Writers of Kern

Award winning author Andrew Roth will cover the process of moving a completed manuscript to a pitch before agents and publishers at various writer’s conferences as well as the steps required to move a published novel into audio.

After serving in the US Army, attending California State University at Bakersfield, and teaching American History for 22 years Andrew Roth began his writing career. After writing a number of novels he began attending numerous writer’s conferences up and down the state. He also sent over 200 submissions and queries during that time, seeking a traditional publishing house. Finally, he landed a contract in Nov. of 2018 with Elk Lake Publishing Inc. with his first novel being released in June of 2019.

Married for 35 years, with 2 children and 3 grandchildren Andrew has published 8 Christian Historical novels with Elk Lake Publishing and is currently moving two of them into audio. Last year, two of his books were finalists for the coveted “Selah Award” in Christian Westerns and one of those two also won the “Will Rogers Gold Medallion Award” for Inspirational Western.

https://www.andrewrothbooks.com/books

https://www.facebook.com/andrewrothbooks

Meeting on Saturday, July 20, 2024
Breakfast begins at 8:30 am
The general meeting begins at 9:15 am
Hodel’s at 5917 Knudsen Dr, Bakersfield

This workshop will present ideas, tips and a chance to practice developing your own voice and exploring points of view. Tips will be given and exercises will be demonstrated on how to find and develop your unique way of description, dialog, imagery and syntax. A point to remember is that editor’s comments are only suggestions, not corrections. Your own authentic voice is the one that your readers want. The close third person point of view is a newer way of crawling into a character’s head to experience thoughts, feelings, and intuitions without quotes or italics. This workshop aims to give writers more devices in their writer’s toolbox to express themselves.

Phyllis Wachob, born in Bakersfield and currently residing there, began her traveling adventures after college. She became a travel writer and then an English teacher, living and working in various places across the globe. These experiences are reflected in her mystery novels in the Teachers Abroad Mystery series. Later, she used her hometown and its inhabitants as inspirations for her Kern Kapers Mystery Series. So far, she has completed eight cozy mysteries, honing her writing skills along the way. Fellow members of the Writers of Kern as well as critique group members have shown her different ways of looking at characters, storylines and points of view.

Workshop Title: DO THE TWIST: HOW TO CREATE A GREAT ENDING

Learn how to organize a story where the reader gets that mind-shifting realization at the end that the solution to everything was right in front of them, but they never even saw it.

Mike Apodaca – Bio

Mike Apodaca was born and raised in Southern California with his mother, adopted father, and three brothers. In college, he felt there had to be an answer to the pain and suffering he saw in this world. He turned to his God where he found his answers and never turned back. He received a degree in preaching and, later, a masters in Theology from Fuller Theological Seminary. He pastored a church for nine years and then moved to the High Desert where he helped start a church and then led a home church for a time. For the last seven years he‘s devoted himself to teaching high school boys about the faith.

Mike became a public-school teacher and molded the minds of over a thousand young people. Mike’s specialty was Gifted education. He taught classes at the state-wide CAG Conference and for UC Riverside. He also taught a class in teaching reading at Brandman University. 

After 30 years in education, Mike took his retirement. He’s been working with his young grandchildren in the age of COVID. He’s currently the Vice President of the High Desert branch of the California Writer’s Club where he runs their Zoom meetings, edits their newsletter, and sits on various committees. Mike‘s written seven books, four of which are self-published on Amazon. His stories have appeared in club anthologies and in The Literary Review.

Mike would tell you that his greatest treasure is his family: His loving wife, Debi, who’s shared their adventure for 38 years, his two children, and two grandchildren.

Mike can be reached at mrdaca.ma@gmail.com