Our speaker for the November meeting will be Cindy Sample. Having sold over 125,000 books, she will be doing a presentation on Creative Tips for Killer Sales.

Cindy Sample is a former corporate CEO who decided plotting murder was more entertaining than plodding through paperwork. Her national bestselling mystery series, described as Erma Bombeck meets Agatha Christie, features single soccer mom, Laurel McKay. The series, set in the California Gold Country, includes Dying for a Date, Dying for a Dance, Dying for a Daiquiri, Dying for a Dude, and Dying for a Donut. Cindy is a four-time nominee for the LEFTY Award for Best Humorous Mystery and a winner of the NCPA Best Fiction Award. Cindy describes Dying for a Donut as a lip-smacking mystery. It definitely involved the most dangerous research!

Check her out on www.cindysamplebooks.com, www.facebook.com/cindysampleauthor, and www.twitter.com/cindysample1.

One of our own, Michael Brandt, will be detailing information useful for many writers

Michael Brandt is an award-winning short story crime fiction writer and an extreme adventurer.  He has run marathons and mountain climbed on the seven continents and traveled to the four-corners of the world.

He is a decorated retired LAPD homicide detective of 29 years who writes short stories and destination travel articles for magazines and newspapers. His professional career includes writing manuals, training material, and curriculum development for a national anti-fraud investigators academy. He has been a guest speaker numerous times at health care anti-fraud conferences across the nation and multi-state writer’s clubs. He holds a degree in Political Science from San Francisco State and attended grad school at USC.

Michael will be speaking about the differences between real-life police work and TV shows’ perception of police work.

You may visit his website (MHBrandt.wordpress.com) or contact him via email (MHBrandt119@yahoo.com).

Jim Azevedo, marketing director at Smashwords, will be speaking on “How to Publish, Distribute, and Sell Your Ebook”

It’s easier to self-publish an ebook than you might imagine. In this jargon-free primer to ebook self-publishing, you’ll be presented an ebook publishing checklist covering everything you need to know to get started. The workshop will begin by providing an overview of the latest ebook market trends, then dive into the advantages of ebook self-publishing, and conclude with detailed guidance on ebook creation, pricing, metadata, retail & library distribution, and more. Attendees will leave the workshop armed with the knowledge to self-publish with greater pride, professionalism, and success.

Jim Azevedo is the marketing director at Smashwords, the largest distributor of self-published ebooks serving over 120,000 independent authors, publishers, and literary agents. Since 2008, Smashwords has helped authors around the world publish and distribute more than 420,000 titles to top ebook retailers, subscription services, and public libraries. Jim’s career began more than 20 years ago in the Silicon Valley high-tech world. For the past 15 years, Jim has been the drummer for Rivals, a popular San Francisco Bay Area hard rock band (woohoo!!). Jim’s forthcoming book, How to Get Your Band out of The Garage, will be published in 2017.

Our August speaker, Linda Joy Singleton, is the author of over 40 children’s books!

She will be speaking on “Publishing in a Changing Market.” She’ll share how she survived losing agents and long periods of no sales but kept working hard. She has four traditionally published books in 2016 with at least three scheduled for 2017. She’ll give helpful tips on selling books and share with us a fun story about how she got her 5th agent.

Linda Joy Singleton is the author of over 40 children’s books, including THE SEER series, DEAD GIRL trilogy, CURIOUS CAT SPY CLUB series, SNOW DOG SAND DOG, and Sept 2016 YA MEMORY GIRL. She started writing at age 8 and kept her stories, poems and other keepsakes in memory boxes—realizing even at a young age that memories are precious and fragile. She grew up in the Sacramento area, attending schools in the San Juan District. She and her husband live near Jackson on 28 acres with a lovely view of oaks and pines and a menagerie of animals. For more: http://www.lindajoysingleton.com/

Our July speaker, Kris Calvin, will be discussing life experiences used in fiction and her hybrid publisher experiences.

