Online Registration is now closed. Call the office at 425-771-0228, Mon-Fri, 8:30am-5:30pm (PDT) for registration information for Friday 1/2 Day sessions "Living Dialog" and "Craft and Confidence." For a print copy of the brochure schedule, go to: http://www.writeonthesound.com/images/documents/2016_schedule_4.pdf
Friday, September 30, 2016, Pre-conference workshops
Full
Deep Editing Power and Writing Fresh Body Language (Lawson) Deep Editing is for the writer who wants to learn fresh editing techniques and to psychologically impact the unconscious of the reader. Learn the EDITS System, and then take it deeper by learning the interplay of patterns on the page and analyze what's needed to strengthen the scene. Receive various tips including back story management, power lines, throw-away words, cliché twists, back loading, tautologies, and emotional hits. This full-day session includes Margie's Body Language Basics. Learn how physical cues such as lips, eyes, chin, full facial expression, gestures, posture and hierarchical zones define character point-of-view and emotional state of mind. Examples from bestselling authors are reviewed, dissected and analyzed. It is recommended attendees bring their own work so they can explore this editing approach with their writing.
Living Dialog (Athans) - A lively workshop on the do's and don'ts of writing dialog for all genres and forms, including fiction, screenplays, and game scripting; anywhere a character has to speak. The session will look at various examples and work through some fun exercises in listening, punctuation, dialect, context, colloquialism, and more.
Full
Crafting Your Personal Essay (Lewars) - The most interesting personal essays are about life's struggles. This workshop will identify the struggle of your story, which often involves some trial and error, as well as trial and success, and how to place your story within the context of "the hero's journey." Included are discussion and handouts on thesis, ending, dialogue, characters, arc, scenes, and other necessary elements, as well as revision tips and techniques.
Craft and Confidence (Kenower) - Mastery of craft is never as complicated as the psychological and emotional mastery needed to sustain our work. Once we learn craft, we rarely forget it, but a writer can forget where his or her confidence resides at any time. In this half-day session, particpants will take an intensive look at how to keep attention where it needs to be to sustain our private writing work while simultaneously pursuing the very public career of author.
Saturday, October 1, 2016 Sessions
Writing Fresh Visceral Responses: Beyond Hammering Hearts (Lawson) -This workshop teaches writers the importance of including visceral responses when emotions run high, and how to write them fresh. We'll cover the full range of visceral responses, writing fresh, using the Four Levels of Powering Up Emotion, how to crescendo emotion, stimulus/response patterns, overwriting and underwriting, ideomotoric shifts, and how to viscerally hook your reader. Examples of various responses will be dissected and analyzed.
The Elastic Boundaries of Nonfiction (Marshall) - Are you drawn to several different types of writing? Many writers move back and forth between genres in the same literary work or borrow from techniques associated with one genre to enrich another genre. Look at how nonfiction writing may effectively incorporate narrative, lyricism, illustrations, and statistical facts within the same piece, and launch your own nonfiction pieces that push at boundaries and convention.
Full
Critical Scene Techniques (Thayer) - Scene structure hides itself from the reader but successful scenes have a timeless and proven pattern, and knowing the pattern is a critical skill for authors. This presentation will cover the vital techniques for every scene such as how to begin and end a scene and how to move the scene forward. It will also discuss avoiding scene killers, those mistakes that make agents and editors quickly turn down the novel.
Make Writing a Business: Nitty-Gritty of Being an Author Entrepreneur (Sullivan) - Expand your writing passion to embrace entrepreneurship. In the session, participants will discover resources that will help them manage their writing ventures. Learn the basics of a writing enterprise, such as home office deductions, sales taxes, and tax reseller agreements. Topics include domain names, websites, accepting credit cards, bank accounts, crowdfunding, licenses, and more.
Full
Who's That Talking: Problems with Point-of-View (Barksdale Inclán) - Writers often think plot and character are their main issues, but what can derail a story is inconsistent or confusing point-of-view. This workshop will help participants identify the POV in a piece of their writing, and discuss issues particular to various genres, as well as other challenges mastering POV.
Five Ways to Make Your Memoir Stand Out (Folkins) - This session touches on five points not always considered in nonfiction. Writers will learn to narrow their focus, develop a narrative arc, explore point-of-view, incorporate research and learn how to check facts. Whether you are brainstorming new material or honing a draft, this interactive presentation will examine how authors apply these five points, and offer a brief exercise in applying them to your own work.
Above the Noise: Navigating the Literary Magazine Arena (Gapinski) - There are thousands of magazines and journals out there. Choosing the right publication for your work can be a daunting task. This session will give participants the tools necessary to navigate the literary magazine arena thoughtfully and deliberately, identifying the best markets for an author's work, and tailor submissions to fit an author's favorite publication venues. When approached more meaningfully, the submission process becomes a community building exercise rather than a faceless point-and-click process.
