The following people from the writing world presented themselves ata meeting of the Redwood Writers Club and provided a fascinating glimpseinto their writing lives.

In his presentation to the Redwood Writers,Frank Baldwindisplayed his trademark wry and self-depreciating humor with war stories from the writing trenches, including some Irish pubs. He is author of two well-published novels, Balling the Jack by Simon & Schuster in 1996 and Jake & Mimi by Little Brown in 2002. Refreshingly forthcoming about both his trials and achievements, he offered several bits of advice including: Before submitting your writing work in the marketplace, make sure it is as good as it can be; hire an editor if necessary. Competition is too fierce to do otherwise.

Prior to devoting himself to writing full-time, Frank lived and worked at various jobs in New York City, Washington, D.C., Atlantic City and traveled some in Europe. A copy editing job for a petroleum publication brought him and his soon-to-be-wife Lora to San Francisco where they now live. Luckily the publication folded and left Frank no choice but to pursue his true writing dream of becoming a novelist. Both of his novels have also been published overseas and both sold to Hollywood studios.

Frank, a member of the Peninsula Branch, is a good friend to writers and a good friend to the California Writers Club.

Susan Bonosays: "In both memoirs and personal essays, readers respond to the intimacy and vulnerability of the writers, but there are distinct differences as well. A memoir is built more like a story with a beginning, middle, and end while a personal essay can take many forms and meander down different paths. I think the personal essay is well suited to [revealing how] the personal can be the universal...how the experiences in the writer's life can be used to illustrate larger issues."

Susan reads hundreds of memoirs and personal essays in her job as contest editor and publisher of "Tiny Lights," the Petaluma-based literary magazine considered by many to be one of the best reads in the county. "These pieces describe defining moments in people's lives," Susan says. "Each demands at least one act of reconciliation so powerful that writers attempting to settle questions in their own lives may also work changes in the hearts of their readers."

Susan shared why certain pieces capture her attention and are selected for "Tiny Lights." She explained how to avoid a writer's most common mistakes andhow to decide which form, memoir or personal essay is best suited to the writer's needs.

Since his enjoyable and enlightening visit to the Redwood Writers, Dana Gioia has been appointed to head theNational Endowment for the Arts. During his time with us he hadbegun by saying, with a hint of laughter in his voice, that the title of his talk should be: "Confessions of an Itinerant Poet-The World's Second Oldest Profession."

"I'm absolutely dedicated to being the best writer I can be," he says. "I work at it constantly." Dana is a BBC Radio commentator, teacher, author, poet, critic, editor of The Penguin Anthology of Short Fiction, and a founder of this summer's innovative conference for teachers of English called "Teaching Poetry" (July 2001 at Santa Rosa's Sonoma Country Day School).

"Sonoma County is so beautiful in so many ways...full of interesting and talented people...I want to create situations where local writers can develop to write on a national level."

Dana kept his passion for poetry a secret for years. As vice-president of Kraft Foods, he was responsible for every product bearing the Jello® brand name and limited his writing time to evenings and weekends. But Dana's cover was blown when his essay "Can Poetry Matter?" was printed in Atlantic Monthly where he wrote: "It is time to experiment, time to leave the well-ordered but stuffy classroom, time to restore a vulgar vitality to poetry and unleash the energy"."

Press Democrat columnist Susan Swartzwrote the following: "We don't have huge name writers living in Sonoma County...but we haveJean Hegland, who lives in the hills outside Healdsburg and who, one day in 1997, on her way to taking her kids to piano lessons, found out her first novel, Into the Forest, was the subject of a New York [publishing] bidding war."

For those of you who haven't had a chance to read Into the Forest, here are excerpts from the Bantam Books reader's companion to Jean's novel:"A word-of-mouth phenomenon embraced by readers, booksellers and critics alike... Perhaps several times in a lifetime we come across a book with such a singular nature, it defies categorization. Into the Forest is that all-too-rare book."

