.  She completed her undergraduate work at UW-Eau Claire before accepting a graduate program at Columbia College in Chicago where she currently resides.  She has also published other chapbooks, fearless as I seam and child in a winter house brightening.  I got the opportunity to ask Abigail a few questions about her new book and how the Eau Claire area influenced her writing.  

CVWG: Is there a recurring theme in girls their tongues?

Abigail: Water appears often. The book begins with rained out performance art and ends with a car's moving windshield wipers. Water as tears/grief, as weather, as form-finding, as a body of water—lakes and rivers—which is a sort of home to me. The poems in this collection are from many different speakers, all women, with undercurrents of loss, an obsession with happiness and measurements, and a need to tell a story, to say simply what it is she sees. 

Has your experience living in Eau Claire shaped the content of this book?

Very much so. Eau Claire is where I met and fell in love with my husband, where we heard the diagnosis of cancer, where his family still lives. The long process of grieving him—and my memories of our time together—form the basis of the book. Some time after, I moved to Chicago, a city that I first felt was abrasive and lonely but have come to appreciate the surprising moments of intimacy between strangers—crushed up against each other on the train, good weather or city-wide celebrations calling everyone to the streets. Though unnamed, these two cities are the poems' landscapes.

How does girls their tongues differ from your chapbooks fearless as I seam and child in a winter house brightening?

The chapbooks each function as one long poem that makes or remakes a mythology: fearless as I seam is a series of prose poems that follow the protagonist on a journey through another world, while child in a winter house brightening retells the ugly duckling story with the duckling rescued by an ugly child. The poems in girls their tongues are not as explicitly cohesive, though as a collection they shape an emotional arc of the grieving process, of the disconnect experienced when one is forced to revise her reality. And while some of the poems have elements of the fantastical or pageantry, many chronicle small, everyday moments and interactions in a more personal voice than the chapbooks.

Do you have a poetic style you stick to in this book or did you experiment with various styles?

I don't fully understand the form of a poem I am writing until I am halfway through it, and even then it's often changed in revision, influenced by the forms of other poems in the project or perhaps what I am reading. There are a few long poems in the book in which I attempted to rely on space rather than line breaks for pacing and to convey formally an absence. And there are two series of poems threaded through the book, which repeat the same form. The "portrait" poems are short blocks of text made up of broken phrases to mimic a kind of stuttering, moving toward more fluid prose sentences as the narrator regains speech. The "sisters" poems follow two sisters on a series of adventures involving the high seas, a cooking show, deer hunting, and interior decoration. Keeping the forms the same I hope provides a familiar anchor for the reader, especially for those who don't usually read poems.  

Any advice for young writers seeking to do what you do?

Be gentle with yourself! It's okay if you go through times of not writing or if your work keeps getting rejected. Neither are failures. Being on both sides of the author and publisher process, I've realized how rejections do not reflect or define your work. Perhaps the editor enjoyed it but went with another piece or didn't think it quite fit the aesthetics of the press. Perhaps she was in a bad mood and barely looked at it, which is frustrating but does not mean your work is unlovable. I think what ultimately matters is that you become a person who is watching and reading and absorbing and considering until your reflections begin to take a form, whether that's in writing or another creative outlet, whether you write every day or only during specific seasons in your life.

 Girls their tongues can be ordered HERE

5 Reasons To Sign Up For New York Times bestselling author June Melby’s Memoir Residency

June Mebly (Image: Parker Deen)

by Erin Stevens

When writing memoir you have to stick to the truth.  You can’t invent characters, or make your mother into a Soviet spy.  You might have an uncle who’s interesting, but he’ll shoot you if you tell. So, how do you keep the reader riveted?  Are you expected to reveal your most embarrassing family secrets?  What are the ethical lines, and how do you keep from crossing them? Join New York Times bestselling author June Melby (My Family and Other Hazards; Henry Holt, 2014) for three days focused on writing and revising highly readable narratives from real events in your life.  

➜ Learn about June Melby's Summer (2017) Writer's Residency at Cirenaica

See below for five fantastic reasons to spend three days working on your craft with June Melby this summer:

1. Share your work with a New York Times bestselling memoirist

It takes a special kind of writer to make the New York Times bestseller list, and June is that special kind of writer!  Her debut memoir, My Family and Other Hazards has been hailed as “enchanting” and “an outpouring of tender, witty memories” according to Publisher’s Weekly.  Click here for an excerpt.

2. She knows Wisconsin

Having grown up in Wisconsin, June knows our region well.  And not just geographically, mind you, but emotionally as well.  As proof, check out this delightful piece, “Don’t Go To Wisconsin,” featured on Wisconsin Public Radio’s “Wisconsin Life” by clicking here. 

3.She was the voice of the alien Bang in Space Jam! 

Maybe it’s a stretch to say June co-starred alongside Michael Jordan in the movie Space Jam, but her voice certainly did!  In addition to being a fine writer, June has also done some cool voice work, recorded CDs, won poetry slams, and much more.  According to her website, she is a writer, spoken word artist, and yes, even a mammal!  To learn more about her diverse talents, click here.

4. She loves chocolate

Or at least calls upon chocolate for the answer to any truncated questions by us!  See this interview for more about chocolate, her influences, and what to expect this summer at Cirenaica.

5. Special Guest BJ Hollars

Yes, the Chippewa Valley Writers Guild’s founder and UWEC’s very own BJ Hollars will swing by to talk about his latest nonfiction project.  And if you ask nicely, maybe he’ll even regale you with stories on extinct birds, Bigfoot, and his typewriter collection.  (Well, he’ll probably “regale you with stories” on these subjects whether you ask nicely or not…don’t say we didn’t warn you!)

What are you waiting for?  Give yourself the gift of time, support and community this summer.  Click here to apply for June Melby’s “The Art of Memoir” today!

Living to Write

by Karissa Zastrow

I think the best advice I was given about writing had little to do with the technique of writing at all. As a creative writing student, I was given a lot of advice on how to write, such as kill your darlings, put every word on trial, and show, don’t tell. All of those recommendations are important, but looking back, the best piece of advice I received had nothing to do with how I was writing. On the last day of my fiction writing workshop class, our professor told us in order to become better writers, all we had to do was get out there and live.

