April 11-13, 2014
Wyndham Hotel, Austin, Texas
I love writing conferences! I’m so excited to return to Austin this year for the 6th time to join in on the Story Circle Memoir Conference.
Stories from the Heart VII brings women from around the country to celebrate our stories and our lives. Through writing, reading, listening, and sharing, you discover how personal narrative is a healing art, how you can gather your memories, how to tell your stories. You can explore difficult or hidden issues and discover different modes and media—art, dance, and drama as a way to tell stories. Register here!
Pre-Conference Workshop, Friday, April 11
The Three Stages of Memoir Writing
Memoir writers need a roadmap to begin, develop, publish their memoir.
We will identify the three stages: Kickstart Your memoir, The Muddy Middle, and Birthing your Book. We will discuss and use the tools you need to get to the end of a first draft.
In Kickstart, we will do timeline and turning point exercises, and learn how to write scenes, the building blocks of story. In the Muddy Middle we will discuss, truth, writing as healing, the inner and outer critic and do exercises. In Birthing Your Memoir, we will talk about editing, revising, and publishing.
The arc of writing, developing, and publishing a memoir will be addressed with practical solutions that really work. We will talk about craft skills you need, and the psychology of writing a full length work. Group discussion and writing exercises to be shared will offer emotional support. You will come away knowing that other writers run into the same challenges, and there solutions.
You will leave with the ability to define the stages where you’re writing, locate the stuck places, and work your way through them. You will leave with two new vignettes, and a timeline that you can keep building.
Register for the Pre-Conference workshop here.