The Pittsburgh SouthWrites Homepage



SF, Fantasy, Horror

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shield Who We Are shield

The Pittsburgh SouthWrites group is a workshop for science fiction, fantasy, and horror writers who live in the city itself and in the south and west suburbs. We meet roughly every two weeks. We use the Clarion method, in which a member hands out copies of a story or a chapter at one meeting and the rest of the group reads and line-edits the work during the next two weeks, critiquing it round-robin style at the next meeting.

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shield Our Members shield

John Branch, Ann Cecil, Chetan Chothani, Judith Friedl,
Lynn Hawker, Larry Ivkovich, Diane McCarty, Henry Tjernlund

Members in Absentia: Jamie Chew, Steve Chew, Mary Turner

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shield Meeting Schedule shield

Our next meeting is on March 9th at Ann's.
May we all see publication in 2008!

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shield Our Bylaws shield

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shield Milestones shield

  • February 2008: Henry Tjernlund's flash fiction story "Fresh" is published in Issue Two of Escape Velocity magazine, published in both print and ebook versions. Way to go, Henry!
  • June 2006: Chetan Chothani's short article is published anonymously in the "Off the Record" column in Infoworld, a webzine. Read Chetan's take on the other side of outsourcing here. Woo hoo!
  • March 2006: Larry Ivkovich's short story "Navilla's Wraith" is featured in Twisted Cat Tales, an anthology edited by Esther Schrader. Find it here at Amazon.com. Huzzah, Larry, huzzah!
  • November 2005: Larry Ivkovich's short story "Gateway to Avalon" is featured in the September 2005 issue of Kenoma webzine. You go, Larry!
  • July 2005: Triangulation 2005 is now out from PARSEC Ink. It features stories by SouthWrites John Branch ("The Voices of Eternity"), Ann Cecil ("Coffee, Tea and Persia"), Judith Friedl ("He Lifted His Voice to Sing"), Lynn Hawker ("The Devil is in the Details"), and Larry Ivkovich ("A Life in the Day"). Once again, Barb Carlson did a great job as editor. You can find Triangulation 2005 at PARSEC Ink. Order your copy today!
  • November, 2004: Larry Ivkovich's short story "Lord of the Fleas" is featured in "The Front," a new Pittsburgh-area weekly newspaper. Larry does it again!
  • July 2004: PARSEC's latest publication, Triangulation 2004, comes out in time for Confluence 2004. "A Question of Belief" by John Branch, "Well Met by Moonlight" by Judith Friedl, "Merlin and Vivian--Monologues in the Whitethorn Bower: Then and Now" by Lynn Hawker, and "The Gray War" by Larry Ivkovich are among the terrific stories in this year's anthology, which was edited by Barb Carlson. You can find it at PARSEC Ink. Get your copy today!
  • March 2004: Larry Ivkovich sells his short story "Casual Day" to Storyteller, a Canadian print magazine. Larry shoots and scores!
  • July 2003: PARSEC's newest publication, Triangulation 2003, comes out in time for Confluence 2003. "Shadow Chasing" by John Branch, "Wishing Bridge" by Ann Cecil, and "Troll" by Judith Friedl are among the fine stories in this anthology. You can find it at PARSEC Ink. Get your copy today!
  • September 2001: Judith Friedl's short story "Well Met by Moonlight" appears in the September/October issue of the now-defunct Alternate Realities webzine. Sweet!
  • January 2001: Six from PARSEC: the PARSEC Fantasy Anthology becomes the first book published by the fledgling PARSEC Publishing venture. Ann Cecil's "The Pittsburgh Town Musicians" and Judith Friedl's "The Love-Talker" are among the featured stories. Oh, yeah!
  • December, 2000: The Barnes & Noble anthology Crafty Cat Crimes is published in time for holiday buying. Carole McIntyre's short stories "Burning Bright" and "Habit" are in good company. Mee-ow!
  • December 2000: the second part of Barb Carlson's article on ferret-proofing the home appears in the Jan/Feb issue of Ferrets magazine. Barb does it again!
  • October 2000: the first part of Barb Carlson's two-part article on ferret-proofing the home appears in the Nov/Dec issue of Ferrets magazine. Fabulous, Barb!

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shield Links shield

  • PARSEC, the Pittsburgh Area Realtime Scientifiction Enthusiasts Consortium, just what it says. PARSEC hosts Confluence, a literary convention, almost every year; Confluence 2006 was held July 28-30, 2006, at the Four Points Sheraton in Moon Township, PA.
  • Pittsburgh Worldwrights, the first of the PARSEC-related science fiction writers' groups. Members live mostly in the city and the east hills. Membership is closed and there is a long waiting list.

  • Write or Die (WorD), another writers' group, open to the public. Members live mostly in the northern suburbs, eastern suburbs and beyond. They meet at the Monroeville Public Library.

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At some point in every writer's life, someone will read a passage of his/hers out loud and say, "Umm, you might want to change this." This poem is a celebration of those points in our lives.

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by Judith Friedl

She rose at dawn to work on her story.
Grateful endorphins crawled up her backside, painted a faded red.
She lifted the thirty-gallon keg and took a long swig,
staring at the empty screen.
You'd think, she thought,
living at 333 Muse Mews would be of some help, but no.
This writing is dry work, she said to the empty keg,
and went to bed for the night.


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Any questions or comments can be sent to the Webmaster at
jafriedl1951 @ hotmail.com (close up spaces in address before sending).


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Created November 1998. Last revised March 2008.