New Release

“How are you?” Brenda asked, seeing a strange look on my face as we began our Zoom meeting.

“Really good!” I replied, the smile spreading from ear to ear. And at once, the committee knew why. 

“She said yes?” Anne asked, referring to the long-shot email we had sent off to prominent London-based author Emma Donoghue. 

“She said yes!” I confirmed. We were silent for a beat (notable for our chatty group) before we burst out in whoops and cheers. The moment was electric as the star power that such a well-known author was lending to our anthology project was undeniable. I felt like a fan girl as I gushed about what it was like to receive the email. “She even signed it, ‘Emma!’” I said before I pulled myself together. After I reassured the team that I had stopped short of printing the email and tucking it away with my keepsakes, we began another two-hour meeting discussing submission guidelines, confirming panel members, and checking in on our grant status. 

We built the suspense (hey, we’re writers after all!), keeping the identity of the finalist judge from the membership until the following LWS meeting when we announced it with flourish: she’s an internationally-renowned bestselling author; she’s an academy award nominated screenwriter; she’s… Emma Donoghue! The membership shared our excitement. 

But the good news didn’t end there. At the next committee meeting on Zoom, Donna announced that we had been approved for a $4,500 grant from the London Arts Council. Had our meetings been in-person, I think someone would have popped a bottle of bubbly. 

As the buds were returning to the trees, and summer only a few months away, our next task was to ensure that our members were writing. I was struggling with my own piece, quietly wrestling with it in the early mornings, and I knew I couldn’t be alone in wondering whether I could find the time, or even the right cadence. The A-Team agreed.

The committee decided to offer workshops for each genre and hired bestselling Canadian author and Trent University creative writing teacher, Adelle Purdham, for the nonfiction workshop; LWS member, novelist, scriptwriter and Fanshawe College creative writing teacher, Meg Howald for fiction; and for poetry, London’s past poet laureate, the celebrated, multi-published Penn Kemp. Donna opened her backyard oasis for dedicated writing time for members, complete with tasty treats and a chance to share work in a safe space. Our established critique groups volunteered to take on “guest members”, offering live beta reads and providing suggestions for writers who had a piece ready to polish. 

The plan worked! 

Our members were creating, honing their craft, receiving critiques, and polishing their writing. I finally found my rhythm in Penn Kemp’s poetry workshop. Set in her idyllic London home, I realized that the piece I was working on would be better suited to poetry than nonfiction. The herbs from her garden tickled our senses and goldfish from her ample pond splashed nearby. An ambulance’s siren pierced the tranquil afternoon as a group of LWS members discovered their inner poet. 

I always wanted to write poetry and even promised my late grandmother that I would. Her first cousin was Margaret Avison and I was left the family collection of the award-winning poet’s books (including her memoir, where my grandmother had dog-eared any pages that mentioned her). Now, thanks to the LWS, I was making another dream come true. 

With the website “submission page” ready—another shout out to Marco, our webmaster!—the scoring rubrics and submissions guidelines finalized, and a large part of financing in place thanks to the London Arts Council, we felt ready for the portal to open. Leading up to the September 15 opening, we did a final promotional push. Our volunteers placed posters in local libraries, community centres and retailers. We created a social media blitz, sent reminder emails, and announced the anthology submission dates at each LWS meeting. And then the day arrived. The submissions portal opened and we were live.

To be continued…

  Martha Morrison is honoured to have served as Chair of the Anthology Committee for the London Writers Society’s inaugural anthology project Out of the Woods. She holds a BSc in Biochemistry and an MFA in Creative Nonfiction writing. Her work has been published in various literary anthologies and she was shortlisted for the International Amy MacRae Award for Memoir. Her previous careers include flight attendant and professional ballroom dance instructor. Martha lives on a farm outside London with her family, dogs, cats and chickens. Most days, she gets up before the rooster (and the kids) to write in the quiet early mornings.