Looking
for writing classes?
Want to write for publication or for personal growth?
Want to sharpen those professional skills?
WritersCollege.com is
the place!
SCHOOL
NEWS: One new seminar (one week) and one new course (six weeks) for your use:
Eulogies is a new one week seminar by veteran WritersCollege.com teacher Sandra Louden. Looking for a new writing path that’s been completely overlooked and basically by-passed (read "no competition"). Well, look no further. Eulogies are present at all funerals today and as the bereaved look to find just the right words for their own personal tribute, those words and that personal tribute can be written by you. In this one-session seminar, Sandra Miller-Louden gives you the tools you need to get started writing eulogies—and gives you practical, specific suggestions to turn your writing into a full-fledged business. Put aside your aversion to the creepy factor and explore this totally untapped writing field that’s just waiting for someone to discover it.
Writing an entire novel is an intimidating prospect. We have this idea but are not sure how to go about it. Now we have help. Jump Start Your Novel is a six-week course by author Joe Nassise, internationally bestselling author of the Templar Chronicles series, as well as seven other novels. He is a two time Bram Stoker Award and International Horror Guild Award nominee, as well as a former president of the Horror Writers Association. The Jump Start Your Novel course focuses on how to plan your novel before you start writing it to make it as effective and intriguing as possible. By the end of the course you will have a variety of tools to help you in the writing process from character and setting sketches to scene outlines to a complete plot roadmap.
FEATURED
COURSES: To see ALL of our courses, visit our Catalogs page
Writing one good eulogy can get you through a time of bereavement looking to the rest of your family like a knight in shining armor. Writing eulogies as a business can be a profitable sideline. This seminar is intended for both the person needing to speak at Uncle Fred's funeral day after tomorrow and for the person writing eulogies on a regular basis for other families.
Focus on how to plan your novel before you start writing it to make it as effective and intriguing as possible. By the end of the seminar you will have a variety of tools to help you in the writing process from character and setting sketches to scene outlines to a complete plot roadmap.
Dialogue
is what makes your writing - fiction or non fiction
- come alive for readers. Learn how to make dialogue
work for you- to develop character, advance your
plot, impart information, show conflict or tension,
set the mood, and make readers part of the action.
Self-editing
is probably the most difficult part of writing. Fine
tuning the manuscript, seeing the flaws, imagining
how the words sound to the reader, and then garnering
the courage to rework them is daunting. ... During
this class, we’ll work on toning things down,
tightening things up—a diet for your manuscript.
Learn
to write a query letter that can attract the interest
of an editor and clinch the sale.
ESSAY: Most of today's essay is a suggestion that you visit Bob Parson's link at GoDaddy.com. GoDaddy.com is an excellent web hosting company that is cheap and yet has 24/7 real live humans who answer questions. I have a number of web sites with them though not, oddly, this one. This one is hosted by Register.com, an equally fine company but one more geared to business sites.
I have always wanted to write some rules of my own. I have long lived by some that I wrote down:
WORK: Work eight or more hours each day. (I actually work longer but also try to take Wednesdays off to make up.) You may say, "Well, I work at an office eight hours, what's the big deal?" The big deal is that for home-office freelancers, it is too easy to go shopping instead. And we don't get paid for talking at the water cooler or attending silly office meetings, either. So we have to get down to it and stay down at it.
SOCIAL/RELATIONSHIPS: Never say anything bad about anyone. Keep up with friends. Do acts of kindness whenever the opportunity arises. Do something each weekend.
I'm bad about social relationships as I get hunkered down in my little writing world and fail to put in the work a friendship or a love requires. I grew up an only child living out of an Army footlocker and moving twenty times in my first thirty years. I actually like being alone. If there were any employment these days for hermits, I guess I could be one. So I force myself to get out and see people.
GOVERNMENT: Vote. Volunteer for a campaign. Volunteer in a government office.
I Never worked in a campaign. Well, there was the loony I drove around the state one time because he wanted to be a U.S. senator and didn't own a car, but I didn't even vote for the guy. I just felt he should not be held back by poor transportation.
PERSONAL: Keep physically fit by daily exercise. Keep my space (house, yard, office) clean and organized. In the past year I have fallen into sloth and idleness and this is not good. I swear on a stack of frozen Healthy Choice dinners to do better. Plus, as a sailor, I need to be in good physical condition or I can get hurt.
CHARITY: Give $1 a day to someone. Support at least one organized charity with donation and volunteer work.
People get on my case about my policy of giving money to street beggars. A buck a day is not going to kill me and I am not my brother's keeper. If he wants to spend the dollar on booze or crack, that's his business. I don't give money with strings attached.
I also don't declare it on my taxes, not even my support of several local charities. I choose to whom to give my money and I do not expect the American people to have to pay a part of the bill for that.
ETHICAL: Never lie or cheat. This is actually the easiest part for me. Born and raised and then serving myself in the military, I was taught a code of honor that has become only more rigid over the years. These days, of course, I avoid lying because I cannot recall ten minutes later what I said. If I always tell the truth, then what I say the second time will be more or less the same thing, and I don't have to suffer brain-strain trying to keep things straight. My ethos used to be a proud and noble thing. Today it is just a practicality.
All this reminds me of a line from the movie Lawrence of Arabia, where the sheik says to a reporter, "Lawrence does what he does because he is passionate. I do what I do because it is good manners. You may be the judge of the more reliable motive."
Now, your turn. I would like to add to my list of good things to keep in mind for a good life. Send me your suggestions. Use this link:
WHO's
DOING WHAT: WritersCollege
Maximum Leader Steve Morrill is one of the members contributing to the newest book out by the American Society of Journalists & Authors. The book, Sixty Candles, is a celebration of the 60th anniversary of the Society, as well as a paen to the writing lifestyle in general.
FEEDBACK: Got
a response? Got a question? Been published? Write to me with:
Your
questions
Your news
about your writing
Suggestions
for the school
An
essay to be featured in the newsletter
Whatever
else I need to know
The
above might be printed. I usually use names. If
you wish something different, or want a web site mentioned,
tell me.
