Click on titles of
Books
Yuletide Blues
The Blue Camaro
The Crying Jesus
Takes
Up All Night
Revved
Feeding At Nine Winner! 2007 Saskatchewan Book Awards Children's Literature
Apart with Wendy MacIntyre. Groundwood Books.Available through Thistledown Press and Groundwood Books or one of the on-line booksellers.
Workshops
Title: Sweating the Big Stuff
Course Description: This workshop focuses on what an editor looks for when reviewing a fiction manuscript and offers a perspective on the kinds of tools available to evaluate a work-in-progress.
In my professional writing career, I do much more than sit in front of the computer staring at a blank screen (the one below), trying to figure out what key to hit next, I also work as a fiction editor, a job that can be tedious, terrifying and fun—sometimes all in one M/S. I have edited more than thirty books over a ten-year period and read dozens of manuscripts for potential publication. If there’s one major difference between an experienced writer and an emerging writer, it’s that the experienced writer knows how to “sweat the big stuff.” Not that “the little stuff” isn’t important—it is, but spelling, punctuation, syntax and style are merely cladding for the structure beneath. That’s where the story is. Somebody once said that “voice is everything,” but really, you can have all kinds of voice and still not have a story. Structure is everything.
Level of Writer: Beginning and developing.
Although the workshop focuses primarily on the structure of short fiction, it is applicable to any kind of story making, and while writing implements are necessary for the workshop, it is not a writing exercise. It is an interactive discussion on Structure And The Essential Parts of Story and is intended to delineate a process for evaluating/editing the writer's own work. Participant work samples required a week in advance of workshop date.
Workshop Length: Six Hours. Maximum Registrants: 12. Travel: Yes. Billet: No. Fee: $650
Readings
Presentation Description
How Did This Happen?
Rod begins by attempting to answer how a guy from the wrong side of the tracks, whose parents barely completed grade school, and who was way more interested in hockey and girls and making money, ended up being a writer. (A mystery.) He then introduces some of his early work (what parts really happened, and what parts did I just ‘make up’?), includes a Q&A, and then reads from some more recent work—provided there’s time. Presentations usually run from 45 – 50 minutes and can be adapted for groups ranging in age from 10 to 100. Size in not an issue. Needs a place to set books, and a glass/bottle of water. $250
Click here for Reading and Workshop Events
Links
Thistledown Press Ltd.
Groundwood Books
Saskatchewan Writers Guild
The Writers' Union of Canada
Writers Guild of Canada
CANSCAIP
"The Book Talk", an article by A. Dornai
Page installed (it certainly isn't designed) by Rod MacIntyre. Contact R.P. MacIntyre
