The Write Workshop or Presentation
For Your Event
Dear Event Coordinators,
I am available to teach or speak about the following topics. The length of the speech or workshop can be tailored to your needs, whether you want an hour presentation, daylong event or in-depth multiple-week course, either in-person or online. If you're interested in how I can shape the presentation for your particular audience, or if you'd like me to address a topic not listed, please email me.
Grow a Great Character, Grow a Great Plot
People aren't simply vehicles for stories, they are the stories. That's what you'll learn when you come to this workshop facilitated by novelist and writing coach Martha Engber and grow your own character from the ground up. Through discussion and writing exercises, you'll learn what makes a character great and how his or her actions create a plot.
Growing Great Characters From the Ground Up
People aren't simply vehicles for stories, they are the stories. Therefore it's crucial writers take the time to grow great fiction or nonfiction characters people want to read about. In this class, participants will do just that by seeding and growing their own character, whether for a thriller, memoir, biography or other writing venture. Based on my book of the same title, we'll begin with how and where to gather ideas and cover how to make characters unique, thus allowing them to grow into consistent, believable, admirable beings who have a life of their own. Once participants learn the process in detail, they'll have the tools necessary to develop a multitude of other characters.
Pyramid Tipping:
How to Build Great Characters From the Top Down
While it makes perfect sense to develop in-depth main characters by laying a broad foundation of their likes, dislikes, physical attributes and family history before beginning to write, such a heavy base can wind up crushing our characters by burying their most important qualities and introducing inconsistencies. To avoid the mistake of over-burdening your characters with too much baggage, this workshop will show you how to tip the information pyramid over. Instead of starting from a broad layer of general facts, you'll learn how to find and isolate that one telling detail upon which your entire character will be based. Such a key detail will not only clearly define your character, but also ensure consistency by serving as True North if you find yourself lost and confused about how your character should act when facing the challenges you create.
The Fast Start:
Establishing Your Character's M.O. From the Get-go for a Killer Opening
Your mission: to pull readers in with nail-biting action while getting them to care about your main character, all by the end of that crucial first page. Impossible? Not at all, so long as you know the trick successful writers use to accomplish the job. In this workshop, you'll learn not only how to find what makes your character tick, but also how to fold that critical information into an unforgettable, action-packed opening.
The 10 Most Common Mistakes Writers Make
When Creating Characters, and How to Avoid Them
I know, I know. We don't make mistakes when we create our characters. But if we did, I'll bet I know what those mistakes might be. So if you feel the time may come when you'll slip up, ruining that perfect record of careful, thoughtful development that leads to classic, charismatic, bestselling characters, whether for fiction or nonfiction, come to this presentation where I'll throw you not one, but 10 lifelines to help you avoid singing those My Character Done Me Wrong blues.
Globalization of the Reading World:
Shrinking Boundaries, Expanding Hearts
Flaming Good Dialog:
How to Create Unforgettable
Characters Through Exchanges That Singe
You think you've got fantastic, unique, bestselling characters? You'll have to prove that to readers, not only through your characters' actions, but also by what they say, how and when they speak almost as important as what words they use. In this workshop, you'll not only learn how to sidestep the most common dialog pitfalls, including why characters all too often wind up sounding alike, but also how to employ the five techniques that will make your characters unique and eminently believable.
Enough With Show, Don't Tell Already:
What Does It Mean, Why is It Necessary and How Do We Do It?
Show, don't tell has got to be one of the most oft-spoken phrases in all writerdom and one that dogs determined scribes without mercy. We think we're showing, showing, showing, when really we're telling, telling, telling. So why not tell? Look at all the fabulously famous writers who do. Then again, if we're not fabulously famous and want to be, or if we just want to be the best writers possible, should we really succumb to telling readers exactly what our characters are thinking at all times?
The Art of Rewriting
As Dorothy Parker once said, "I can't write five words but that I change seven." While writing anything can be an arduous task, rewriting can be ten times as difficult and as bewildering. Yet rewriting also allows you the fantastic opportunity to not only improve the story you're currently working on, but your future writing, as well. In this class we'll discuss how to structure and employ various strategies that we'll then practice in class. We'll also talk about: adopting the right expectations; estimating the time necessary for completion; understanding the three levels of editing; breaking the job into manageable pieces; and seeking feedback as part of the process.
Editing For Winners:
How to Make Your Writing Sharp, Sharper, Sharpest
Whether you're writing a short story, novel, nonfiction book proposal or article, making your copy as clean as possible can make the difference between seeing your name in print and getting a rejection slip. That's because no matter how great your idea, if it's not presented in a professional manner, it may never see the light of day. So if you're motivated to succeed from query letter to final submission, come to this workshop to learn the three levels of editing that will lift your work above that found in the slush pile.
Online Critique Group
During this month-long critique group conducted via a class website and group email, you'll get feedback on six crucial components of whatever you're currently writing with the goal of helping you continue the development/ rewrite process independently. The components include concept, character development, plot, narrative, dialog and research. You'll submit a segment of your writing each week and get feedback from me within four days. You'll also have the opportunity to network with other writers and offer feedback to one another, mutually beneficial connections that have the potential to continue beyond this course.
Fantasy, Reality and the Making of fabulous Minds:
How Writing Can Explode the Boundaries of Your Universe
(Class for kids)
Through this six-session small group summer writing experiences for middle school students, kids will learn to write what they love and in so doing, stretch their creativity to all areas of their lives. We'll do outside-the-box writing exercises, discussion and critique.
Let Your Brain Storm:
How to Generate Thundering Good Ideas in A Split Second
"Where do you get your ideas?" is one of the most popular questions people ask successful authors. But while that process is a mystery to audiences, it shouldn't be to aspiring writers. During this course, writers will learn how to turn a barren horizon into a virtual downpour of worthy writing possibilities. Through discussion, brainstorming, writing exercises and group critique, picipants will learn how to catch, hold and hone ideas into thought-provoking concepts upon which classic stories are based.
Explode the Box:
Experimental Writing That Rockets the Imagination
If you have a serious urge to push writing to its limits, this workshop is for you. As writing rebels, we'll launch our imaginations to see how far they'll go. We'll mix, match and test outrageous combinations of language usage, structure, oints-of-view and characterization while sharing each other's work and reading classic examples of our experimental and avant-garde forebears. While our endeavors will no doubt generate plumes of humor, we'll also take a serious look at why it's important to both reserve a segment of our writing lives for the furtherance of writing as art as well as suspend the rules for awhile to allow our minds the freedom to soar.
Write Your Way Up the Ladder:
How to Succeed in Business Through Better Writing
Writing is one of the most persuasive tools available for getting what you want in the business world. Whether you're an entrepreneur or an ambitious employee, knowing how to successfully word emails, proposals, updates, evaluations, grants and reports is imperative for communicating the fact that you know what you're doing and can handle the job. In this workshop, you'll learn to write from the proper attitude with a specific goal in mind. You'll also learn how to choose the right words and why it's important to employ proper spelling, punctuation and grammar in an era when all that seems passe. By the end of this class, even if you never develop a passion for writing, you'll come to love how it can help you present yourself as a winner.
In Homage to Book Clubs:
How and Why They're Saving America