Write Club Hyderabad just published 3 pm Tales with stories that came up during their weekly meetups, Check it out! 

November 17 was a special day for folks who are a part of the Write Club Hyderabad because they launched their third anthology, 3 pm Tales at Phoenix Arena, HITEC City. And if you can't wait to get your hands on it, be patient, because their first edition was already sold out at the event.  When we spoke to Sravanthi Talluri, Founder of the Write Club Hyderabad, she told us how their first book was a collection of short stories and poems and their second one was a theme-based book, but 3 pm Tales contains those works which were developed at their regular Saturday 3 pm meets at Lamakaan.

Some of the regular participants of the club are director Aparna Malladi, poet Rebecca Vedavathy, poet Paresh Tiwari and several others

Since three years, participants of Write Club Hyderabad have been meeting to write more and write better. At every meet, Talluri, or a host participant, provides the group with prompts, themes or a storyline which the participants take up and create their own pieces. Best of these pieces, whether haikus, haibuns, flash fiction, poetry or short stories, have been distilled for 3 pm Tales. "This year, we wanted the anthology to be about what we do in the club. So we published the best works of participants," says the 27-year-old Talluri.

Say cheese: Club members and Kalpna Singh-Chitnis, an Indo-American writer and filmmaker, at the book launch

But sustaining a club for three years is no easy task, we assume. So we ask Talluri how she has managed to keep the club going. "Well, am a stickler for rules, some of which, I think, has really helped us with consistency," says Talluri, who is a Senior Analyst at Deloitte. One of these rules being that if you have attended the meet more than twice, you are eligible to host a meet, for which, you will provide a prompt of your own. Then, the same prompt is used by other participants to write their piece of the day. Usually, their sessions include a warm-up for the first 15 minutes, wherein, people are asked to do various things - from physical exercises, doodling to group exercises. Then the prompts and guidelines are given and the writing begins. Towards the end, participants are free to read out what they have written and fellow participants offer suggestions for the piece.

They also conduct workshops for both members and non-members. Their membership fee is `250 per annum

"Next, we want to be able to target audience as per their age, for example, we would like to conduct workshops for 13 to 19-year-olds and help refine their skills so that they can be steered in the right direction," says the alumna of Vignana Bharathi Institute of Technology. "I still remember that I started this club because I wanted to hone my own writing skills. My aim was also to build a community of writers," says Talluri, adding that she is working on something independently too.   

For more on them, click on facebook.com/writeclubhyd/