And from Publisher's Weekly's starred review:"From the first page, the sense of crisis and the lucid, honest voice of the 17-year-old narrator pulls the reader in, and the fight for survival adds an urgent edge to her coming-of-age story...The plot draws readers along at the same time that the details and vivid writing encourage rereading...a truly admirable addition to a genre defined by the high standards of George Orwell's 1984."

Elsa Hurley,literary agent with the Candice Fuhrman Literary Agency in Mill Valley, is an agent any writer would be lucky to have on his/her team. If her friendly but no-nonsense presentation was any indication, she would be a truthful, down-to-earth and passionate writer's advocate in the publishing world.

Among the advice she dispensed: Send out only your best work; in the cover letter address an editor (or agent) specifically by name; prepare your manuscript properly; don’t get discouraged. And write, always write. In your search for an agent, she recommended Literary Market Place (the "agent’s phone book"), which can be found and used in the library for free.

Elsa has a B.A. in Russian Literature from Bryn Mawr College, and an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from San Francisco State University, where she was named "Most Outstanding Graduate Student" of her year by the faculty. She has worked in publishing and writing since earning her B.A. in 1987, starting on London’s famous Fleet Street.

The Candice Fuhrman Agency represents high quality literary fiction, and a wide range of nonfiction subject. Elsa’s sales include Fast Track Adoption: The Faster, Safer Way to Adopt a Baby (St. Martin’s Press), Money Lost: When Women Undersell Themselves (Career Press), and the novel The Breakable Vow from (HarperCollins).

Relatively young, Matthew Iribarnehas proven he is a serious writer to be reckoned with. Twelve years ago he fled the flatlands of Sacramento for San Francisco and discovered geographical distance did not mean he could leave Sacramento behind. Which, it turns out, is a good thing, since he has transformed the material of his tragedy-laced roots into compelling, affecting tales collected in Astronauts & Other Stories (Simon and Schuster, 2001).

This finely-crafted collection is the result of ten years work; he is now (late 2002) two years into a first novel. In this time he also received his M.F.A. from San Francisco State University and currently teaches Creative Writing at UC Berkeley Extension and UC Santa Cruz.

In addition Matthew won several literary prizes, including the 1999 Joseph Henry Jackson Literary Award (as given by the San Francisco Foundation) the annual prize that recognizes the best unpublished work by a Northern California writer under 35. As well, he received the Nelson Algren Prize in Fiction and the Francis Ford Coppola Scholarship in Writing, and has been a writer-in-residence at the MacDowell Colony, The Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, the Millay Colony, and the Djerassi Foundation. He was also the Walter E. Dakins Fellow this past summer at the Sewanee Conference Writers Conference in Sewanee, Tennessee.

In his presentation to the Redwood Writers he graced us with a reading from his book of stories to enthusiastic approval and afterwards entertained a lively question and answer period about the short story and its future in the literary marketplace.

Sister Jane Kelly is the whistle-blowing nun who broke the story of the financial and sexual shenanigans in the Santa Rosa Diocese (and, as was subsequently discovered, in the Catholic Church nationwide). Her book, Taught to Believe the Unbelievable, tells the story of how Sister Jane Kelly contested Church leaders efforts to shield the sexual and fiscal misconduct of its priests. Rather than collude in the cover-up, she went to the press, at great risk to her reputation and her relationship to the Church she had served for fifty-five years. When newspaper headlines at last broke the news, Sister Jane’s courageous actions reveal how this crisis of faith ultimately became an opportunity to revitalize the Church’s most fundamental spiritual teachings. Through her amazing story, she reminds every reader, regardless of their faith, that the call of one’s own heart and conscience supersedes all externally imposed authority. Sister Jane Kelly, P.B.V.M., holds a Masters in Theology and is the recipient of the Woman of Distinction Award from Soroptimists International, Woman of Consequence Award from Church Women United, and the Sister Jane Kelly Woman of Integrity award created in her honor by the National Woman's Caucus. Photos provided by the San Rosa Rotary Club.

