Upcoming workshops and appearances

Have settled the summer schedule:

June 15, 3013:
Missouri Romance Writers
“The Heroine’s Journey”
Booksigning: 12:30
Maryland Heights Centre, 2344 McKelvey Road, Maryland Heights, MO
Website

July 16-20, 2013
Romance Writers of American National Conference
Panel on Romantic Women’s Fiction
Friday 2-3 pm
Atlanta Marriott Marquis, Atlanta GA
Website

July 28-August 3, 2013
Antioch Summer Writing Institute
Writing Commericial Fiction workshop
Mornings, all week
Antioch University, Santa Barbara
Website

VOICE CLASS

THE WRITER’S VOICE

A six-week writing intensive designed to help writers understand voice as a whole, and to understand the elements that make her own voice unique.

The exercises are mostly timed writings, and are designed to build, week by week, to help you see what you have to offer the world with your work. Are you a funny ethnic writer with a thread of poignancy? A serious historical novelist with roots deep in a particular time?  What influenced you to become a writer and what do you want to get from it?  Who taught you to speak, and what have you read and loved?  These are all elements of the writer’s voice.

The class runs from Tuesday to Tuesday, and is comprised of lecture, exercises and discussion. Due to the intensive nature of the reading and writing requirement, class size is limited to 8.  If an entire critique or other like group takes it together, there is a 10% discount, and as always, I will offer one scholarship available for each segment.  To be considered, email me with “scholarship” in the subject line and specify which class and date you want to be considered for.

Questions? Email me.

COST: $225
DATES:  April 30th–June 4th 3013

July 30th–Sept 3rd 2013
IF THERE IS SUFFICIENT INTEREST, I WILL CONSIDER OFFERING THE VOICE II CLASS LATER IN THE FALL.

 

SYLLABUS

WEEK ONE:

What is voice, exactly?
Childhood and cultural influences

WEEK TWO

Becoming Aware: ourselves and our places
Voice vs. Style

 

WEEK THREE

Other influences: other writers, stories, genres.

Individual truth and emotional honestly; why writing is scary sometimes, even if you’re making it up and the heroine is a princess for heaven’s sake

 

WEEK FOUR

Check in: how does it feel? Discussion.
More on influences and exercises on how to see them, see yourself, see others, pick out a voice
Illustrating the differences.

WEEK FIVE

Exercises designed to show individual voice and quests.

Two part exercise designed to illustrate each individual voice. Reading, side by side posts.

WEEK SIX

Pulling it all together. A worksheet and discussion to help each writer answer lingering questions, put all her ideas in one place, and have a chance to display her own work.

 

To sign up for the class, email me  and I will give you details.

To apply for a scholarship, email me with VOICE SCHOLARSHIP in the subject line. I’ll draw names from a hat the week before the class starts.  Please don’t feel you have to give reasons. I’ve been there, and I trust you–if you can pay, you will.  

 

Antioch Writing Institute, Audible Books, and finally….turned in the new book!

A handful of news updates this freezing Friday February morning.

 

BOOKS

—The first is that I’ve finished revisions for my next women’s fiction book, The Flavor of a Blue Moon, which will be out from Bantam some time next spring. (Sorry–it was research intensive, four food bloggers who gather at an organic lavender farm–I hope you’ll find it worth the wait.)

—I’ve solicited some reads on The Mirror Girl, the project I blogged a year ago, and the response is overwhelmingly enthusiastic. I’ll be making another pass through it, then sending it off into the world  Hope to have news of that for you soon.

—Audio: lots of books are going up in audio, both backlist and frontlist, so if you’ve missed one, keep checking back.  I’m waiting for approval on A Bed of Spices, and will run a special promotion (because it is particularly beautiful!).  Recent new additions to the catalogue are some special reads on The Sleeping Night, Walk in Beauty, The Last Chance Ranch, and one of my favorites, Light of Day.   Check out the growing list here. Nearly all of my books have been contracted or are in production. I have had so many emails asking, so this is very good news!

TEACHING/APPEARANCES

—I’ll be teaching this summer in Santa Barbara, at the Antioch Summer Writing Institute in Santa Barbara. The week-long immersion will focus on Writing Commercial Fiction. Space is limited.   READ MORE ABOUT THE PROGRAM>>>

—After many many inquiries over the past few months, I have decided to offer my six-week voice class twice this year, in April and in August.  I’ll post an official announcement soon, but if you are interested, email me at awriterafoot @ gmail.com with the subject line VOICE CLASS.   As always, there will be two scholarships per section offered, to be drawn randomly (so you don’t have to qualify).  Places are VERY limited.

