Welcome to FAW 2026!!!
Join FAW
Want to join Fremont Area Writers? Click here or the “Join Us” link on the menu bar above.
New Events
The Rules for the April 2026 Flash Fiction Contest have been announced. The theme is first love, the submission deadline date is April 6, and the judging will be at Half-Priced Books on Saturday, April 11.
The full rules can be found at the Contests and Submissions page.
See the Contests and Submissions page for non-FAW events. New CWC contest posted, deadline is May 1 and word limit is 300.
New, New, New!!!
The March 2026 Ink Spots Newsletter is now available on the Newsletter Page.
The Contests and Submission Page is available at https://cwc-fremontareawriters.org/contests-and-submissions/
Or click the sublink under the Writer Resources Menu Item at the top of the page.
Send Scott email if you want to be informed of new entries to this page, otherwise I won’t clog up your inbox. However, there is a CWC poetry contest. I think all members should have received an email about it, but I posted it anyhow on February 1.
You can submit your Shout Out to Ink Spots on the Newsletter page also, using a handy form. Have a story you’d like to submit to Ink Spots? You can submit it using the Shout Out form too! Don’t worry about formatting, Ink Spots will take care of it.
All FAW members will receive Zoom information the Tuesday or Wednesday before the next meeting. The next meeting is Saturday, March 28, featuring poet Dr. Adrienne Danyelle Oliver on Poetry as Balm. Information is below. This is her flyer – the meeting starts at 2 PM, and FAW members will get Zoom information. Not a member? You can join FAW today on our Join Us page. But anyone can attend, free, by requesting Zoom information from Scott Davidson.
Want to join FAW? You can also do it on-line, at our Join Us page. Fill out the form and then pay using PayPal or your credit card.
President’s Message – March 2026
Welcome to March. Spring is just a few weeks away. The days are getting longer. The snow is melting…
Right, we’re in California, where we get to watch the rest of the country freeze while we debate whether we need a jacket. Sometimes that is hard to remember, even after 30 years since we moved here. But Spring does bring one thing. Time to get the garden ready for the year. Soon we’ll see the little shoots, so delicate, that will grow into the monster squash and tomato plants we’ll get later in the year. But Spring is the start, the beginning.
Which leads me to the beginning of our writing. I hope you all got to see our February speaker on killer openings. Don’t doubt the importance of how you open your piece. It makes a difference to your reader, and your editor.
I’m in the middle of judging over 150 books for a contest, and I love bad openings. They let me put the book aside and make my life easier. When I see a good opening, I think, “rats, I have to read more.” So many writers feel they must tell me about their characters. Are they married, their appearance using the traditional mirror to let them and us see themselves, the traditional mirror, how many kids, their profession. Boring.
The writer of one of my contest books did it the right way. In the initial scene, the heroine is getting ready to go on stage as a dancer. Will she wear her hot pants? That told me something. Two kids, one young, one in college text her with their crises while the stage manager counts down the time till her cue. Her mother texts. We know something about her appearance, and her age. It is a humor book, and there is a running joke where each kid and the mother say, “you’re not wearing those hot pants, are you?” And she brilliantly resolves the problems and makes it on stage on time. We learn so much about her without a word of description. I’ll be reading more.
Break down the openings of the books on your shelf. Did they draw you in? Or were they something you had to get through before the story began? You can learn so much, just by reading.
Keep thinking and writing
Scott
See books by FAW Members on the Bookshelf page. Updated 3 April with books by Cherilyn Chin and Amber DeAnn
What is the Writers Salon?
From Tony Pino
Every fourth Monday evening, the Fremont Area Writers Group holds a Writer’s Salon. Yet the word “salon” is not used in the daily vernacular of ordinary Americans like you and me—with one exception: the neighborhood beauty salon.
So, what does salon mean in our monthly context?
In response to this question, I am reminded of the film, Midnight in Paris, in which prominent artists of the Post-World-War I era—Gertrude Stein, Ernest Hemingway, Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dali et al—met at midnight to share and exchange artful ideas and commentary. The protagonist of this film, Gil Pender, is a Hollywood writer who becomes a time-traveler when he is invited into this bygone era by no other than T. S.Eliot. The imagined venue of this film—the sumptuous apartment of Gertrude Stein—can be a metaphor for our writers’ group meetings, where we meet online, share ideas, and support each other in our efforts to achieve “clarity and grace”* whether it’s story-telling, essay-, technical- or report-writing, poetry, or any other communication we might consider. We don’t purport to be Hemingways, Steins or F. Scott Fitzgeralds—we’re just friends trying to get to the next paragraph.
Please consider joining us on the fourth Monday of the month at 7:00-PM and listening or commenting on our colleagues’ work. BTW: If you haven’t already done so, see Woody Allen’s film, Midnight in Paris. It’s worth the time.
The next Salon is Monday, February 23. All FAW members will get notified.
See more pictures at the Past Events page.
New!: The FAW Bookshelf is now available. See the books FAW writers have published. If you are a member and your book is not there, send a jpeg of your cover, a link to where the book can be bought and a one sentence summary to Scott Davidson.
Come to the Zoom Write-in, second Saturday of Each Month.
Our next write-in will be Saturday, March 14, 2 PM. The flyer is below. All FAW members will get Zoom information. Not a member? Get Zoom information from Scott Davidson
See all the Shelter in Place (SIP) notes here. Click on the one you want, or scroll down to see them in reverse order.
We made it up to SIP Note 55!!! Since we’re not sheltering any more, we’re done! (Hooray!)
Send questions and comments about the FAW Website to Scott Davidson
|
|
Now Held Online
fourth Monday of the month.
🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳
|
|
|
