Last night, Jessie and I had our first writing session since… she moved to Denver.

You see, we used to meet periodically with our laptops and notebooks at a little cafe in Columbia, MD to take notes, talk shop, and brainstorm about whatever writing projects we were working on at the time.

Now that Jessie lives in Baltimore and I live just outside the city, we agreed to find a new writer’s cafe.

Since this is the first time Jessie has lived in Baltimore City, we both thought it would be cool to explore some of the neighborhoods around her a bit.

Most of my friends live in the city, and I’ve spent a lot of time there over the last several years. But having never lived there myself, there is still a ton that can be missed.

We found a place called Horus Cafe in Fells Point. It turned out to be a Middle Eastern cafe with a  hookah lounge upstairs. We stayed downstairs, but it was a quiet place with a comfortable feel.

Talking about Writing

I must confess up front that we did very little actual writing there, but we did manage to talk about writing quite a bit, and that’s almost as good.

I showed Jessie my notes for  my second novel, The Warden of Everfeld: Legacy, as well as a concept I’ve been mulling over for a trilogy of short stories.

She talked about the work she has done so far with her editor. Oh right, she’s working with an editor on revising her novel at the moment. I’m not sure if she’s shared that already with you all… (Sorry, not sorry, Jessie!)

Here are some of the conclusions we came to through our discussions that will hopefully feed into our actual writing:

1 – Stories involving an influx of newcomers to a small town have infinite possibilities for conflict.

2 – Anthologies are weird (according to Jessie)

3 – Jessie is weird (according to both her editor and me. I don’t know this guy, but he sounds cool.)

4 – Jessie can make really interesting and compelling comparisons between story structures and wines. (I’m mainly including this because I wanted her to write a piece on it. I’m calling you out!)

5 – Not all of my Úr’Dan stories will have connective tissue.

6 – Low fantasy is best fantasy (according to me. Jessie disagrees. I believe we have a debate on our hands.)

7 – Three-part frameworks are a classic and reliable way to structure stories.

That’s all for now. Do you have writer’s sessions with any author-writer friends? Share your experiences with us!

Steve D