The Art of Interviewing

Learn Effective Interviewing Skills with Suzy Spencer

Suzy Spencer

2 – 5 p.m. Saturdays, November 7 and 21
at the Writers League Office
611 S. Congress Ave. Suite 130
$99 members / $159 non members

 

Effective interviewing is an art form essential to the success of all writers — whether you’re doing research for a novel or nonfiction book; writing newspaper, magazine, or journal articles; preparing your thesis or dissertation; creating web content; blogging; or promoting your own book.

In fact, if a writer doesn’t know what questions to ask, how to ask or answer them, as well as how to listen to glean information that no one else has, the writer could miss key opportunities to make an even better book, story, or article.

New York Times best selling author Suzy Spencer, a professional in the techniques of interviewing, will teach the course through lecture, discussion, and role-playing. This two-session class will teach writers how to prepare for an interview, how to conduct an interview, how to turn a bad interview into a good one, and how to follow-up after an interview.

The information from this class is useful for everyone, but especially if you are: a freelance writer or journalist who wants to bump up your interview skills to excel in a tight market, a blogger who wants to add original reporting to your blog, an authors who is — or who plans to be — interviewed to promote a book, or an author interviewing prospective agents and/or publishers.

Interested? Register here.

Master Class: Character in Fiction and Nonfiction

Successful Characterization with Tracy Daugherty

Tracy Daugherty

1 – 5 p.m. Friday, October 30

at the Writers’ League office

611 S. Congress Ave., Suite 130

$99 members / $159 nonmembers

One way to think about successful characterization in either fiction or nonfiction is to say that characters work best when they match the narrative situation. That is, in the short-hand that is literary craft, everything they do illustrates their core qualities and values. Within the narrative parameters you have established, everything about the character’s nature is clear to the reader.

Instructor and  acclaimed author Tracy Daugherty will help explore strategies for creating successful characters in a narrative, whether it is fiction or nonfiction. Together the class will write and share work and ideas, and the instructor will provide published examples of characterization. The class will be in a lecture/discussion format.

Students will learn:

• a firm concept of characterization
• a sense of effective dialogue in fiction and nonfiction
• an understanding of tone, as it relates to characterization
• strategies for developing narrative situations that effectively illustrate character
• an understanding of how to build story from character, rather than the other way around

Interested? Register here.

Book in a Month: Novel Writing Tool Kit

Novel Writing Online Class with Kit Frazier

Kit Frazier

Self study, online course

starts Oct. 26 – Nov. 30, 2009

$149 WLT members / $209 nonmembers

Just in time for National Novel Writing Month! Whether you’re thinking about writing a novel or mired in the middle of your work in progress, this is the class for you. The intensive course of study reviews Christopher Vogler’s The Hero’s Journey’s three-act structure and Debra Dixon’s Goal, Motivation, and Conflict: The Building Blocks of Good Fiction, and breaks these concepts down into a manageable, 30-day writing regimen, with particular emphasis on those all-important first five pages and middle-of-the-story conflict.

The Book in a Month Tool Kit includes:

• PowerPoint Videos of Class Instruction
• Personal Goal Tracker Calendar
• Character Worksheets
• Character Goal, Motivation & Conflict Sheets
• Story Board Worksheets
• Time Tracker Worksheets

Instructor Kit Frazier will provide daily encouragement to students and host Friday online brainstorming chats. Students will also have the opportunity to share work in small online groups. Bonus! Students who complete their novel by November 30 will receive a discount on an entry in the 2010 Writers’ League of Texas Manuscript Contest.The Manuscript Contest has nine categories, and each category winner receives a complimentary consultation with an agent at the 2010 Writers’ League of Texas Agents Conference on June 26.

The Craft of Writing

Kathleen Allen-Weber

Ann McCutchan

Choosing the Writing Life: Art and Practice with Kathleen Allen-Weber & Ann McCutchan

Saturday, September 12, 10a.m. – 5p.m.

Whether you are thinking about becoming a writer or living the writer’s life but desperate for a booster shot, this six-hour intensive workshop offers the ideas, tools and inspiration for turning desire into flow, and flow into finished manuscripts. Team-taught by essayist, journalist and three-book author Ann McCutchan, a professor of creative writing at the University of North Texas, and licensed therapist and writer Kathleen Allen-Weber, Ph.D., “Choosing the Writing Life” addresses the three critical components of the writer’s way: awareness, commitment, and practice.

