A Five-Day Writers Workshop by Betsy Ashton

I attended Tinker Mountain Writers Workshop at Hollins University.. I go to improve something I have in process; others go to begin writing. I'm beyond the beginning point but by no means beyond learning new techniques.

I took two short stories, which I hope will become part of a novel-in-stories. One story was nearly at its final version. The other was good in the first half but ran off the rails in the second half. I knew that but had no clue how to fix it.

I was one of eleven in the class, which ranged from very accomplished to "I haven't written anything at all." Not the best mix to get the most of a workshop if you are at a more advanced level. We ended spending a a lot of time helping them understand basics like, "what's a cozy?" or "what do you mean by voice?" Hard to keep your perspective.

We had a collection of nine extremely accomplished writers, all of whom took their work pages away and looked the typing under layers of ink. We all marked everything up and gave the manuscripts back to the writer. We had almost 200 pages to read, reread, and critique. Death march by any other name.

When the group read my first story, they liked the textures I wove in; the voice, which was a ten-year-old boy; the sense of setting, and the plot. The instructor liked the fact that I used sentiment but never lapsed into sentimentality. You guessed it, one of the newbies wanted to know the difference. She'll learn.

As I said, I loved the experience. It was my sixth time, and I will return next year. I always prepare my absolute best work, only to find out it needs a lot of help. Look for me to be working though the suggested changes this weekend.

And now to rest. I'm brain dead. I really can't think about anything beyond dinner in a couple of hours, a glass of wine, and a long summer's nap. See ya on the other side.

3 x 3, A Different Way To Look At Books by Betsy Ashton

I went to a fantastic week-long writers' workshop last week at Hollins University in Roanoke, VA. Only 50 minutes from where I live, I chose not to drive back and forth daily but checked into a dorm. Yes, a college dorm. Rows of stall showers. Common rooms where we met nightly to do our homework and chatter. And drink, of course.

Tinker Mountain Writers' Workshop has helped me so much. I first went four years ago where I workshopped what eventually became Mad Max Unintended Consequences. Two years ago I workshopped a key scene in what became Uncharted Territory.

This time, I took my troubled serial killer novel. I was mired in how to start the damned thing, so I took one start for review. I was right. The opening stunk. General consensus. Was I pissed? No. Was I hurt? Maybe a little, but the six others in the workshop validated what I knew in my heart: I was starting in the wrong place and using a frame that was a cliche.

Out went the frame. No longer do I start with a letter to "someone." I start at the beginning and will let the story unfold in real time. No longer do I start at a point later in the narrative and then fall into a backstory. Yikes! What was I thinking? Or was I over thinking? Still not sure, but I do know the opening lines of "My sorority sisters and I tried sex, drugs and rock and roll, but they weren't enough for me. Then I killed someone and found my true calling." had to go. And out they went where they were. They may reappear at a later point.

One exercise we did was incredible. It's called 3 x 3, hence the title of this post. It's all about reducing your book to three words x three lines. Laura Benedict, our teacher of this writing genre workshop, used The Shining, by Stephen King as her illustration. 3 x 3 goes like this:

Writer caretakes hotel
Ghosts haunt writer
Writer goes insane

Boils King's many words to the core. My 3 x 3 might look like this:

Woman kills stranger
Woman desires rationale
Rational defines woman

Had to admit, this was a tough exercise. Can you do this for your current WIP? Try it and let me know how it works.

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Betsy Ashton is the author of Mad Max, Unintended Consequences, and Uncharted Territory, A Mad Max Mystery, which is now available in e-book at Amazon and Barnes and Noble.