Crimes of Syntax and How to Fix Them (Laura Moe) - This session explores the terrain of sentences. Through a Power Point presentation and brief exercise, participants will learn how to use precise verbs and nouns, question the intentions of their sentences, and fix flat syntax.
Keynote: John Moe Your life as a writer may be filled with editors, publishers, clients and readers who can improve your work by being tough on you. Problem is, they don't know you inside and out like you do. Besides, you can always run away from people like that. But there's no getting away from you. You have the capacity to be the meanest, most passionate, most intense drill sergeant in the world and, along the way, produce your best work.
Market While You Write: Six Ways to Build Your Audience Before You Publish (Jusino) - Marketing has become part of every author's job, and it starts long before the book releases. But building a platform isn't as hard, or as scary, as it sounds. This session offers six inexpensive and realistic ways to build your brand and your community, even before your first book comes out.
Writing Science Fiction and Fantasy (Athans) - This session features advice from the author's books, The Guide to Writing Fantasy & Science Fiction and Writing Monsters. Attendees will learn the necessity of consistently-applied rules for your fantasy and science fiction worlds, the vital importance of a strongly-motivated villain, and other tips regarding the fantasy and science fiction genres.
Villains and Vixens: Writing the Dark Side (Duarte) - Good and evil exist side by side in our daily lives. Characters' flaws, mistakes, secrets and sins are what make stories real and readable. There are no heroes without "bad guys." What will your villains stoop to? This session will reveal ways to depict the "dark side" through metaphor, images and good story writing techniques.
So You Think You Want to Write a YA Novel [Fiction - Beg/Int] (Treichel) - Some might argue that a YA novel is simply a novel with a young adult protagonist. But is that all it is? Is YA nothing more than a marketing label? This session will look at some of the differences between YA and adult fiction in terms of plot, pacing, POV, and language, and explore some of the common tropes in YA fiction and how authors can use or subvert them.
Full
Harnessing the Chaos of the Universe, or Basics of Humor Writing [All Genres/Levels] (John Moe) - We live in a world that is inherently ridiculous but that our brain translates as normal in order for us to get through our day. If you remove that filter and let the deep-seeded bananasness wash over you, you're well on the way to a successful humor writing career. Probably. I mean, it's either write humor or scream in terror all the time, so you might as well have fun, right? Learn how!
Full
Map It Out: Discover Plot in Your Setting (Hardwick) - Are you plot challenged? Do your stories have amazing plots but lack a strong setting? In this workshop, we'll look at how setting influences plot by exploring everything from the news of the day to known and not-so known holidays. We'll look at how a setting bible can help you organize your story and you'll leave with plenty of plot ideas to write a series or spin-offs.
Full
Travel Memoir: Take Your Readers on a Journey (Green) - Whether your travels have taken you to the fjords of Norway or the brewpubs of Portland, you have been on a journey that can be fascinating for readers. The trick is to engage them on all levels: with emotional urgency, a well-balanced description of enough detail, but not too much, and thematic resonance.
Full
Powerful Objects: Character, Plot and Resonance (Szilágyi) - What makes a story pulsate with meaning? How can you keep imagery fresh and ideas and emotions tactile? We'll discuss the use of objects to develop character, story structure, and to heighten emotional impact. Examples from various author's work will offer insight into the topic, with a particular focus on how imagery and detail can bring out the psychic power of a particular object. A brief exercise offers participants an opportunity to practice points reviewed.
Sunday, October 2, 2016 Sessions
Sunday-only Registrants receive a ticket to the Keynote address on Saturday afternoon.
Tickets must be picked up at the Frances Anderson Center front desk on either Friday Sept. 30 or Saturday Oct. 1st.
Full
Setting Emotion: How to Use Place to Establish Emotion (Treichel) - Explore the reason why the ubiquity of the old writing commandment, "show, don't tell," sometimes obscures how difficult it is to understand and master. This session will focus on how to use place not just as a backdrop, but as a means to establish emotion and to reveal character. We'll also look at how the description of place can suggest or reveal an untold event, or something happening outside of the scene
How Poetry Can Help Us Tell Stories in Any Genre (Marshall) - Examine poems that tell brief stories and identify the techniques poets use to create character, tension, and epiphanies (often in a very short piece). Explore those techniques and tools to create your own short piece of poetry or prose that puts into practice the unique ways that poetry uses lyrical language to tell stories.
Book Review Basics: Publication, Payment and Platform Development (May) - This session explores book reviewing publication opportunities and how writers of any genre may supplement their income while enhancing their personal platform and expertise. We'll discuss how reviewing contributes to your life as a writer, how to write a successful review, and how to query and pitch potential publications.