Topics include:

• developing self-knowledge
• building technique
• seizing ripe opportunities

Don’t miss out on this workshop. To register for, click here!

Summer Writing Retreat Submission: Gerald Warfield

Itwas Adark and Stor Mynight

by Gerald Warfield

Itwas Adark and Stor Mynight lounged at the edge of the purple pool. Stor raised her crystal glass, delicately, in her pincer claw. “Itwas,” she said, “there may be no gods to bless you, but you bless yourself with this act of kindness and compassion.”

Itwas raised her crystal, too, though not as high, and spread her third pair of legs in a sign of deprecation. “My dear, no one is more deserving than you. The accident that destroyed your eggs last season was tragic in the extreme. The least I can do for so unfortunate a friend is to provide a nest pool.”

“But the silver it must have cost …”

“Nonsense. My barnacle was already here. I only had to have the pool itself carved, and the entrance channels.”

Stor raised her eye stalks and looked out onto the blue ocean. Great waves broke upon the rocks only a few spans from

The Business of Writing

ResumeRX to the Rescue with Khotan Shahbazi-Harmon

2 pm – 5 pm, Saturdays, April 4 and 18

Writers’ League Office, 611 S. Congress Ave., Ste. 130, Austin

“ResumeRX” is back by popular demand! Khotan Shahbazi-Harmon is expanding “ResumeRX” into an interactive two-part session that will assist anyone writing or revising a resume in search of a new job, including writers and publishing professionals seeking to develop their own platform or pitch their books in the new economy.

Registration is still open! $99 members; $159 nonmebers.

Opinionated: The Art and Craft of Op-Ed Commentary

A Master Class with Journalist, Evelyn C. White

9am – 1pm, Saturday, March 14

Writers’ League of Texas, 611 S. Congress Ave., Suite 130, Austin

Registration is still open!

Commentary is a perfect microcosm for exploring nonfiction writing. Journalist, Evelyn C. White, will lead students in producing a 600- to 700-word op-ed that can be submitted to newspapers following the class. Students are encouraged to bring an idea and a self-addressed, stamped envelope addressed to a newspaper. $99 WLT members; $159 nonmembers.

Don’t miss Evelyn’s other Austin appearances:

• International Women’s Day Lecture at UT, 5 p.m. Wednesday, March 11, Main Building, Room 212 (free)
• Talk on Alice Walker’s life and impact and book signing at BookWoman at 3 p.m. Sunday, March 15

Publicity and Marketing

Nettie Hartsock

Overloaded, OverWWWebbed: What You Really Need to Know About Social Media

Saturday, February 28, 2-5p

with Nettie Hartsock and Jennifer Hill Robenalt

How do you choose the best social-media tools that will work most powerfully for you? This class will focus on blogging and Web 2.0 social-media tips, tools, and traps to avoid so you’re not mired down and online 24/7 without a return on your right investment.The class will cover:

• Facebook, LinkedIn, and who still needs MySpace
• How to follow the short and long tail on social media so you don’t waste your time
• Myths about what social media can and cannot do for you
• The top ten tips for reaching out to bloggers today
• Why microblogging and Twitter are the next cool tool for you to use

Don’t miss this opportunity and register online early!

The Secrets of the Agents

“Building a Better Beginning”

Saturday, February 28, 9am-1pm

with Brandi Bowles

Guest Brandi Bowles will help writers re-evaluate the beginning of their book to craft an opening that pops, has an irresistible concept, and relays relevant background, ensuring that readers will stay hooked till the very end.

Register online at www.writersleague.org.

The Business of Writing

ResumeRX to the Rescue: Crafting Your Work-Life Narrative in to an Effective Resume

Saturday, February 21, 2-5 pm

with Khotan Shahbazi-Harmon

Where do you begin when it comes to thinking through, compiling, and communicating your life’s work and experience for potential projects and jobs? In a tight job market and a fast-changing landscape of work opportunities, it is essential that you find and practice the best strategies for putting together a clear and effective resume that will get you noticed for the right reasons.

Please join us for a highly interactive and informative workshop on Saturday, February 21st to help you craft the resume you need to get the job want!