Kris Calvin is a past local elected official who knows politics from the inside out. She’s been honored for her advocacy on behalf of children by the California State Assembly and the California Governor’s Office. Kris’ education includes degrees from Stanford and UC Berkeley with training in economics and forensic psychology.

More than a decade of work with state legislators and bureaucrats provides Kris with ample fodder for murder and mayhem in her debut Sacramento-based mystery series, which features lobbyist Maren Kane as an amateur sleuth.

When she’s not writing, you’re likely to find Kris at mystery writer conferences, in the halls of the Capitol in Sacramento, or cheering on her teams at Warriors basketball and  SF Giants baseball games.

Another professor from ARC will be our June speaker: Lois Ann Abraham

Lois Ann Abraham is the author of Tina Goes to Heaven (Ad Lumen Press). Tina Goes to Heaven has been described as “an emotional treasure” by Lydia Netzer, author of Shine, Shine, Shine and as “a crazy cocktail” by Joshua Mohr, author of All This Life.

She is a writer of short fiction, novels, and essays. She has read both as open mic and as a featured reader at TrueStory and also at American River College’s SummerWords 2016, where she offered a workshop on generation, inspiration, and revision as a creative process. Her purpose as a writer is to celebrate untold stories, challenge assumptions, and enjoy the beauty of sentences.

Her first book was Circus Girl and Other Stories, a collection of short fiction. Her stories have been presented at Stories on Stage Davis and Stories on Stage Sacramento. She is presently mid-way through the first draft of a new novel set in the 1890s.

She has been a tenured professor in the English Department at American River College for thirteen years, teaching literature, composition, and creative writing. She lives in Sacramento with husband and cats. Her hobby is staring out the window.

At the June meeting of the Sacramento Suburban Writers Club, she will read from her published work and work-in-progress, talk about her processes of writing, and field questions from the audience in what promises to be an entertaining discussion.

Professor Michael Spurgeon will be speaking to us

Let the Water Hold Me Down (Ad Lumen Press 2013) is Michael Spurgeon’s first novel. It was inspired by his experience living in San Cristobal de Las Casas during the time of Zapatista’s uprising. His writings have appeared in regional and national journals, including The North American Review, Sonora Review, The Packinghouse Review, and many others. He is the author of two short collections of poems—Valente’s Delicate Wrist (Talent House Press, 1998) and Prosthetic Breath & Other Poems (3300 Press, 1995)—and his poetry has been anthologized in Burning the Little Candle (Ad Lumen Press, 2013) and Late Peaches: Poems by Sacramento Poets (SPC Press, 2013).

He is co-founder and Board President of 916 Ink, a Sacramento area non-profit dedicated to promoting children’s literacy through creative writing. He serves as Faculty Advisor for American River Review, the award-winning literary magazine published by the English department at American River College. He is also one of the primary founders and organizers of Summerwords, a writing colloquium at American River College. This year his workshop will be Morality in Fiction: Beyond Good & Evil. Registration for Summerwords should begin April 1^st. Register at:www.summerwords.org.

Michael Spurgeon, his wife, and their two children currently live in Sacramento, CA, where he is a tenured professor of English at American River College.

Our own Brittany Lord will be addressing us on the topic of Critique Groups: Are you in one?

If you are a writer, you should be in a critique group. Critique groups are one of the easiest (and cheapest) ways to get your story looked over before you hire an editor. They will help you fix your story, spice up dialog, and tell you where your tension is lagging and needs work. If you are a writer and you’re not in a critique group, you are missing out.

But fear not, the SSWC is one of the best groups around for critique groups, and the next meeting is your chance to get into one. Instead of a regular speaker, we are going to have a critique get-together where you can meet, greet, and get to know all of your fellow members in critique groups. This is your chance to ask questions and get answers. There is also a chance of meeting other members looking to get into a critique group and form a new one.

Please bring a pencil and paper to collect contacts as well as write down the tips you learn.