At the time, I thought I was living. After all, I was going to class, working, doing homework with coffee, and drinking every night, sacrificing sleep because you never know what could happen. Yes, those were fun and exciting times, and I always had plenty to write about, but you can’t live like that forever.

Four months later, I found myself in my first full-time job, where I let my life be ruled by work, unable to figure out how to find a decent work/life balance. I saved the weekends for trying to keep up with my old lifestyle, but even then, it wasn’t the same. I thought that once I graduated, I would have all this time to write and then be well on my way to having something that was publishable. I fell into an endless routine and slowly, my creativity dwindled and writing was put on the back burner. Many times, I would sit down to write, but my words would run dry a sentence or two into typing. Feeling stuck and uninspired, I was ready to give up on writing completely. 

That’s when I needed a change. I quit my job and traveled to Europe, which I had been dreaming of for years. The second day into my journey, my brain started swirling with ideas for poems, short stories, and the need to document my adventures. Whenever we weren’t out exploring, I was writing—on the train rides, buses, planes, hanging out in parks, before bed, and after I woke up. I was bursting with creativity and for the first time in a long while, I felt alive. After coming back, that creative energy carried over and I worked four very different part time jobs to make ends meet. I didn’t have much time, but there was no shortage of ideas when I started to write. 

About six months ago, I took a full time job and I found myself falling back into a routine. My life wasn’t exciting and when I started to write, I couldn’t find the words. I was back in a slump, and I didn’t know how to change it. But, in February, I attended the Winter Writers Retreat at The Oxbow, and set aside that whole weekend for myself and my writing. The day of the retreat, I produced a piece of nonfiction and was pleasantly surprised with how it turned out. I started setting aside time to write a little more. Three weeks later, I traveled to the east coast to interview at a graduate school where I had been accepted for creative writing. While wandering the streets of Pittsburgh, ideas started popping into my head and between the interview and the informational meetings, I made myself comfortable on the campus terrace and wrote until I didn’t have anything left to say.

In the last few weeks, I have found more to write about than I have in the last three years. All of these different experiences, made me realize that a change of scenery, meeting new people, and trying new things inspires me to write and develop new ideas for all sorts projects. Since February, I’ve been seeking out new experiences locally, and so far, I have watched a soccer game in a snowstorm, pet stingrays in Iowa, visited Minneapolis, and made a trip down to Platteville. All these experiences have somewhat pushed me out of my comfort zone and given me a lot of inspiration for pieces that I wouldn’t have created if I had just stayed at home. Getting out of my comfort zone and pushing myself has not only taught me a lot about myself, but also about my writing and creativity.

It’s been almost four years since I sat in my fiction workshop and was told to go out and live, and I’m finally starting to figure out what my professor meant. Living is a way to figure out what inspires you as a writer and what gives you material for your work. As I mentioned earlier, through living, I learned what fuels my writing. Every writer is different and what feeds their creativity is different as well. Some writers are able to keep the routine of everyday life and are inspired by the beautiful, little things they find each day. Plus, if we don’t live, how are we going to be able to describe our experiences to our readers? So, my fellow writers, let’s get out there and live! I can’t wait to hear all of your stories.

Exploring Boundaries and Identities in José Alvergue's New Book precis

Dr. José Alvergue (Image via theforeworduwec.com)

by Jeana Conder

José Alvergue was born in San Salvador, El Salvador and was raised on the U.S./Mexico border.  He is a graduate of Buffalo Poetics and CalArts Writing programs.  José has written other works such as gist : rift : drift : bloom.  José currently teaches at the University of Wisconsin Eau Claire.

His latest work precis, released on April 1, tells the tale of a girl that was killed by a drunk driver in San Diego’s Sidro neighborhood.  José takes the reader on a journey between the literal U.S. and Mexico border and the border between individuals, bodies, and communities.  Below is a brief interview with José on the content of his new book and the thought behind the format. 

CVWG: Precis, by simple definition means a concise summary of essential points, statements, or facts. How do you feel the title of your book reveals itself within your work and impacts the meaning?

Alvergue: The definition of the word was really important for me when thinking about the composition of the book. It’s an indication of knowledge, or knowing when it comes to people, place, and history. But it’s also an indication of genre in the sense that genre choreographs certain cultural expectations, values, and reveal reading practices: for example, the ways a cultural belief around “criminality” or “precarity” forms reading practices related to “border literature” or “immigrant literature.” I want to disrupt the continuity of these expectations with the story/-ies in the book. In many ways this is very similar to the Russian avant garde practice of factography from the 1920s, but it is also influenced by current day postlyric practices that treat language between its concreteness, and its social identity. You can’t summarize the assembly of the social, even if concreteness wants to show ‘the social’ as a static body––this gets even more entangled the more specific we are about the particular assembly in question. In this case, borders. There’s a review of the book I read recently and it sort of frustrated me because it assumed the names in the book are of immigrants, all of them. But this is not the case. There are Americans that live at the border too, yet the narratives concretized around border experiences are of immigrant contexts, which, as an expectation, not only reduces the heterogeneity of lives, but also essentializes one immigrant experience as a summary the many. So I include various instruments of summary: maps, etymological definitions, linguistics, industrial organization flow charts, finger tips, and ‘story’, both invented and non-fiction, but do not allow the gratification of the summary to complete expectation.

From the excerpt I read on the Omnidawn website, precis seems to be different than your average novel. Precis plays with structure, creating different emotions. From newspaper clippings, blacked out text, and more, how do you hope the reader will receive your message from such a unique format?

The first thing I guess is that I don’t imagine it as a novel. There’s a really great description of one of my favorite books, Theresa Cha’s Dictée, by a prominent scholar, who calls the book a recit. I really like this way of talking about books that are conscious of genre only if for the intent of unsettling genre as boundary––or I guess treating genre exactly as that, boundaries that can be approached without destroying what makes them such––a boundary. Like walking along that dynamic terrain where a body of water territorializes and recedes from a terrain. It gets cloudy and one leaves an imprint, but the wash always resets the boundary. That’s the beauty of genre. You can’t break them. I would hope that potential readers understand that. Experimental or conceptual work won’t undo identity, particularly a reader’s identity; they seek to expand the topology or landscape we envision ourselves to inhabit. Poetry is about nuance, not reduction. I think these existential questions related to Literature must also account for area literature, like US Ethnic literature; it’s not just for the big white authors of ‘Western Civilization’. I would hope that they understand the politics of this intervention as well.