Check back for more on that next week.

Now, I’m off to scribble some more on a juicy piece I’m writing for Lunch Hour Love Stories.  It will be available mid-March.

Stay warm!

 

 

New! Online Voice Class available this fall

Finally!  I have a couple of months that are a little less demanding so I can offer the voice class again this fall. It’s been almost two years!  I love teaching this, and believe deeply in the power of voice, so I’ve missed it a LOT.

What it is:

A six week writing intensive designed to help each writer recognize the unique elements that form her own voice, and to recognize voice as a whole.    Each week, I’ll post a set of exercises, and you will have several days to complete them.  Then you will post your work to the group, and we will then discuss what elements of voice have been showcased that week.   There is plenty of time to discuss questions that come up, and to address each writer’s concerns about her own voice.

The exercises are mostly timed writings, and are designed to build, week by week, to help you see what elements make your voice unique, and how you might be able to best match it to the marketplace. Are you a funny ethnic writer with a thread of poignance?  A serious historical novelist with deep roots in a particular time?  What influenced you to come a writer, who taught you to talk, what have you read and loved?   All these elements form the developing writer.

It’s a very deep workshop, very hands-on, and I believe it can be very helpful for writers who are floundering for whatever reason–too many contest judges, too many rejections, a crazy critique group, an editor who undermined you. Maybe you aren’t at all sure where you belong in the writing universe and need to figure out where you fit.  Over the years, a number of students have found their voices in all kinds of surprising and interesting ways, and have formed friendships with other writers as well.

READ THE SYLLABUS HERE

The class is SMALL, and very intimate, and I will be reading and commenting on your work personally, which is why this is more expensive than the average online workshop.  I do offer two scholarships every time, so if you are aching to do this and just can’t swing it, please drop me an email at awriterafoot@gmail.com with SCHOLARSHIP REQUEST in the subject line and I’ll put your name in a hat.

Start date: August 31, 2010

Price: $225

If you are interested, send an email with Voice Workshop in the subject line to awriterafoot@gmail.com

And any of you out there who found it helpful, either online or in person, please let me know that, too.

Circles of Quiet, a workshop for working writers


Circles of Quiet

An
anonymous workshop for published writers—for nourishment, recommitment,
reinvention and support.

 

Start date:  June 16,
2008*

Length: 8
weeks

Price: $200

 

To
reserve your place, email me.

 

(As always, I am happy to make
arrangements for payment, and there will be two scholarships awarded. If you would like to be considered for a
scholarship, simply email me .)


BACKGROUND

Over
and over, I have heard tales of frustration from writers who have been in the
game a long time, sometimes a very long time, who wanted to have the freedom to
talk about their problems and concerns in a safe environment.


This
will be as anonymous as it is possible for any gathering to be. I can’t make any
guarantee that no one will ever guess your identity, but as a teacher, I will
protect your privacy as carefully as a priest(ess). Only I will know who you are. You will join the class through me, but then
you will take a new email address under whatever name you like, and join the
group email list in that name. In this
way, writers can feel free to talk about the challenges of life as a working
writer without fear of repercussions.

Each
week, I’ll post topics for discussion, and perhaps exercises, and then help
facilitate discussion. It’s is meant to be a give and take—your experiences and
ideas are important to the process. The
goal is to help each writer renew and recommit to writing.

Some of the subjects for discussion
are:

 

Self-esteem: how do you keep your sanity in a business
like this? Burn-out, exhaustion, and
disaster—tricks to manage the pitfalls.


Clearing the decks: remembering the
original lure into the writing business. What to keep? What to cast to the seas?


Particulars: individual
challenges.


Celebration:  really, it’s a great life
in a lot of ways (as I’m sure everyone tells you as much as they tell me).
Developing a habit of gratitude and awareness.


Pressure: business pressure, family
issues, juggling outside influences.


Staying in the game: Flexibility,
reinvention, and disaster.


Manifesto and connection: honoring
yourself and your passions while also honoring the need to make money.


*I’ve settled on these dates in particular so that those
writers attending the RWA conference in July will have a bridge, before and
after, to help navigate what can be both exhilarating and crushing, depending on
what happens.

 

Questions? Concerns? Email me.

Flickr Creative Commons photo by Angela7Dreams

CLASSES FOR WRITERS

To read recent blog posts on these topics, click here.  Or click on the dates on the calendar.

