God Uses Ink 2003 - Classes and Workshops

The continuing classes and many of the workshops are organized according to six general learning tracks:

1. Beginners - for new and aspiring writers
2. Writing for Children - any level
3. Non-fiction book - intermediate/ advanced
4. Fiction - intermediate/advanced
5. Moving up - intermediate/advanced
6. Journalists - advanced/professional

These divisions may help you choose the sessions that will best meet your needs. However, you are not obligated to stay within a single track.

Each Continuing Class consists of five one-hour sessions.
Choose ONE of the following options:

1. What every aspiring writer needs to know - Lindquist with Austin, Margaret Buchanan, Careless, Gregoire, Henschel, Hiebert, Smrcek
You think you'd like to be a writer, and maybe you've even had a few things published, but you realize there is a lot more to becoming a writer than simply wanting to write. Learn the basic tools from experienced professionals: find out how to get started, put together an action plan, network with other writers and editors, promote yourself, find markets, write queries, make editors happy, improve your skills and more.

2. Writing for Children - Hodgson
This interactive course offers an overview of writing for children's magazines and books, including: age divisions; fiction, non-fiction and poetry formats; and marketing tips.

3. Non-fiction book creation from the ground up - Whalin
This class will help you research and identify worthwhile ideas, target them to appropriate markets, and develop them into manuscripts that will interest publishers.

4. Special fiction intensive - Cook / Hall
This class will be done in a critique format. Each instructor will work with a group of 12 people. Participants must submit a short story or first chapter of a novel, maximum 5,000 words. The manuscript will be photocopied and mailed to other members of the group in advance so they can read and critique it. All work must be typed in Times Roman 12 point font, double-spaced, one-inch margins, with your name at the top of each page. Manuscripts must be received by May 15, 2003.

5. Making the move from amateur to professional - Murphey
What does it take to become a "professional" writer? What do our editors teach us? How do we co-operate with our publishers in promoting our work? How do we break into full-time writing? How do we package and brand ourselves? How do we attract an agent? How do we dissolve the agent-writer relationship? Learn the six major factors of a good writer-editor relationship.

6. Take Your Writing to the Top Level - Sweet
In this hands-on seminar for professional journalists, participants will work on the development of their own authentic writing voice. They will focus on the skills necessary for powerful reporting and writing, as well as effective editing. Participants will be introduced to practical approaches and successful methods to apply to their work — with a special emphasis on effective researching and interviewing, finding their voice, as well as story structure and story telling.

Each workshop will be 90 minutes long.
Choose ONE workshop from each session (A B C and D).

A1. Q & A on writing for newspapers
Instructors: Henschel, Karim Jr., Mackey, White, Dorsch (Moderator)
Come with your questions to this panel discussion. Find out what editors of Christian newspapers need; the distinction between writing for newspapers and for magazines; how to approach an editor; the differences in style and content between news articles, features, columns, reviews, devotionals; how to find ideas for articles; typical rates of payment; etc.

A2. How to turn everyday experiences into stories that sell
Instructor: Oscar
We think of an old friend and then run into him or her on a city street. We lift great-grandmother's silver teaspoon to stir sugar into our tea and suddenly, time stops as we feel generations of family history pass through us. Our car breaks down on a windy bridge and angels driving pickup trucks arrive, speaking words of grace. How do we capture such moments? How do we write about them? This workshop will explore, through readings and brief exercises, the ways that words can capture and transmit spiritual experience.

A3. The inside story on publishing your book as a Canadian author
Instructor: Willard
The publishing industry in Canada has challenges that are unique to Canada. An author needs to be familiar with those challenges when they approach a publisher with their manuscript. To be a successful author in the Canadian market, you have to present your work knowing what the publisher is looking for and what challenges they will face trying to distribute and market your book. This session will help you to think like a publisher and a publicist.

A4. What authors need to know about agents
Instructor: Stobbe
A majority of publishers today do not accept unsolicited manuscripts, instead depending on editorial services and agents to find potential books. Therefore writers need to discover: how to find an agent; what an agent can do for you; what an agent cannot do; what relationship you may have with an agent and the publisher.

A5. Great U.S. break-in markets
Instructor: Hodgson
Discover the American Christian markets most open to freelance writers, church take-home papers and denominational magazines, and learn what and how to write for them.

A6. Forum for professional journalists. Discuss issues and learn from your peers. Facilitator: Doug Koop. Resource: Thom Froese
Come ready to debate issues, express your concerns and share ideas. Includes a segment with Thomas Froese describing his experiences as a North American journalist living and working in a dangerous time and place.

Each workshop will be 90 minutes long.
Choose ONE workshop from each session (A B C and D).

B1. Journalism 101 for beginners
Instructor: Lois Sweet
In this workshop, novice writers will be introduced to the basic skills required to be an effective journalist. They will tackle such subject areas as coming up with story ideas, conducting interviews and structuring stories. Particular attention will be paid to sharpening their writing skills.

B2. Q & A on writing for children and youth
Instructors: Belec, Margaret Buchanan, Schemenauer, Simmons, Knight (Moderator)
Come with your questions to this panel discussion. Find out how these writers got started, how they got published, how to write effectively for different age groups and for various formats, what are current trends in children's and youth publishing, etc.