Precis focuses on the literal border between the United States and Mexico, but also focuses on the boundaries between individuals and communities. Do you think one has to understand the broader aspects of divides to truly understand the impacts of the border between the two countries?

I don’t know if one needs to understand “divides” but rather be comfortable with the prospect of caesuras that are unbreachable. We can exist within difference without imposing homogeneity. The existentialism of this is important when it comes to considering legislation, because the ‘planning’ or the beliefs undergirding the support for political institutionalisms feeds into the feedback loop, which we experience as phobias. I think these fears, homophobia, xenophobia, and more specifically Islamophobia, are partially existential––a deep fear that the mere acknowledgement or presence of a person that exists in a state of difference to the normative will unrattle the veneer behind which Americaneity often resides. We all experience “divides,” but we also can’t level them as being the same. What we should be thinking about is the way a constructed fear is appropriated as a personal way of being American.

You start off your synopsis of the book by describing the border as "a policed realm, neoliberal market." With the newly founded Republican controlled government, do you hope Precis can make a political stand against the erasure of identity of those effected by the border?

The stand can never be structural to the degree necessary for actual protection against the policies that will prey and are currently preying on the already precarious. The project of conceptual poetry is one of meaning; it’s meant to encourage an enchantment with language in a manner that invites the invention of meaning on behalf of another, another who is not the writer or the lyric persona of the text: in other words, the reader. We often don’t realize that we place meaning back in the world with the ways we interact with representation. It’s not about purely binary, good/bad, do something/don’t do something responses. It’s about nuance. I think the stand against erasure begins with a recognition––as a self-care––of our own capacity to involve ourselves in the making of meaning.

From the Mouths of Writers 1: The Best Advice You Ever Received

by Jeana Conder

A couple of weeks ago I set out on the task of asking local writers to answer a series of eight questions I compiled.  The responses I received are now creating our newest series, “From the Mouth of Writers.”  We hope that this series allows upcoming writers to gain knowledge from others with the same passion. This week’s question:

What is the best advice you have received about writing?

Allyson Loomis

A poet once told me that all you have to do to be a writer is (1) LIVE (2) READ (3) WRITE (4) THINK ABOUT WRITING (5) REPEAT UNTIL DEAD.  I’ve always thought that was a sound checklist.  I routinely share it with my students.

Sandra Lindow

When I was a sophomore in high school, my English teacher said that I didn’t need to “try to be different”.  He believed that I was “different enough” to become a successful writer by just writing the truth about myself.

Molly Patterson

The best advice given to me as a writer was to try different techniques, to push myself outside of my comfort zone. I used to live in San Francisco and had been writing for some time when I took a class with the Writers Studio. Their model was based on reading a published writer's piece, breaking down the various techniques in terms of voice, point of view, style, and approach, and then using those techniques as guidelines for beginning a piece of your own. This method helped me become much smarter as a writer and reader: by forcing me to take on different styles and voices, I expanded my range. The surprise is that in the process, I developed my own voice as a writer. I would recommend this process to anyone.

Bruce Taylor

“A fool on a fool’s journey would be a fool to stop.” Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

Jon Loomis

Read everything and write every day.  I don’t necessarily follow it, but it’s great advice.  

Marsha Qualey

I have been teaching for ten years in a low-residency MFA program. Twice a year the students and faculty meet on campus (Hamline University) and the writing talk flows. I have taken in so much great advice, but possibly the most eternally pertinent to my own writing comes from a faculty colleague, Claire Rudolf Murphy, who likes to pound the podium and urge “Cut the exclamation marks.” That caution is about much more than punctuation, of course. My writing leans toward the emotional and I need to monitor that aspect all the time. Looking for exclamation marks is a good approach.

Sandra McKinney

Write every day; in a journal or otherwise. Meditation.  

Jay Gilbertson

I have been given a ton. As any published writer who has been around will tell you. I suggest you attend workshops or take classes and read writing books (or any book, for that matter) and look over the acknowledgements to see what inspired that particular author. Don’t Stop Writing! Oh, and read and read and read and NOT just in your genre.

Nickolas Butler

Read, read, read.  There's no way you're going to become a great writer, without first becoming a great reader. 

Brett Beach

In an interview on the Longform podcast, Cheryl Strayed talked about the success of her memoir, Wild. Paraphrasing here, she notes that the success was one part luck—extraordinary luck of the kind that so rarely happens, it should not be a thing people wish for—but, more importantly, she had written the best book she could, so that when luck came, she was ready. In other words, she had worked hard. Really, she had worked her butt off.

I think about this all the time: that of all the things writers believe they can control, in truth the only thing we can do is work, and do the best work possible. I believe deeply in working hard. I take writing seriously, and do not romanticize it (no lit candles, no prayers to a muse, no special pen, no writer’s block). Nor do I treat writing an occasional hobby. The writers I know, and respect the most, have all found ways to make space in their lives for writing. Writers prioritize writing—are sometimes even selfish about it. (Ha! Ha! you laugh. Does he have kids yet?) The act of creation can be wonderful, and frustrating, and euphoric, but it is also a choice I make each day when I sit down: I am a writer. I am here to write. So I do the work.  

Cathy Sultan

Things: Always be honest. Your reader will know if you aren’t; Write about something you know and are passionate about.

Teaching and Learning in Writing 101

By Brady Krien

On my first day of teaching college writing I handed out 3x5 note cards to my students and asked them to give me a little bit of information to help me get to know them. I asked for their name, their major, why they chose Marquette, and their favorite Tom Hanks movie. I also asked a few questions aimed at getting a sense of who they were as writers, asking what they struggled with most, what their semester goals were, and if there was anything that I should know about them as writers.

The responses were mostly unsurprising. Students were anxious about commas and the higher stakes of college, many just wanted to get through the class and improve their writing a little (or, in one case, to improve their “grammer”), and none of them had heard of Joe versus the Volcano. What I did not expect was the number of students who claimed that they were “bad writers.” Over half the class claimed to be poor writers.

Looking back, having repeated some version of this same activity with each of my classes, I should not have been surprised. This was the most common response that I received at Marquette and continues to be the most common response I receive at my current institution in Iowa. The odd thing is that very few, if any, of the students that I work with are bad writers. There are writers who occasionally produce bad writing, writers who’ve convinced themselves that they “write better on the first draft” and never revise, and writers who don’t yet understand a topic well enough to make a compelling argument about it, but there are few out-and-out bad writers. 

