Lit Crawl 2015 + FDA's Writing Update · 11:53pm Oct 22nd, 2015
Yesterday, I attended the NoHo’s annual Lit Crawl (that’s North Hollywood for you out of town folks…which is perhaps all of my followers 
).
For those unfamiliar with it, the Lit Crawl is an event where literature hits the streets; it's a literary festival that’s a bit like an art walk. Imagine a book/poetry reading somewhere, perhaps inside a cozy coffee shop or perhaps inside an independent bookstore. A small crowd gathers; they listen to three, four, five speakers. They drink, mingle, and then say their goodbyes, waiting for the next book event, probably within the week or two.
Now imagine ten or so of these readings happening simultaneously—inside a barber shop or amidst the center of a fighting gym or at the edges of several open air restaurants. Some people lean against the railings. They sit on the barber chairs or stay standing inside a quaint grocery store or flower shop. Rooms sometimes fill way beyond capacity, people huddled so close that you can’t even see a way out (of course at this point, the store owners force people out to keep the space clear).
That’s what the Lit Crawl is. It first started in San Francisco under the name Litstock which then, after a bit of trouble, became appropriately named Lit Quake. After it started gathering steam, the event was expanded to other cities: Seattle, Manehatten Manhattan, Austin, Miami, and even London. The “crawl” aspect was introduced after the hosts divided the event into three rounds.
What do I mean by rounds?
In a designated area in each city (usually no more than a few crossing streets), designated stores host forty-five minute readings from local (or sometimes not so local) literary groups. Each designated store has at least three writers reading their works aloud, and people walk the streets popping in one store, listening to what’s being read. Then, when they tire of that particular reading, they can walk out, go to a different store, and listen to someone else.
The first picture is outside of a pizzeria. The second picture is inside a pie shop. Their pies are delicious.
You have one literary group hosting their event at the storefront and after their forty-five minutes are up, a new literary group comes and takes their space. Or sometimes, the stores only host one group so that people are forced to walk around the city.
I don’t go to a lot of poetry readings—truthfully, I don’t go very many literature readings—but poetry is what I love listening to the most during this event. You get plenty of fiction writers or essayists, and sometimes performance art, but there’s something about a poem being read aloud—hearing their inflection, their power as they read the words they wrote—it’s magical. My teacher's aide was a very outspoken about poetry. She used to say that as prose writers, we learn a lot more from poets than poets learn from us, and I am inclined to agree. Plus, literary readings in general always seem so...small. The reading spaces always feel so claustrophobic. I like blending in, not standing out. And I love the atmosphere of people walking around just for this event.
Here's a poetry reading taking place outside of a wine bar. (Not my video, but I was in the audience and saw him perform.)
This is from inside a martial arts studio. The reading was set up like a battle. Noir writers verses Cozy writers with categories like "Best Death" or "Best Sex" scene (that best defines their genre style) and the audience would vote (by cheering or clapping) for the excerpt they thought was better.
Someday, I'd love to go to the San Francisco's Lit Quake. They've hosted the event for over eleven years and it usually attracts more than 10,000 people as well as all the big name authors. The NoHo Litcrawl in comparison draws about 3000 or more.
FDA's Writing Update
Firstly, hello to my all of new followers! Now I need two hands to count all of you! 
I guess I should do an obligatory blog post about my writing.
The September Writeoff
I wrote two stories for this Writeoff. One, I never finished because of the sudden heat wave that hit--but after reading all the entries, I assure you, it would have easily been the most ridiculous story for that round. So I opted out of that story and with about a day and a half left, worked on The Pony's Dictionary, a ponified version of The Lover's Dictionary by David Levithan.
TPD came in fourth during the "Distant Shores" Writeoff, and I was very flattered (Okay, I was super excited. It was my first time in the finals too ). A few weeks ago, when I finally opened the document to work on it, I realized how much of a mess it was. I'm a heavy outliner, but I went into it with no outline, and because of that, the story suffered from a lack of a conclusion. Also, because of the achronicity, I realized that TPD is one of the most annoying stories I've ever edited.
To help me with the editing process, I had to make an Excel sheet. Yes, Excel. I never use Excel to outline or for writing anything story-related.
I had four categories in there.
1) Scenes related to revelation of Rarity/Applejack confession.
2) Scenes related to going away to Prance.
3) Orange family reunion stuff.
4) Regular slice of life moments that can be placed anywhere.
I have a lot of #4 and I was deterred by this, but someone made me see that this isn't just fluff, but necessary moments that define that undefinable notion of love. 
I'm still debating whether or not to expand the Orange family reunion. Anyways, I hope to get this story finished and posted before the end of the year. Or maybe sometime after... I need to ask people to edit, so I wouldn't know how long it would take. The holidays are coming up and I can only imagine everything getting busier and busier. Telephone and Noise are also on my to-publish list, and though they're fairly easy to fix and publish, I have other stories that are higher priority slot than them.
The October Writeoff
I won't explain too much, but my story Killing Time made the finals this time too. 
Usually, I put out three stories every minific round, but the prompt killed me and I ended up working on just this story. I have plans to publish it, but I'll think about it after TPD is done.
Truthfully, instead of TDP I've been working on two other stories. One is Fit For Dionysus, my first Writeoff story--let's pretend it was the only one I turned in at the time. I've expanded Berry's quest, but I'm trying to figure out how Minuette will fit (I can't lie. Another reason I wrote Killing Time was being I didn't feel like writing other characters and kept writing Minuette). The Moondancer episode messed with my idea of Minuette's personality, and though part of me is protesting, I think I might just ignore canon. Or play it safe and change characters completely...
Next is my horrendous Twixie romance (because I'm horrendously obsessed and love Twixie romances), a story I've been working on since before I joined Fimfic. When finished, I think it'll clock in around 75k, but the all the gimmicks involved and the story's overall structure are really starting to weight me down. The Twixie story is important to me, so all my free writing time has been trying to write that story. My original goal was to finish half before the year ends, but I don't know if I can make it. 
~~~
The most recent news is that I'm going to join the original fiction Writeoff! I've been writing original fiction all my life, but I can't think short enough for a short story. 
Somehow, my ideas always expand into novels. But we'll see how it goes.
And to all my followers joining the fray, best of luck to you! 
To see if the Lit Crawl will ever hit your area, check out the website: http://litcrawl.org/
A very good friend of mine who reads lots of poetry and writes says the same thing.
Man, the Lit Crawl sounds like a blast. And I'd love to edit for TPD!
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Yeah, the way some poets string words together sometimes--it's downright amazing. I made it a goal once to read one poem a day, but it turned into a poem every few months.
Oh man, thanks so much!
I've never posted on threads or formally asked people if they could be an editor, so...this is new territory for me. 
I don't know when it'll be done but I'll send a PM when it rolls around.
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Ha, that's still more than me, I think I read about one poem per year, if that? xD
And take your time, no worries! I don't think I've ever formally requested proofreading either. I just usually ask other people I know and trust.