Welcome to a monthly series of educational and informative meetings for writers, small publishers, indie authors and those wanting to know more about the brave new world of publishing.
|
|
Dialog is the heart and soul of your novel or memoir.
Learn from publishing professional Toni Lopopolo how to create
charged, dynamic interactions between your characters
The July 1 meeting of IWOSC/SPAWN Ventura County will host publishing professional Toni Lopopolo speaking on how to make your writing come alive through dialog. Ms Lopopolo was an executive editor in New York, a literary agent, and now a popular area writing instructor. The meeting takes place at Goebel Adult Center in Thousand Oaks beginning at 6:30 pm.
Dialog, the spoken words in fiction and narrative nonfiction, always comes between quotation marks. Dialog writing is the skill that will make or break your novel or narrative nonfiction manuscript from the chance at getting published. It is where your characters take their first breath on the page.
"The first thing an editor in a publishing house looks for is your dialog, said Ms. Lopoplo. "Editors tell agents: 'I look for a scene with dialog. If the dialog doesn't work, the manuscript gets bounced. If it's good, I start reading.'"
Why is dialog so important to a story? Because your characters come alive--or fail to--when they speak.
Dialog takes a lot more attention than narration or even action. Why? Because this skill, writing dialog, requires more thought, time, rewriting, and sounding out. Some writers will come up with obvious tricks to cover up weak dialog, especially in secondary characters. That is really cheating your readers with two-dimensional people.
Ms. Lopopolo continues: "Dialog in fiction, as well as in the best narrative nonfiction, is never a conversation we use in real life; dialog must sound charged. Learning to write dynamic dialog is what separates hack writers from the best that's published in today's discerning and sophisticated market."
Come hear her best tips that writers can take back to their computers and apply the next day.
The meeting will be held July 1, 2019 at the Goebel Senior Adult Center, 1385 E Janss Rd. Thousand Oaks, CA 91362 from 6:30 to 8 pm. The fee is $5 at the door. Refreshments available so plan to stay and meet other area writers.
IWOSC/SPAWN Writers' Meeting is a joint gathering for writers, authors and book lovers presented by the Independent Writers of Southern California (IWOSC) and the Small Publishers, Artists & Writers Network (SPAWN) a national literary nonprofit based in Ojai, CA.
Dialog, the spoken words in fiction and narrative nonfiction, always comes between quotation marks. Dialog writing is the skill that will make or break your novel or narrative nonfiction manuscript from the chance at getting published. It is where your characters take their first breath on the page.
"The first thing an editor in a publishing house looks for is your dialog, said Ms. Lopoplo. "Editors tell agents: 'I look for a scene with dialog. If the dialog doesn't work, the manuscript gets bounced. If it's good, I start reading.'"
Why is dialog so important to a story? Because your characters come alive--or fail to--when they speak.
Dialog takes a lot more attention than narration or even action. Why? Because this skill, writing dialog, requires more thought, time, rewriting, and sounding out. Some writers will come up with obvious tricks to cover up weak dialog, especially in secondary characters. That is really cheating your readers with two-dimensional people.
Ms. Lopopolo continues: "Dialog in fiction, as well as in the best narrative nonfiction, is never a conversation we use in real life; dialog must sound charged. Learning to write dynamic dialog is what separates hack writers from the best that's published in today's discerning and sophisticated market."
Come hear her best tips that writers can take back to their computers and apply the next day.
The meeting will be held July 1, 2019 at the Goebel Senior Adult Center, 1385 E Janss Rd. Thousand Oaks, CA 91362 from 6:30 to 8 pm. The fee is $5 at the door. Refreshments available so plan to stay and meet other area writers.
IWOSC/SPAWN Writers' Meeting is a joint gathering for writers, authors and book lovers presented by the Independent Writers of Southern California (IWOSC) and the Small Publishers, Artists & Writers Network (SPAWN) a national literary nonprofit based in Ojai, CA.
Literary Agent and writing instructor, Toni Lopopolo, has a book publishing resume that began in 1970 in the publicity dept of Bantam Books, where she helped publicize authors such as Philip Roth, Barbara Cartland, Isaac Asimov, and Louis L’Amour.
She next served as Library Promotion Director at Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, then Houghton Mlfflin offered her a position in Boston as Marketing Manager, Paperback Books. Her big campaigns included Even Cowgirls Get the Blues by Tom Robbins. When Macmillan presented Toni the title of Executive Editor, she moved back to New York City and published Judy Mazel’s Beverly Hills Diet and Elvis 56 by Al Wertheimer among other hits.
St. Martin’s Press made an offer she couldn’t refuse, so Toni became Executive Editor there from 1981 to 1990 publishing many succesful memoirs.
In l991, Toni opened Toni Lopopolo Literary Management. She has since sold books for authors Sol Stein, Lee Silber, Lillian Glass, Steve Duno, Nancy Baer, Flo Fitzgerald, Judith Smith-Levin, Howard Olgin, Jeanette Baker, Larry Seeley, and several others. Toni relocated her company to Santa Barbara, California in 2011.
Toni is also known for her Tea With Toni workshops where she uses a unique method that helps first-time novelists to master the skills needed to successfully write book-length fiction, and she aids nonfiction writers to produce compelling narrative nonfiction, using fiction techniques. Toni has held workshops at Temple University in Philadelphia, PA and at the Writer’s Room of Bucks County, PA. as well for the 805 Writers Conference, Santa Barbara Writers Conference and Ventura County Writers Club in California.
LopopoloLiterary.com
She next served as Library Promotion Director at Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, then Houghton Mlfflin offered her a position in Boston as Marketing Manager, Paperback Books. Her big campaigns included Even Cowgirls Get the Blues by Tom Robbins. When Macmillan presented Toni the title of Executive Editor, she moved back to New York City and published Judy Mazel’s Beverly Hills Diet and Elvis 56 by Al Wertheimer among other hits.
St. Martin’s Press made an offer she couldn’t refuse, so Toni became Executive Editor there from 1981 to 1990 publishing many succesful memoirs.
In l991, Toni opened Toni Lopopolo Literary Management. She has since sold books for authors Sol Stein, Lee Silber, Lillian Glass, Steve Duno, Nancy Baer, Flo Fitzgerald, Judith Smith-Levin, Howard Olgin, Jeanette Baker, Larry Seeley, and several others. Toni relocated her company to Santa Barbara, California in 2011.
Toni is also known for her Tea With Toni workshops where she uses a unique method that helps first-time novelists to master the skills needed to successfully write book-length fiction, and she aids nonfiction writers to produce compelling narrative nonfiction, using fiction techniques. Toni has held workshops at Temple University in Philadelphia, PA and at the Writer’s Room of Bucks County, PA. as well for the 805 Writers Conference, Santa Barbara Writers Conference and Ventura County Writers Club in California.
LopopoloLiterary.com
|