What I’ve come to understand is that this bad writer claim is less a confession of compositional incompetence than a request for help. It’s a way of saying that 1) writing is really hard, and 2) writing scares the bejeezus out of me. These sentiments are not uncommon, even (or perhaps especially) among people who write a lot. As I’ve worked with students to overcome these challenges, I’ve found that my own understanding of writing has profoundly changed. The three most salient writing lessons I’ve taken from this experience are: 

1. Revision is Key. So many of my students come to college believing that they draft so well that revision is unnecessary (I confess that I shared in this delusion once upon a time). A significant portion of my teaching is devoted to converting them to the school of Anne Lamott: write shitty first drafts and revise extensively. As I’ve preached this particular writing gospel, my own revision process has expanded dramatically. I now devote at least as much time to revising as I do to drafting (and often more) and I’ve come to find an extensive revision process to be incredibly liberating for both myself and my students because it dramatically reduces the pressure to produce high-quality drafts.

2. Silence the Critic. I work with a lot of students who struggle to start writing. They’ll sit down, write a sentence or a paragraph, hate it, and delete it. They will then repeat some version of this process again and again until they either give up and go watch Netflix or the deadline forces them to accept work that they hate. I’ve found that silencing this inner critic by forbidding deleting anything during the drafting process (after all you’ll come back and revise it, right?) goes a long way toward getting words on the page, a necessary prerequisite to producing any writing.

3. Write for Time. I tell all my students set time rather than output goals. Anyone can commit to write for two half-hour blocks during the course of a day and this helps to alleviate the dread of sitting down and writing out the entirety of a ten-page paper which often leads to procrastination and no writing at all. I’ve found that committing to write for a little while every day drives writing productivity way up and the frequency of late night writing binges way down. Energy drink companies will suffer, but you will prosper.

I’m convinced that I’ve learned more about writing from my students than they ever learn from me. Observing their writing struggles and helping them to overcome them has been the best part of teaching writing and has helped my own writing dramatically. It’s helped me to understand that, while we all have very writing processes, there are a lot of shared roadblocks and talking about them, sharing them, and helping others to overcome them is sometimes the best way to move forward with your own writing.

Photo by Caleb Roenigk: https://flic.kr/p/brNqFE

“Talking about soup shouldn’t be this philosophical” (An interview with Cirenaica chef Brent Halverson)

Cirenaica chef Brent Halverson chats with our founder BJ Hollars about 2016's summer writing residencies, what to look forward to for this year's residencies, and the powerful meaning of sharing food with a new group of friends. Have a listen!

A Fond Reflection on Time Well Spent: Looking Back at Cirenaica 2016

By Tony Dee

Having spent the year leading up to Cirenaica teaching first-year writing courses, it was a delight to be on the “other side” of the classroom. Although in this particular instance, the “classroom” was a warm common area in a cabin (cannot stress this enough: on architecture and furnishings alone, Cirenaica scores a home run) and the teaching was a blissful break from my lectures on comma splices. Max Garland, poet-in-residence, had this magical ability to engage with our cohort on numerous levels—hard, theoretical, college seminar-prosody stuff—but made sure the humane integrity of the art remained intact. Discussion was both critical and generative, and I hadn’t spent that much time hunched over a notebook furiously burning through pages and wrist-strains since middle school (speaking of eras wrought with nostalgia and preciousness). Max was cheerleader and champion, scholar and peer; at several points he was also a park ranger (that was my second favorite Max) on a number of field trips, most memorably into the Wisconsin woods to behold Big Falls.

Despite the fast friendships, often, the best time was spent alone. The area surrounding the cabin offered many trails, opportunities to lose oneself if one was so inclined; had I conquered those grounds I suppose I would have taken advantage of one of the few up-for-grabs bicycles and rode into downtown Fall Creek, as one of my fellow writers did one morning.  I opted to go on a social trip to a bar in Fall Creek with several of my newest friends; from what I remember, we had a really, really good time. On our walk back up the hill to the cabin, we sat, laid back, and admired the stars, the moon, and probably discussed art, God, Her capability to create such a subtle spectacle. You know how writers are, yes?

Long days of discussion, invention, discovery, and revelry were fueled by gallons of coffee and some of the finest cooking I’ve ever had the pleasure to enjoy, and enjoying food is my passion if poetry isn’t. Chef Brent will forever hold a dear space in my heart as the mastermind behind cold oatmeal. Yes folks, cold oatmeal. Where creativity was being nourished, our physical bodies were being absolutely satiated. I’d say spoiled, but frankly, we deserved the delights if for no reason other than the talent and camaraderie on constant display during impromptu or planned readings, sharings, and workshops.

I now humbly submit, what could be a journal entry or piece of intentional writing, as my honest to gosh recounting of my arrival at Cirenacia last summer:

“Portrait of a writer in motion: vehicle peeling itself off the long expanse of yet another Midwestern highway that surely I would write a poem about after a day’s worth of driving. Well past Chicago by breakfast time, Detroit, Michigan, was time-zones away in the rear view mirror. My little car buckled getting onto a local highway, parts of which were dirt. One of the many talented Eau Claire bands I’d brought with me were quietly playing to the added percussion of anticipation and small stones underneath my tires. Clouds obscured the otherwise tremendous expanse of land that makes up the vistas of Fall Creek, Wisconsin. I thought back to my M.F.A. friends in California, trying their best for my benefit but just not getting the treasures our pastoral landscapes offer. As if to snap my attention from the often reviled throws of nostalgia and preciousness, a bolt of lightning punctuated the long sentence of a thunderstorm.

I’ll blame the torrent of rain rather than human error, despite my ever gracious hosts making it abundantly clear how to locate the difficult to spot entrance to Cirenaica; I had to turn around in the neighbor’s driveway, which was quite far away from the bold and blue letters announcing my temporary new home. A dirt driveway snaked up and away from the road, into a row of trees, suggesting what woods lie beyond. Through the clearing there appeared as if by magic the kind of cabin that would turn a person into a poet: sharp edges on a vaulted roof, logs and bricks, long windows offering gaze into our isolated surroundings. Rain pattered in puddles in the sloping lawn, leaves danced on their branches, and, fully embracing the (now) nostalgia of hyperbole, I realized I had arrived at a home like which I had never resided."