"If you don’t do your work, it might not ever get written."  Madeline L’Engle

Over the past few years, I have been engaged quite a lot more in teaching.   It seems to me that there is a great need for circles of encouragement among writers, and that is what these classes are designed to do.  Each class is meant to foster creativity and friendships, as well as inspire writers to find and produce their own special body of work.

BACKGROUND
For several years, I wrote a column
called The Care and Feeding of the Girls in the Basement for Novelist’s Ink, the newsletter of a group of published
commercial novelists. (The title comes from a phrase coined by Stephen King, though he calls his "boys in the basement." Of course.)  It’s a working group, with a number of writers
who’ve been producing novels for decades, and it seemed to me that the
newsletter offered plenty of business and writing advice, but there
wasn’t much attention given to the idea of how to take care of the
vulnerable, more delicate creative of the personality.  What I was seeing around me were a lot of exhausted, demoralized writers who needed desperately to fall back in love with their writing.  So I started writing about it.

Which lead, in a roundabout way, to teaching creativity and voice to both aspiring and published writers, and helping to create circles of support for writers at all stages of their careers.  There are lots of people who tell you how hard this career is, how impossible the statistics, how challenging, and how very few writers ever get published.  I believe that no one is called to writing by accident, and what most writers need is encouragement and some illumination about how to stay healthy and productive and allow the process of creation, rather than forcing it.

CREDENTIALS (such as they are)

I have been writing for my bread for virtually all of my adult life, through ups and downs in both my personal and professional life.  By some miracle, I am still madly in love with the process and the product, but it hasn’t always been easy.  These classes are the product of all those years of writing professionally, and they continue to grow and expand as each class teaches me something new.  As my  career continues to grow and expand, it feels more and more important to stay grounded in the day-to-day tending that an artistic path requires, and this is one way I have found to continue to feed my own "girls in the basement".*

Email me with questions

ONLINE CLASSES

VOICE I
A six-week class on the basics of voice, including family and place influences, as well as illustrations of how each voice is naturally unique.

VOICE II
A continuation of the previous voice class, taking the study of voice into more particular and individual levels.

GIRLS IN THE BASEMENT
A nourishing and step-by-step journey though the cornerstones of building a healthy writer’s life, from the basics of health to figuring out your best work styles.  Best for emerging writers who are in earlier stages of their careers.

CIRCLES OF QUIET
An anonymous course for published authors, 9-weeks, utilizing some of the same aspects of Girls in the Basement, but more particular to the needs of long-time writers who might have lost their way, or simply want to connect with others in a safe and supportive environment.  (Email me if you are interested in more details.)
     (begins June 16)

ON THE ROAD
Santa Barbara Writers Conference, June 22

Romance Writers of Australia, August 25

Voice II Class–Practicalities and holy callings

ONLINE CLASS

Many students have asked for a continuation of the voice class, and after much thought, I have fashioned a syllabus that will build on the foundation we use in Voice I.    Using the same format of small, intimate groups, timed exercises, and discussion, we will discuss the passions, ideas, and compulsions we want to express in writing, as well as the practicalities of finding times, fitting ourselves to the right markets and learning to shape voice to style.  As with the other classes, there are scholarships available.

Prerequisite: Voice I or my permission.

Cost: $225
Length: 6 weeks
Class limit: 8

2008 start dates:  March 11; October 22
Email me to hold your place.

SYLLABUS 
Week One–Holy Callings

Week Two–Genres and connection

Week Three–Seminal events

CHAT

Week Four–Practicalities

Week Five–Path

Week Six–Pulling it all together

Girls in the Basement

THE CARE AND FEEDING OF THE GIRLS IN THE BASEMENT
12 week online class designed to nurture writers and help create circles of support
$340
Email me to reserve a space

 No classes scheduled until next spring, 2009.

“If you don’t write your books, they might not ever get written.” Madeline l’Engle.

There are a great many how-to-write courses and many great teachers of how to write a novel. This is not one of them. The Care and Feeding of the Girls in the Basement is meant to help inspire and encourage you, to help you learn (or remember) how to nurture your creative spirit. It’s a chance to renew your joy, tap into the original delight you once felt for writing, and make a powerful commitment to yourself and your writing. We’ll draw from several texts, including The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron; Women Who Run With The Wolves by Clarrissa Pinkola Estes, and Writing Down the Bones, by Natalie Goldberg, among others.