Noelle Oxenhandler is a long-time contributor to The New Yorker and a regular guest teacher in the graduate non-fiction program at Sarah Lawrence College. Her essays appear in many other national and literary magazines as well. This year she joined the full-time English Faculty at SSU. Her book from St Martin's Press, Eros of Parenthood: Exploration in Light and Dark, prompted Isabelle Allende to write: "I have waited for years for this book! Finally someone talks openly and wisely about the passion any normal parent feels for a child." Noelle shared a marvelous piece about artichokes which ran in the New York Times and commented on the challenge of writing about subjects some readers find to be controversial.

Joan Pinkvossis the founder and senior editor of Aunt Lute Books, a small press in San Francisco which has been "discovering" talent for over 14 years. The press focuses on works by previously unpublished but talented women writers, most of whom go on to publish with mainstream publishers.

Joan says: "Our mission is to print works of literature by women who have been traditionally under-represented in mainstream and small press publishing. We seek writing that reflects the complex truths of women's lives and the possibilities for personal and social change; explores the specificities of the very different histories from which we come; and that examines the intersections between the borders we all inhabit." Log on to Auntlute.com to see their catalog and review the writers guidelines.

With an MFA in fiction and and MA in literary criticism, Joan discovered early in her career that she was better suited for editing than writing creatively. She is active in the national effort to keep literature a vital part of the arts landscape, including the retention of the NEA literary funding for individual fellowships.

Although Aunt Lute is looking for women writers, Joan shared how both women and men can catch the attention of a small press through a combination of talent and persistence.

Penny Warner,resident of the Bay Area, has sold over 40 fiction and nonfiction books for both adults and children. Her Connor Westphal murder mystery series features a feisty, independent heroine, publisher of a small newspaper, who is also deaf. In the process of entertaining her readers, Penny also manages to slip in quite an education for the hearing public, and to make the reader laugh in the process. Connor is constantly getting herself into scrapes, occasionally being rescued by her "anvil-armed" boyfriend, Dan Smith, who good-naturedly upbraids her for her antics. But secretly Dan is proud of Connor, and their relationship is warm and true.

But Penny’s child and family-centered books came first in her writing career. A few of the most popular ones include: Healthy Snacks for Kids, Learning to Sign the Fun Way and Smart Start for Your Baby. She has a bachelors degree in child development and a masters in special education and has taught sign language, special ed and creative writing. She had the Redwood Writers rolling in the aisles with this quip: "I had a successful career in nonfiction, but it wasn’t until I had teenagers that my thoughts turned to murder."

On a publishers panel this past summer (2002) at the East of Eden writersconference in Salinas Holly Taines White, senior editor at Ten Speed Press, was heard to utter these lovely phrases, music to the ears of a writer aspiring to publication: “We like working closely with writers...Very writer friendly...We will consider non-agented material.” Happily, she answered our call to come speak the Redwood Writers.

Ten Speed Press publishes 150 nonfiction titles a year which have included Odd Jobs, Tadich Grill, The Magic of Fire, and, one of the best known and most enduring, What Color Is Your Parachute?.

Holly talked about the editorial process, from proposal to manuscript development and on through to publication. It is essential to make sure, she emphasized, before submitting your work for consideration, that the publisher actually handles the type of writing you do. This kind of research saves everyone a lot of time and disappointment. But once a match is made, Holly explained, at Ten Speed the editor works closely with the author every step of the way.

Holly Taines White is a graduate of UC Berkeley with a major in English and a minor in French. Her first publishing job was with Wildcat Canyon Press in Berkeley. Holly joined Ten Speed Press in 1999 as a project editor and has since been promoted to senior editor, continuing to work on a variety of books covering all subjects from careers to cooking to humor to art to self-help.