The stuff oozes out of me after the weekend of reinvention, hard work, and good writing. The details of my arrival are abundantly more available to me because, after being ushered in by an impossibly energetic and welcoming host (local Wisconsin beer in outstretched hand, I might add) BJ Hollars, the individual moments of the Max Garland Poetry Residency begin to blur. I’m positive I did some of the best writing I’ve ever done in my life; that’s including time spent in a graduate program for creative writing.

Two memories stick out most profoundly to me. First, the very same friend (from graduate school) who made Michigan-me aware of this little writing residency all the way in western Wisconsin, also heartily recommended visiting Eau Claire’s Pizza del Rey. Like I said, poetry and food are my passions. I was determined to visit this landmark. Not wanting to be anti-social, I offered to my new group of companions that, despite having just finished an enormous (and delicious) meal, I’d be going into town for some pizza, “anybody want to tag along?” Two full cars went from the cabin into town, and the rest of that tale is found between boozy and cheesy poems written in some journal, somewhere.

The second is bittersweet. I had quite a long drive ahead of me, so my last morning at Cirenaica was a short one. Hurried coffee, tossing clothes and books back into my bag, tossing that into the trunk, another hurried coffee, then goodbyes.

I drove away barely remembering the apprehension I’d driven into town with; if there’s a more likely group of friendly strangers than writers, I couldn’t guess who they’d be. Full of spirit, creative energy, and eyes fully locked on the rear view mirror well beyond the numerous state borders I crossed on my journey, the Spirit of Cirenaica, I knew, would be a constant companion for the many months ahead.

Until, hopefully, next summer.

Interview: Nickolas Butler

Nickolas Butler | Photo: Jeff Rogers

By Alison Wagener

Local writer Nickolas Butler's debut novel, Shotgun Lovesongs received international acclaim, a spot on the New York Times Bestsellers list, and a deal with Fox Searchlight. Raised in Eau Claire, Butler attended UW-Madison and then the acclaimed Iowa Writers Workshop before publishing the book, which contains multiple references to the Chippewa Valley. His second novel—The Hearts of Men—is poised to release on March 6.

This summer, Butler will return to Cirenaica to host a writer residency on the theory and practice of fiction. Details here!

We recently sat down with Butler to ask him a few questions...  

CVWG: The essential first question: did you always know you wanted to be a writer?

Butler: I think writing’s always been a big part of my life. I don’t think that I ever thought it could be my job maybe until I went to Iowa, and I started gaining a momentum, and I could see there was some kind of path for me moving forward. But I think when you grow up in the Midwest, the notion of dreaming of becoming a writer seems sort of far-fetched. So maybe even if that’s what I wanted to do, I never would have vocalized that.

So it just clicked for you sometime during college, you decided to pursue writing in grad school and everything fell into place?

I mean when I was going to grad school, my wife and son were living north of the Twin Cities, and I was commuting down to Iowa City from there. And it just felt like there was a lot at stake for my time in Iowa. What was my wife sacrificing for? Why was I away from my family if not to really work hard all the time? So I used my time really efficiently during that two years and was able to write two books while I was there, and I was lucky enough to get an agent halfway through my time there, so everything just kind of clicked, yeah.

Both Shotgun Lovesongs and your new book The Hearts of Men are set in the Chippewa Valley, the Eau Claire area. Is that you writing what you know best, or do you think it’s something more of a tribute?

It’s writing what I know best. This book takes place mostly north of Eau Claire; it’s in a Boy Scout camp kind of near Rice Lake. But it also ranges to Vietnam, to South Africa, to Botswana—so it’s kind of more around the world than Shotgun Lovesongs was. It’s what I know the best, but it’s also just what comes naturally, too. I’m not really interested in writing about anything else right now.

Were you a Boy Scout growing up? Do you think that played into your idea of what men should be?

Mm-hmm. Cub Scouts, Boy Scouts, ultimately an Eagle Scout, so yeah, I was going to camp from when I was eight until I was 16 or 17… I don’t know that I could say that I thought Boy Scouts necessarily was instructive of what I thought masculinity was going to be. For me it was ultimately more about being a good person than a good man or a good woman. The book is interested in masculinity, but I think that’s sort of separate from the Boy Scouts. It’s convenient that the Boy Scouts are there. But they’re not the same thing.

I think I was thinking about masculinity from more of the standpoint of being a young father, and thinking about the job my own dad did, and the job that I have to do moving forward. I don’t know that Boy Scouts really colored my idea of what masculinity is. At least I don’t think. Nobody’s asked me that before.

As I read, it seemed like Nelson sort of became a paragon of masculinity over time, even though he’d certainly gone through his own troubles and his own transformation. I was just wondering if for you, is what Nelson becomes your ideal of what men should be? Does that ideal even exist?

I don’t know that I think about Nelson as a paragon necessarily—I think what’s good about him and what’s good about most of the characters is that they’re trying to do their best, and it doesn’t always work out. But they’re trying. The notion that he has some kind of code, or thinks about a code, is what’s most important.

And the funny thing is, like, people think about the Boy Scouts as like a punch line, you know? If someone thought you were a dimwitted rube, they might say oh, you’re such a Boy Scout: you’re not complicated enough to act in an indecent way, or something like that. Like, what’s wrong with trying to have a code? What’s wrong with trying to be your best person? And also, is that possible? What happens when you fail – are you a bad person when you fail your code, if you can’t live by it all the time?

There’s quite a spectrum of morality and masculinity within your characters. Maybe I was reading a bit too much into the masculinity theme, but the book is very male-centric, with characters who do and don’t try to follow that code. What do you hope the men in your book collectively convey about what it means to live morally?

My dad, who was not always a very good dad, shares some of the same qualities as Johnathan. My dad’s dad, my grandpa, was often gone on merchant marine ships. He wasn’t around for my dad’s childhood. And I think even when he was around, he didn’t know what to do. He didn’t know what to do because his own dad died in a coal mining accident before he was born. So he had no exemplar. My dad used to tell me, “I’m not a good dad, but hopefully you’ll be better than me, and your son will be better than you.” So I think part of the job of the book, especially because it takes place over sixty years of history, is asking if we’re trying to become better.

Masculinity is a hyper-loaded word, and I never set out to make any sort of statement on that. I like to think about myself as a pretty sensitive person, and I’m raising both a son and a daughter right now. But I think the project of the book and of these characters is just to improve over time, to try and set a moral code out for themselves, and then try their best to live by it.

