Volcano Writers Publish a Book Together
Bryan Furer, seated, is surrounded by members of the Volcano Writers Group in the garden of Ira Ono’s Volcano Garden Arts and Café, the meeting place of the writers group. Standing, from left to right, are: Rick Frazier, Kathy "Kat" Gaiser-Licht, AwaHoshi, Anela Scott, Pamela O’Shaughnessy, Vitus The Mad, Taressa Watson, Chris Corley and Janet Carpenter. Bryan, Rick, Kathy, Pamela, Vitus and Janet participated in the group’s first group book publishing project, as did Lehua Wells and Donald Bingle who could not attend the recent gathering in the garden in person. AwaHoshi, Anela, Taressa and Chris are new members of the Volcano Writers Group who look forward to being able to participate in the group’s next book project.
In the summer of 2019, Bryan Furer, a member of the board of directors of Hawaii Writers Guild representing Volcano, who also founded the Volcano Writers Group, talked to a few members about the possibility of publishing a book together. Response was tentative at first, but the more they talked about it, the more the members “got serious about it.”
To get the project going, they came up with a formula to divide up the space. They allocated 10,000 words to each writer, figuring that, if six or eight writers delivered approximately that much copy, they’d have a book. In the end, eight writers made the commitment and, eventually, they did have a book: Out of our Minds: Voices from the Mist. It includes original stories, poetry and essays from the eight authors.
To get the project going, they came up with a formula to divide up the space. They allocated 10,000 words to each writer, figuring that, if six or eight writers delivered approximately that much copy, they’d have a book. In the end, eight writers made the commitment and, eventually, they did have a book: Out of our Minds: Voices from the Mist. It includes original stories, poetry and essays from the eight authors.
As the writing progressed, the group met regularly to share their work-in-progress. They set up a deadline which came and went, but when the second deadline came, the copy was finally in.
They also divided up key jobs. Furer took on the job of designing the cover. Lehua Wells, Janet Carpenter and Pamela O’Shaughnessy shared the proof-reading, and Rick Frazier assembled a master copy of all the work submitted for both the Kindle version and the paperback version.
Besides those already mentioned, writers whose work is in the anthology include Vitus the Mad, Kathy Gaiser-Licht and Donald Bingle.
The group self-published through Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing. It turned out to be “a learning experience.” The book initially carried a publication date of January 2020. The group planned a big inaugural reading, and then COVID-19 hit and “everything shut down.”
The delay proved fortuitous, however, in that it gave the group time to make corrections that were needed because of miscommunications with Amazon. “Edits and changes took longer than we anticipated,” Furer recalled. “Mercury must have been in retrograde. We went through the process maybe three times before we got it right.”
A corrected printing was published around August 2020. The group is hoping to reschedule a reading around Halloween 2021, a good match with some of the content, which leans toward the supernatural and the spooky.
The writers hasten to proclaim the diversity of their writing, however, and assure readers that: “We are confident that there is something in this anthology for nearly everyone to enjoy…” As further proof of their assertion of diversity, they point to the fact that they are planning a new book. Their second book may be called Out of Our Minds: Laughter from the Mist.
The Volcano Writers Group is growing and the next anthology may well include the work of new writers as well as those who participated in the original book project. Stay tuned!
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They also divided up key jobs. Furer took on the job of designing the cover. Lehua Wells, Janet Carpenter and Pamela O’Shaughnessy shared the proof-reading, and Rick Frazier assembled a master copy of all the work submitted for both the Kindle version and the paperback version.
Besides those already mentioned, writers whose work is in the anthology include Vitus the Mad, Kathy Gaiser-Licht and Donald Bingle.
The group self-published through Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing. It turned out to be “a learning experience.” The book initially carried a publication date of January 2020. The group planned a big inaugural reading, and then COVID-19 hit and “everything shut down.”
The delay proved fortuitous, however, in that it gave the group time to make corrections that were needed because of miscommunications with Amazon. “Edits and changes took longer than we anticipated,” Furer recalled. “Mercury must have been in retrograde. We went through the process maybe three times before we got it right.”
A corrected printing was published around August 2020. The group is hoping to reschedule a reading around Halloween 2021, a good match with some of the content, which leans toward the supernatural and the spooky.
The writers hasten to proclaim the diversity of their writing, however, and assure readers that: “We are confident that there is something in this anthology for nearly everyone to enjoy…” As further proof of their assertion of diversity, they point to the fact that they are planning a new book. Their second book may be called Out of Our Minds: Laughter from the Mist.
The Volcano Writers Group is growing and the next anthology may well include the work of new writers as well as those who participated in the original book project. Stay tuned!
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The Inside Story
On a recent sunny June day, members of the Volcano Writers Group who had participated in the group’s first collective book publishing project sat down in front of a computer on the terrace of Ira Ono’s Garden Arts and Café in Volcano, Hawaii. Backed by a lush green lawn, tulip trees and other tropical plantings, one-by-one, the writers talked to Member News via Zoom about their experience of becoming the collective publishers of Out of Our Minds: Voices from the Mist and what that experience meant to them. Here are some of the highlights they shared:
Bryan Furer
- Bryan Furer was not just the organizer of the Volcano Writers Group and the instigator of the book project. He was one of the eight writers whose work appears in the book -- and he designed the book cover.
- Our interview with Bryan extended across two Zoom meetings as we prepared for the big Zoom meeting with everyone at Ira Ono’s Garden Arts and Café. Material included here is taken from each of those meetings.
- M.N.: What is your own writing background?
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When I was older, my Mom wrote a book and I helped her put it together before she died. After I moved to Hawaii, I wanted to go back to writing, but I wasn’t sure how to go about it. Then I realized I could turn my old film scripts into stories and books, so I did that for a while.
Now I’m working on my first novel, set on the Big Island, a detective mystery called Kona Coast Files: A Brush with Death. It will be the first in a series featuring a detective named Ronan Whitlock.
M.N.: You sit on the board of directors of the Hawaii Writers Guild and you’ve started the Volcano Writers Group. What’s the connection between the two?
B.F.: I was enthusiastic when the Guild formed. I used to drive all the way down to Waimea for writers group meetings at Tutu’s House. I learned a lot from the people who were in that writing group and those who formed the Guild. My experience in the Waimea group inspired me to form the Volcano Writers Group in 2016. Not everyone in the Tutu’s House Writers Group belongs to the Hawaii Writers Guild, and not everyone in the Volcano Writers Group belongs to the Hawaii Writers Guild, but some of us belong to both the writers group and to the Guild.
M.N.: Tell us how you feel about how your group book project has turned out.
B.F.: Well, it’s turned out very nice. Vitus looked at our Amazon account recently and we had a chunk of change come into our account – I believe it was mostly from Australia. We’re also exploring local venues for selling our book. It’s been a real success – and we’re going to do another book! The Volcano Writers Group is growing, so the next book will probably have the work of even more authors in it.
[A special thanks to Volcano Writers Group member Harvey Scott, who took the pictures in Ira Ono’s garden.]