B3. How to get a publishing house to look at your manuscript
Instructor: Pape
All aspiring authors long to be published with a large publishing house... or maybe they don't. Publisher Don Pape, VP of WaterBrook Press and its imprint Shaw Books, part of the publishing program of Random House, Inc., will join writers in their quest for a good fit. Time will be spent on the editorial process, the selection of titles and how to navigate the publishing side to secure attention and interest in your book project.

B4. Q & A on being a book author
Panelists: Mark Buchanan, Clemons, Gregoire, Hall, Wiseman (Moderator)
Come with your questions to this panel discussion. Get practical tips and encouragement. Hear the inside story from these fiction and non-fiction authors: how they got started, how they developed their initial ideas into full-length manuscripts, how they got published, how they promote their books, etc.

B5. How your personality affects your writing (Part 1 of 2; take both parts)
Instructor: Buller
God's unique gift to you is the special style you embrace for writing from your heart. Are you fully aware of your preferred way of writing? Do you realize that how you start, what you decide to say, how you say it, and how it gets completed has a lot to do with personality? Join us as we tap into the natural strengths of your personality, and show you how to use those strengths in your writing through the Myers Briggs Type Indicator.

B6. Advice on media relations, publicity, messaging and performing
Instructor: Gyapong
A former television producer and communications advisor, who previously booked authors and writers for interviews and panels, will tell you what works and what doesn't in getting on television or radio and into the mainstream media to promote yourself, your book or your publication.

Each workshop will be 90 minutes long.
Choose ONE workshop from each session (A B C and D).

C1. Q & A on writing for magazines
Instructors: Cotnoir, Dorsch, Fledderus, Hiebert, Oscar, Knight (Moderator)
Come with your questions to this panel discussion. Find out what editors of magazines need; the distinction between writing for newspapers and for magazines; the differences between denominational and general-audience publications; how to develop story ideas and pitch them to editors; the differences between news articles, features, columns, devotionals; typical rates of payment; etc.

C2. Children's non-fiction & textbooks: markets, business savvy & author-publisher relations
Instructor: Schemenauer
How do you identify potential publishers? Know what you can and cannot write for a secular market? Choose between a royalty and a flat fee? Work with an editor or learn to be one? Come and explore these and other aspects of the fascinating world behind the factual children's books you see in schools, libraries and bookstores.

C3. Q & A on book publishing
Instructors: Bastian, Clements, Henne, Pape, Stobbe, Whalin, Willard, Nelles (Moderator)
Come with your questions to this panel discussion. The Canadian and American panelists represent a broad spectrum of publishing expertise. Learn from publishers, agents and editors about the differences between Canadian and American markets, and between Christian and general publishing. Discuss the realities of the book publishing industry today, trends, retail sales issues, what publishers are looking for in authors, etc.

C4. Pitfalls in fiction
Instructor: Murphey
Learn the 12 basic pitfalls or writing mistakes to avoid that point your work in the wrong direction, undermine your intent, and even alienate your readers.

C5. How your personality affects your writing (Part 2 of B5)
Instructor: Buller
See description in B5. Take both parts.

C6. The challenges of bringing Christian news and views to Canadian readers
Instructors: Koop, Mackey, White.
This team of experienced editors will outline the problems confronting publications as they attempt to reach a small but diverse Christian market and articulate a Christian worldview to a multi-cultural Canadian society.

Each workshop will be 90 minutes long.
Choose ONE workshop from each session (A B C and D).

D1. Q & A on being a freelance writer
Panelists: Careless, Froese, McMurray, Newman, Presland, Dorsch (Moderator)
Come with your questions to this panel discussion. Discover the realities of running your own writing and editing business. Learn how the panelists got started, the various types of work and markets they pursue, typical rates of payment, how they promote themselves, how they oganize their time and bookkeeping, etc.

D2. Finding a home for your poem
Instructor: Hodgson
Come to this workshop to find out what poetic forms and styles editors look for, how to format your poems for submission to an editor, and other valuable tips for getting your poems into print.

D3. Book Proposals That Sell
Instructor: Whalin
How do you write a book proposal? What makes an excellent proposal and what makes a terrible one? Publishers receive thousands of these proposals. How do you determine which publishers are interested in your particular proposal? The workshop will include marketing tips and practical how-to information about proposal writing.

D4. Coaches' Corner: Innovative ways to develop structure in fiction
Instructors: Gyapong, Schemenauer
Learn how to decide when to show and when to tell in fiction; when to develop the action and when to get inside your characters' hearts and minds. This workshop also includes the concept of coaching in writing: how a coach may help you and how to find your own Don Cherry of the writing world — or be one. Bring 200 words you've written and we'll apply coaching principles as time permits.

D5. Forum for published authors: Discuss issues and learn from your peers
Facilitator: Lindquist. Resources: Bastian, Willard
Bring a copy of your published book to gain entry to this group. Come ready to discuss common issues and difficulties, and to dialogue with Don Bastian (Canadian general market) and Larry Willard (Canadian Christian market). Talk about book distribution, promotion, ways authors who are Christian can work together to increase their profile, how to reach markets beyond Canadian borders, etc.

D6. Delivering what the editor wants: How to write a feature that suits a particular magazine and its reader
Instructor: Marchant
Valerie Marchant is skilled in developing story ideas and in writing, assigning and editing articles for many markets. She will share her broad knowledge and experience with professional writers, teaching them how to understand what editors want, how to know your audience, how to craft an article that meets readers' needs, how to avoid pitching unsuitable story ideas, etc.