Three Easy Steps to Writing Dynamic Short Stories (Duarte) - This workshop will zero in on three steps on ways to write stories that flow from beginning to end with a major plot, a protagonist's viewpoint, conflict, scenes and dialogue that reveal the heart of the story throughout. Writing prompts, exercises and open discussion will reveal a path for writing dynamic short stories.
Pacing: Keeping the Action Going (Morrison) - For a thriller novel, it's all about the pacing, so that readers keep turning the pages long past their bedtimes. But a fast pace doesn't necessarily mean constant action; a great roller coaster ride is as much about the suspenseful build-up of tension as it is about the thrills. Boyd will explore how to balance breakneck storytelling speed with the character conflict and setting details that make a compelling novel.
The Door to Getting Published: Nonfiction Book Proposals [Nonfiction - All Levels] (Kaska) - Nonfiction books are an excellent avenue to becoming published, and can open the door to having fictional work considered. This session focuses on drafting a proposal for a nonfiction publication, reviewing three pertinent questions: Why should this book be written? Who will read it? Why are you the best person to write it? Kaska's biography, The Man Who Saved the Whooping Crane, sold one week after submitting the proposal.
The Five Secrets of Writing (Files) - "There are three rules for writing," Somerset Maugham said. "Unfortunately, no one knows what they are." But he was wrong: There are five rules and I know them. This talk won't give you a sure-fire formula to bestsellerdom, but it will reveal the secrets to writing your strongest, deepest stories, nonfiction and poems.
End the Novel (Kirchner) - A dynamite conclusion is said to entice the readers to buy your next novel and is often considered even more important than the beginning. We will discuss tried-and-true methods behind successful conclusions and will study examples from published novels. Participants will learn the importance of closure, and why it makes or breaks a book. Discover some tried-and-true methods, and how to create multiple endings
Exploring Your Voice as a Children's Writer (Owens) - This fun interactive session offers simple yet revelatory techniques for more deeply and consistently connecting with an authentic personal voice, the material you're creating, and your particular audience of young readers. Participants will come away with a treasure trove of childhood memory-mining activities they can do anytime, as well as strategies for applying what they've learned whenever inspiration flags or their connection to the work needs a boost.
How to Become a Successful Freelance Writer (McDonald Bennett) - This session offers tips and tricks from a professional writer on how to launch and sustain a successful freelance career. Topics include the pros and cons of doing freelance work, what types of writing you can do as a freelancer, how to come up with ideas, places to publish your ideas, how to write query letters that catch editors' attention, and what to do before you hang out your shingle
"Look Here": Voice and Persona in Poetry and Creative Prose (Wright) - How can we learn to explore the inner life of those who intrigue or disturb us? We are often baffled by what makes others tick- historical figures, invented characters, and people in our lives whom we think we know, or want to know better. We will read dramatic monologues and persona poems that enact the inner life of characters in poetry and creative prose, and illuminate our own process of discovery, by writing our own.
Beware the Seven Deadly Writing Sins (Kretchmer, Lewars) - Before you send your manuscript off, you'll want to polish it one more time. In this presentation, Kretchmer and Lewars talk about some of the most deadly writing sins that many fiction and memoir writers make, including spineless stories, smothering prose, sensory deprivation, redundancy, ineffective backstory, slippery point of view, and a host of other messy issues.
Literally Speaking (Sanelli) - A component of a platform is author readings. Sanelli, a professional literary speaker, will reveal how reading your work aloud can artfully communicate and inspire an audience. She will share tips, and demonstrate how to better present your work aloud using technique, strength, grace, and style. Participants are encouraged to bring at least one poem or short prose piece they wish to read aloud.
Researching History (McConaghy) - If you would like to write about a historical person, place or time - how should you go about it? What resources are available to you to be in charge of your own research? Join Dr. Lorraine McConaghy, historian and biographer, for an interactive session on how to strategize and conduct historical research from scratch.
Full
Becoming a More Effective Creator (Long) - This session will demonstrate how to better reach your goal of realizing work that is accomplished, brilliant, and relevant to your values, and how to then put it out into the world. Open to all writers of all genres, from beginner to well-published. The principles and strategies put forward are based on the instructor's years-long study of the choices and practices of world-class artists and writers.
Publishing Panel with Boyd Morrison, Alice Boatwright and Bharti Kirchner (Fitzgerald) -Learn about the many paths to publication during this panel discussion moderated by Seattle author and publisher Waverly Fitzgerald. Boyd Morrison, Alice Boatwright and Bharti Kirchner will describe their experiences. We'll talk about the challenges and rewards of the current publishing environment, provide valuable resources and tips, and outline the process for getting your book published independently or by a small or traditional publisher.
