London Screenwriters' Festival

A Festivus for the Restivus.

An article on writing in the Wall Street Journal?

Believe it or not, here are a few excerpts from a WSJ article on how several famous authors tackle the task:

Most agree on common hurdles: procrastination, writer's block, the terror of failure that looms over a new project and the attention-sucking power of the Internet.
"Put your left hand on the table. Put your right hand in the air. If you stay that way long enough, you'll get a plot," Margaret Atwood says when asked where her ideas come from. When questioned about whether she's ever used that approach, she adds, "No, I don't have to." Ms. Atwood, who has written 13 novels, as well as poetry, short stories and nonfiction works, rarely gets writer's block. When ideas hit her, she scribbles phrases and notes on napkins, restaurant menus, in the margins of newspapers.

Kate Christensen was two years and 150 pages into her first novel, "In the Drink," about a boozy ghostwriter, before she discovered what the book was really about—so she dismantled the draft, threw out a bunch of pages and started over.

When she was working on her first novel, "Interview With a Vampire," in the early 1970s, Anne Rice revised each typed page before moving on to the next. These days, she writes on a computer rather than a typewriter, and revisions are constant and more fluid. She writes a chapter a day to make sure each section is consistent in its tone and style, and often works for eight or nine hours straight when she's in the middle of a novel.
Mystery writer Laura Lippman, who writes a popular series featuring detective Tess Monaghan, creates elaborate, color-coded plot charts, using index cards, sketchbook pages, colored ribbon and magic markers.

OMG Kirsten!!

I'm knocked out by this...
Almost makes me sorry I made her cry over War funding.

Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators Conference

From the SCBWI website:

The 11th Annual SCBWI International Winter Conference begins with a day of optional per-conference intensives for writers & illustrators on January 29th, followed by 2 days chock-full of agents, editors, publishers, workshps and networking designed to rocket your writing and illustration to the next level.

Published or pre-published, you can't afford to miss this opportunity! Get the latest information on the market from the industry leaders in publishing for young people, and be inspired by some of the most well-known authors and illustrators working in children's literature today.

A beautiful setting for us to share our writing with others!

Screening Liberally has invited us to discuss our documentary, Doctors and Detainees, at Netroots Nation the annual convention for Progressive newsmakers on Friday, August 14th, 5pm in Room 406. We'll show a clip of our work-in-progress and get feedback from the audience.

Netroots Nation amplifies progressive voices by providing an online and in-person campus for exchanging ideas and learning how to be more effective in using technology to influence the public debate. Within that campus, we strengthen community, inspire action and serve as an incubator for progressive ideas that challenge the status quo and ultimately affect change in the public sphere

Dr. Davis and Julie Gribble were also invited to discuss the film on Virtually Speaking, a talk show in Second Life, on July 9.
Listen to the interview on BlogTalk Radio.

Check out the new additions to the D&D website:
The Trailer
The Debate Room where readers can discuss the issues and comment on the debate between Dr. Martha Davis and Colonel Steve Kleinman, Air Force Counterintelligence, about APA's controversial decision to allow psychologist to participate in interrogations.
and
The Action Center located on our home page, not only encourages readers to take action but shows them how!

"Doctors and Detainees" - A Feature Length Documentary in Development

From DoctorsAndDetainees.com:

Since 9/11, doctors have contributed to the torture and abuse of detainees through their collaboration with interrogators at Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib and CIA black sites. Are “interrogation doctors” at the forefront of disturbing new roles for psychologists, psychiatrists and physicians in national security intelligence?

I've been working really long hours to get this project moving forward and it's good to finally see progress. The website is up (created using an older version of iWeb flogged into submission) and we've been granted fiscal sponsorship by Arts Engine, Inc., which is a big deal because with their sponsorship all donations towards the completion of the film are now tax deductible.
And to keep up with the times, we can now be joined and tweeted on facebook and Twitter.

Now I'm off to work on getting those donations....