BACKGROUND

For several years, I wrote a column by this name for Novelist’s Ink, the newsletter of a group of published commercial novelists. It’s a working group, with a number of writers who’ve been producing novels for decades, and it seemed to me that the newsletter offered plenty of business and writing advice, but there wasn’t much attention given to the idea of how to take care of the vulnerable, more delicate creative of the personality. I’m writing my last column this month, and have developed the material into a 12-week class.

CLASS FORMAT

The class will be conducted online via email and chat. Each Monday morning, I’ll send out the week’s lessons and exercises to the group. In addition, we will meet three times during the course in a chat room, to gather and ask questions, talk about the week’s lessons. Unlike my voice classes, you’ll be doing your work privately, and we’ll use the email loop to discuss whatever comes up, rather than posting lots of material.

THE CARE AND FEEDING OF THE GIRLS IN THE BASEMENT
12 WEEK CLASS
SYLLABUS**

Each week will include lecture material posted via email, discussion, and 2 hour chat time. There will also be recommended readings (most available online and all available through your library—a list will be distributed at the start of class). Occasionally, I’ll post a link to an audio. You will need to do the exercises and should plan to take an hour-long artist date each week. There is no grade, of course, so how fully you participate is up to you.

WEEK ONE–Basics
The care and feeding of the body
Artist’s Dates and how they work
Making your sacred space

WEEK TWO–Safety
The Good Girl Syndrome
Setting boundaries and creating a safe zone
Learning to play
Building an altar

WEEK THREE–Drama
Crazymakers
Keep the drama on the page
Methods to recognize false drama and get rid of it

Chat

WEEK FOUR–Fear
Working with fear
Countering victimhood
Finding symbols of your own
Chat

WEEK FIVE–Abundance
Abundance—what it is and what it isn’t
If I have all I want, won’t someone else suffer?
Suffering as a secret virtue
Chat

WEEK SIX– Scar Clan
Scar Clan and Descansos, working with sorrow and anger
The good luck/bad luck game

Chat

WEEK SEVEN—Belonging
The odd woman out
Finding your tribe

WEEK EIGHT—Passion
Dreams and ambition as a road map
Drama and jealousy as road block
Passion as a calling

WEEK NINE—Power
Power corrupts…or does it?
Getting over fears about power
When you get what you want and it’s not what you thought
Chat

WEEK ELEVEN—Love
All you are is love
Writing as an offering and a joy
Accepting love, accepting play

WEEK TWELVE—Trust
You have everything you need
If you don’t write your books, they might not ever get written
Play as the rule of thumb

Chat

 TWO FULL SCHOLARSHIPS WILL BE OFFERED. I’ll draw two names from a hat a week before class begins.

Email me  if you’d like to be considered, or to nominate someone else you think would benefit and can’t swing the fees. Put "scholarship" in the subject line and specify which class you’d like to be considered for.


Voice I Class

THE WRITER’S VOICE

A six-week writing intensive designed to help writers understand voice as a whole, and to understand the elements that make her own voice unique.

The exercises are mostly timed writings, and are designed to build, week by week, to help you see what you have to offer the world with your work. Are you a funny ethnic writers with a thread of poignance? A serious historical novelist with roots deep in a particular time?  What influenced you to become a writer and what do you want to get from it?  Who taught you to speak, and what have you read and loved?  These are all elements of the writer’s voice.

The class runs from Tuesday to Tuesday, and is comprised of lecture, exercises and discussion. Due to the reading and writing requirement, class size is limited to 8.  A 20% discount is offered for groups of five or more, and there is one scholarship available for each segment.  To be considered, email me with "scholarship" in the subject line and specify which class and date you want to be considered for.

Questions? Email me.

COST: $225
DATES:  October 1, 2008 (to give us time to finish before the holidays begin)   

Voice II will begin on October 22

SYLLABUS 

WEEK ONE:

What is voice, exactly?
Childhood and cultural influences

WEEK TWO

Becoming Aware: ourselves and our places
Voice vs. Style

WEEK THREE

Other influences: other writers, stories, genres.

Individual truth and emotional honestly; why writing is scary sometimes, even if you’re making it up and the heroine is a princess for heaven’s sake

WEEK FOUR

Check in: how does it feel? Discussion.
More on influences and exercises on how to see them, see yourself, see others, pick out a voice
Illustrating the differences.

WEEK FIVE

Exercises designed to show individual voice and quests.

Two part exercise designed to illustrate each individual voice. Reading, side by side posts.

WEEK SIX

Pulling it all together. A worksheet and discussion to help each writer answer lingering questions, put all her ideas in one place, and have a chance to display her own work.