Hi Everyone!

 

There’s a new buzz going around Ibis this season and I’ll bet very few of you have any idea what I’m actually talking about.  

 

Can you guess?

 

No… it’s not pickleball nor is it bocce.  It’s not canasta. nor is it Happy Hour…. 

 

One more guess….

 

Yes… it’s the new Ibis Authors Club hosted by non-other than Gary Alexander, our Poet

Laurate and Ibis Board Member. 

 

The Club already has 30 charter members about half of which have published mysteries, poems, textbooks children’s books and memoirs.

 

As it turns out, Ibis has an unusual amount of highly talented members who have develed into the fascinating world of writing and publishing. Writing is truly a labor of love which requires a rather unique set of skills including immense amounts of passion, dedication, devotion and

the realization that all your hard work may simply end up being a treasure that only will fulfill your personal needs. The actual percentage of successful published authors is perhaps as low as 1% of all that indulge in this special experience.

 

The Club which held its first meeting in September has had five monthly sessions. The first session was just a getting to know you meeting.

 

Our October event was hosted by Mary Savarese.  Mary who is a relatively new Ibis member

is an award winning author of two novels- “Tigers Love Bubble Baths & Obsession Perfume” as well as “The Girl in the Toile Wallpaper” which is part of The Star Writers Trilogy of three novels that Mary is working on.

 

Mary was born in Brooklyn, NY and raised her family in Connecticut. For the past 13 years, Mary has worked as a Eucharist minister in the Catholic church bringing her skills to community nursing homes. 

 

Mary also hosts an active website www.marysavarese.com which currently has 12 podcasts called the Two Minute Author which is designed to give helpful hints to prospective authors on writing and the publishing process. Mary gave us some valuable insight into what she termed Marketing Tips on how to go about getting your book out to the editors and ultimately to the readers.

 

Our second session in November was hosted by the none other than author and scholar Joe O’Donnell.  Many of you may know Joe as a neighbor and friend but he also is the author of 6 novels under the penname of JP O’Donnell. These include Fatal Gamble, Deadly Codes, and Pulse of My Heart. His books have been made into audio editions as well as posted on Amazon.

 

Joe’s big break came in 2018 when he was approached to be the producer of a full -length motion picture called Bent  starring Karl Urban, Sofia Vergara and Andy Garcia.

 

Joe’s exciting talk was about the importance of the opening line in a book that must capture the

reader’s desire to get more curious about the plot or story line of the book. It simply needs to draw the reader in as quickly and firmly as possible.

 

Our third class was hosted by Robert Cohen and Leslie Hartman (both psychologists by profession) who wrote a beautiful coffee table book which consisted of thoughts from mostly Ibis residents during the pandemic. I believe. they interviewed about 100 people. Put into an amazing format, this book captures many of the emotions of all of us caught in that terrible web of Covid. 

 

Robert and Leslie spoke about the art of self-motivation when you are writing anything but particularly a novel.

 

Our January session was hosted by Thomas (Wendell) Willis who many of you know as a tennis star here at Ibis. What you may not know however is that when Wendell is off the court, he is busy writing rather risqué adventure novels. 

 

Wendell (alias Thomas) has written three novels, one of which is called Marks Way. This is the story of Mark Price who seeks revenge after his prize possession is taken away from him. It’s an action-packed drama which includes sex, drugs and death row. 

 

Wendell’s topic was about the ups and downs of editing and formatting your book in the world of self-publishing. Self -publishing has become very popular in the last few years as many more tools have become available to writers to bridge that important bridge between a submitted manuscript and the final product of a published book. 

 

The Ibis Author’s Group’s next exciting event will be the first Annual Book Fair scheduled for Saturday, April 13th in the Ibis Ballroom. There we will feature all of the Author’s books that will be for sale as well as some guest lecturers in the field of publishing. We invite one and all to join us in what is sure to be a fun day!