Can you tell us some more details about the release?

It’s coming out nationally March 7. There’s going to be a reading at Volume One March 6, so that’s kind of fun. By all rights, everything seems to be going just as well as it could be. We’ve gotten three-starred reviews from Library Journal, Kirkus, Publisher’s Weekly—Publisher’s Weekly called it one of the top ten books to look forward to this spring. It was nominated for the highest foreign literary achievement in France—this one actually meant a lot to me—it was nominated for another one of France’s highest foreign literary achievements by an all-female jury. It’s called the Prix Femina. It’s an award that’s always been selected by a female jury, so I love that. Made me feel good that this book that is kind of dominated by male characters was accepted that way, and I think they could see that I was critiquing male behavior, not celebrating it necessarily. So you never know, the New York Times could take a big shit on it tomorrow, and that would stink. But I wrote the book I wanted to write, and so far it seems to be going pretty good.

Cirenaica writer's retreat, Summer 2016

So let’s shift a bit. Last year, what do you think went best with your Cirenaica residency? Do you think there’s some things you’ll do differently this coming summer?

The one thing I was fortunate to have last year was a great group dynamic. We had about ten people who really seemed to get along right from the start. That’s really important to me, whether it’s teaching at Cirenaica or teaching at UW-Eau Claire, whatever it is. You need to make everyone in the workshop feel valued and feel comfortable, because it’s not about just listening to me pontificate. There would be no point in having a workshop, then. It would be better if it was just one-on-one teaching. I need everybody to be invested in the group, and I need everyone to be comfortable listening to one another’s criticisms. We were very lucky that last year went that way. I hope that this summer’s group has that same kind of camaraderie and spirit. In terms of what could be improved on? I don’t know. I thought we had a really good first year. There’s going to be air conditioning this year, which is a big step up. There’s gonna be a printer, which is a big deal. The first year, we were just trying to feel things out, like what is this space, how do we use this space, what do we need, what do we have? I don’t mean to paint too rosy of a picture, but it really was a nice experience for everyone.

Well it sounds like an amazing break from real life – you get to go sit in the middle of the woods and do what you love for a few days.

Yeah, and we had a range of talents, which I frankly think is good, because if you’re just starting off your writing, and you’re exposed to somebody who’s doing really good, advanced writing and exposing you to something you can strive for, I think if everybody comes in at the same level, then there’s more room for jealousy or petty bickering or something like that. I’m looking forward to it.

Have you thought about what you’re going to be focusing on yet, what you’ll do during the residency?

I’m going to conduct it the same way I did last year, which is basically that everyone gets a workshop, everyone gets a one-on-one meeting with me. Everyone gets a handwritten critique from me, and then I’ll just be around to chat. And I think sometimes a workshop is for the piece and for the person who’s being critiqued, but sometimes the most important stuff that a person learns is from casual conversations when you’re having a beer. How did you do that? How did you find an agent? How did you get published in a literary journal? Questions like that. And it’s hard to find a casual resource for some of those questions. But that’s what this thing is for, to learn how to break through and make your way.

Anything else?

I mean, I hope we fill up the Volume One store March 6. It will be a fun night, and then everyone is invited to go across the street to the Lakely, and we’ll have drinks afterwards. I think it’s pretty special that the release date is a day early, and it’s here in Eau Claire, which is cool. As far as Cirenaica goes, my hope is that at the end of the weekend, my workshop feels like they’ve created nine or ten new friends. That these people communicate with each other and move forward after that. And I hope that they get good feedback from me, and that it’s – I’ve been told that my workshops are very useful. We don’t waste a lot of time. The idea is to give you positive feedback right off the bat and then work with you about what’s not working quite as well. So I think people will come out of it feeling like they’ve got direction moving forward, and that they’ve also got a support group moving forward. And it’s set in a beautiful spot, it’s pretty cheap. People should use it.

Learning to Write, Again and Paterson

Alex Tronson (center)

By Alex Tronson

Dear Past Self,

About a year after you graduate from UW-Eau Claire, you may find that your general willpower to write has begun to slip a bit. It won’t be for lack of time, (trust me, you’ll have plenty of that), but because you’ll be afraid. (Who was it who said there is no such thing as writer’s block, only fear?)

Maybe that sounds silly to you, Past Self, to be afraid of writing. But with time I’m sure you’ll come to understand that it’s a necessary hurdle in any creative process, and you’ll learn to overcome it. Which isn’t to say you won’t be writing at all during this time, but surely not as much as you once did, and surely not as well. Right?

During this time, you’ll remember your writing workshops, and how there was always a consistent source of feedback. You were never more than a few weeks away from finding out what was wrong with your work. Even if you didn’t always agree with your peers, there was still a supportive group of like-minded individuals committed to helping you improve your craft.

But when you graduate, Past Self, it will be intimidating to write on your own. Until you’ve embedded yourself in the literary community, how will you know if your characters are underdeveloped? Or if your narrative is too slowly paced? Or if your dialogue is unrealistic? You will find yourself asking these questions often, creating a disconnect between your ambitions and your execution. You won’t have trouble getting butt-in-the-chair, (again, trust me, you sit a lot) but you will struggle with overcoming the fear of writing a bad story.

All right, Past Self, allow me to pivot for just a moment to inspiration, which you already know we cannot wait for, but have to find for ourselves.

Sometime in the future, you will pinch your jacket shut against the cold (the zipper on our favorite jacket will be broken) and you will go out to see the new Jim Jarmusch film called Paterson.

The film shows a week in the life of Paterson, a bus driver living in New Jersey, with his wife, Laura and their English Bulldog, Marvin. Paterson drives around, eavesdropping on passengers—a pair of lonely construction workers, two anarchistic college students—and when he finds some time, he breaks out the small, moleskin notebook to write poems, though he does not show these to anyone. (This will feel very familiar to you, Past Self, just wait.)

As someone currently struggling with maintaining a proper work ethic, you will find Paterson to be exactly the kick in the pants you need to begin journaling again, which will then fuel your next poems and short stories. The film will reinforce things you once knew to be true, but had forgotten. That writing can serve as a reflection, an interpretation of the little things, the day-to-day moments and adventures that make us feel the most human.

Though maybe, at this moment, a film won’t do the trick for you. Perhaps a trip to the museum is in order, or a good and spontaneous conversation with a stranger or a friend. Perhaps you need only to put on a good record (try Otis Blue) to find some inspiration. But in the future, this film will help you. And though it may not be the classroom full of inspiration you and I are used to, you can rest assured that everything will be all right, because, Past Self, we will learn to write all over again, and that’s going to be just fine, as long as we let it be.

Sincerely,
Your Future Self

P.S. Oh, and you should probably start jogging again.

The Power of Poetry: How to Be an Advocate Through Your Writing

Rebekah Palmer

By Rebekah Palmer

When I was 14, I started keeping a composition notebook I used to write down everything I felt and knew about current events in the world. I had written about my day to day activities in journals before, but there was a different feel about this blue lined, wide margined notebook that housed thoughts beyond my personal experience. Suddenly my world expanded. I found myself writing about the September 11th attacks, the treatment of veterans, and other issues I wanted to advocate for as an American teenager.  

Several years later, while taking a creative writing class taught by professor Karen Loeb at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, I started another notebook. This one centered on issues I had kept hidden in my heart in high school: sexual assault awareness and living as a single woman in 21st century America. 

The scrawls within those notebooks I kept as a younger person would become the rough drafts for the advocacy poems I used in my first and second books.

If you’re unfamiliar with the genre, an advocacy poem includes lyrics on causes, events, effects and news that lack adequate public awareness. Advocacy poems can be written about anything in the world that the poet wants to provide a different perspective on, call more attention to, or create new solutions about. 

How do you write an advocacy poem? Here are a few good tips:

• Seek out resources that agree and disagree with your position, especially thoseabout how an issue is handled specifically in your community. This will help you garner better specifics and empathy in your advocacy writing. 
• Attend rallies and events for the causes you want more awareness on.
• Free write in a notebook exactly how you and others see, define and feel about the cause. 
• Free write about the atmosphere and happenings at any gatherings you have attended. 
• Write down personal memories and/or interviews from others that could help explain your stance to your readers.
• When writing your poem, try to answer these questions: Is there a physical metaphor I can liken the way I see this issue to? Is there a rhythm to my feelings and thoughts about this issue, and what stanza form will make a reader hear my message the way I hear it? Do the words I have written down remind me of a certain smell, touch or taste?
• Use your memories and the answers to these questions on your five senses to create a poem in which the reader can really experience your perspective on the issue you have chosen to champion.
• Have other writers check your work, especially other writers who have already written in different genres on the subject you have chosen.

Above all else, never underestimate the power of poetry. Use the form to spread your voice far and wide. Be heard.

Writing Through the Excuses: The Story of a Writer and Her Cat

The cat in question.

By Erin Stevens

Two months ago, I adopted my first child. Weighing in at 15.5 pounds of fur and sass, Murphy (or Murfreesboro if he’s in trouble), has changed my life forever. His adoption was a long time coming. The truth is, I’ve been a self-proclaimed cat lady for as long as I can remember. It’s not uncommon for me to receive one (or more) cat-related gifts for Christmas or my birthday, and it’s no surprise I’ve found and befriended multiple cats from the Uptown neighborhood of Minneapolis. 

What is surprising is the amount of time it took me to adopt a fur child of my own. Two and a half years ago, I graduated from UW-Eau Claire, packed up my things, and headed to the Twin Cities. The first question my friends asked was: When are you going to get a cat?

My answer? When I get more settled in my job. And when that job wasn’t working out? When I find a new job, I’ll get a cat. And when I did find a new job? When I find a better paying job and have a bigger apartment, that’s when it’ll happen. 

For months, I’d spend my lunch breaks playing with the cats at the humane society, but my visits always ended with me leaving, no cat carrier in hand. 

As I walked back to work one day, it occurred to me that my delayed entrance into cat parenthood wasn’t the only thing I was making excuses about. 

I graduated from UW-Eau Claire with a degree in creative writing, but with how little I’ve written in the two years since I graduated, you wouldn’t know it. Aside from a blog I updated once a month, I wasn’t writing much else. Similar to the whole cat adoption (or lack thereof) situation, the excuses flowed. 

When I get my first job, I can focus on writing again... 

Once I’m done searching for a new job/writing cover letters I’ll blog again…

When I find a less writing intensive job, I’ll have more energy to write short stories…

Because I love writing, I kept telling myself that it needed to take a backseat to the more urgent things that needed to get done (namely finding a good, solid job).

In short, with both my writing and adopting a cat, it wasn’t the right time. Even though they are both things that bring me a great amount of joy, they were luxuries that I didn’t think I could afford. There were a million excuses that I could come up with that would show the conditions and circumstances weren’t right.

After a while, though, I realized I would always have these excuses. There would always be a reason to not sit down and write the essay, always some excuse that it wasn’t the right time to adopt a cat. Too often we put off doing what makes us happy. We say the circumstances aren’t right. We say we’ll start on Monday. We say we’ll start doing what we love in the New Year. We put off doing what we love. The conditions aren’t always going to be perfect, but if it’s what you want, you need to make the conditions work for you.

So when I landed my current job, I started looking on the humane society’s website for my fur child. A few months later I came across Murphy’s profile, and I knew it was a done deal. The conditions weren’t perfect—he was at the animal shelter almost an hour from my apartment and he was also sick when I got him. However, adopting Murphy has been one of the best decisions I’ve ever made, partly because he’s adorable and I like him more than most people. The other part is that he’s actually helped me get back into a writing routine. 

He doesn’t put up with my excuses. When my alarm goes off at 5:30 AM so that I have time to write before work, I don’t have the option to hit the snooze button. As soon as the alarm sounds, Murphy uses my body as his own personal trampoline. It’s hard to ignore a 15.5-pound cat standing on you, especially when said cat moves his paw to your neck and cuts off your air supply. Additionally, when I come home from work and I’m distractedly updating my blog while watching Parks and Rec, he’ll sit in front of the TV until I refocus on my writing.

If Murphy’s taught me anything, it’s that the conditions for anything won’t ever be right. 

But now I’m willing to make them work for me. 

7 Questions with Max Garland

By Alison Wagener

Our “7 Questions” series has become a bit of a staple in the monthly CVWG newsletter, and in the coming months, we’ll be dedicating these local author featurettes to our esteemed and beloved 2017 Cirenaica summer residency leaders. 

Returning this summer to head our poetry residency is local literary advocate and poet Max Garland. When your audience consists of Chippewa Valley writers, it seems hardly necessary to give Max a formal introduction, but for those of you who don’t know, Max served as Wisconsin’s Poet Laureate from 2013-2014 and was appointed for a two-year term as Eau Claire’s Writer in Residence last April. He’s published two books of poetry, was an English professor at UW-Eau Claire from 1996 to 2015, and continues to provide us with accessible poetic commentary on a world that often seems just out of reach.

Over the holidays, I had the chance to ask Max about his writing, his work, and his reflections on Cirenaica for a brief but insightful interview. 

Did you always know you wanted to devote your life to writing and promoting literature?

No. I originally wanted to play shortstop for the St. Louis Cardinals, but Ozzie Smith turned out to be more qualified, so like many other mediocre athletes, I fell back on poetry. 

Who (or what) most influences your writing?

I think hearing hymns and sermons in childhood, then discovering later that poems were like that-- attempts to say something slightly beyond the ability of words to say. 

What was most memorable for you about your Cirenaica residency last year?

The generous range of experience among those who attended and how well the participants interacted regardless of their differing levels of experience. Also, I was impressed by the amount of writing the residents did. When I arrived early in the mornings, everyone was already writing, sometimes four or five people sitting in a large room, at tables, on couches, some outside, some upstairs, but all quietly working on new poems, or revising poems from the previous day. 

Is there anything you’re currently working on?

I'm revising a new book of poems called The Word We Used for It. I'm also writing songs and essays, and trying to figure out how to stay calm in exceedingly alarming times.

What do you hope your readers gain from reading your work?

I hope people feel something, and recognize that a poem can be a very strange and yet strangely useful thing once readers assume partial ownership. 

What do you find most purposeful as Eau Claire’s Writer in Residence? As Wisconsin’s Poet Laureate?

Poetry is not as far away as most people think, nor as far from the practical concerns of ordinary people. It's so important and potent we often pretend we don't feel the need for it. But try and find someone who hasn't wanted better words, more beautiful or profound language, and you'll be looking a long time.

What’s the hardest facet of writing? Which do you look forward to the most?

The hardest part of writing is granting yourself permission, and then doing it again and again until the habit is part of who you are. 

Photo: Lisa Venticinque

From the TC to EC: 5 Reasons Why I’m Heading to Eau Claire for a Writing Retreat

By Erin Stevens

I’m a proud resident of the Twin Cities. I’m also a proud alumna of UW-Eau Claire. Because of this, I’m often torn when I try to decide where I’m supposed to be. While I have many friends and a great job in the Twin Cities, my heart and my writing community are in Eau Claire.

So when I heard about the Chippewa Valley Writers Guild’s first ever Winter Writers' Weekend being held on February 4th and 5th, I knew that I needed to be there.

This might strike you as odd一why is someone from Minneapolis jumping at the chance to head over to Eau Claire for a writers’ retreat? There are plenty of reasons - too many reasons, actually一but here are the 5 that stand out most to me:

1. This retreat is unique to the area. Whether you’re from Eau Claire or the Twin Cities, Madison or Milwaukee, there really isn’t a program like this anywhere else in Wisconsin or the Twin Cities metro area. How many places do you find the chance to have a weekend writing getaway at a new, boutique hotel, with high quality writing instruction? Having lived in the Minneapolis area for a few years now, I can say I haven’t found any opportunities quite like the programs put on by the Chippewa Valley Writers Guild. This winter writers’ retreat is no exception, it’s truly one-of-a-kind.  

“Having lived in the Minneapolis area for a few years now, I can say I haven’t found any opportunities quite like the programs put on by the Chippewa Valley Writers Guild. This winter writers’ retreat is no exception, it’s truly one-of-a-kind. ”

2. Quality of Instruction. As a graduate from UW-Eau Claire’s creative writing program, I’ve had plenty of opportunities to learn from BJ Hollars. While I spent some time heckling him from the back of a classroom, I can wholeheartedly say that his instruction is one of my fondest memories of my time at UWEC. My writing drastically improved through classroom lectures and one-on-one writing conferences, so when I saw that he was going to lead this winter writing retreat, signing up was an easy decision. I’ve also had the opportunity to work with both Jamie and Charlotte, and so I know that feedback and advice  from both of them will also be incredibly valuable. Whether you’re new to writing or you’re in the middle of your third novel, your work is in good hands with the folks running this show!

3. The Oxbow. I’ve been following their Instagram account for a few months now, and I’ve been dying to get inside ever since. The decor in the rooms and lobby are inspiring and inviting, and  the food looks amazing, as well. Not only is this boutique hotel a great addition to Eau Claire, but, by hosting the CVWG’s first winter writing retreat, they’re proving to be a friend to our arts community, which was enough to make me hit the “submit” button on my application. The cost of the retreat includes one night's lodging at The Oxbow, two great meals, a snack, a drink ticket, in addition to live jazz in the evening. What more could you ask for? (What's that?  You want a record player in your room and a vinyl lending library curated by Justin Vernon?  Good news!  You get that too!  Pretty cool hotel, right?).

4. Read and Have Your Work Broadcast. If you love listening to books on tape, imagine listening to your voice reading your work back to you. That’s exactly what’s going to happen when you sign-up for the winter retreat. Blugold Radio一the hippest station in town一will be at The Oxbow during our reading, and they’ll be broadcasting your work to the world.  How often do you get to start the day with an idea and end it with a public reading to be broadcast to the region?

5. Writing Community. In the big city of Minneapolis, I’ve found a lot of things. I’ve found my favorite coffee shop with a great, worn-in couch that’s perfect for tea, a good book and a rainy day. I’ve found two amazing independent bookstores that, between the two of them, I can find whatever it is I’m looking for. I’ve also found a great job. And yet, after trying a creative writing course in downtown Minneapolis and scouring the Internet for other writing organizations or groups in the Twin Cities, I haven’t found anything that comes close to the community that exists through the Chippewa Valley Writers Guild. The writers in the CVWG community are not only immensely talented, but they’re supportive and radiate positivity, which is unlike anything I’ve experienced in the Cities. This community alone is worth a trip across the state line.  

So what are you waiting for? Spots are filling fast, so click here and reserve your seat, today!