Betty's Tips Sept/Oct 2015
Hello Dear Readers,
Autumn is in the air. Canada geese have honked their way south the past two mornings. I've needed a light sweater when tending the garden early in the day. My bumper crop of tomatoes has transformed into salads, sauce, soup and salsa (the peppers were spectacular). And I've finished back-to-school shopping for both the little Wryte-Goode sprouts, Broccoli and Brussels.
Darling little Broccoli is in first grade this year. I can't believe how fast she's grown. She was just a teeny bud when we planted our garden last spring, and here she is so excited to be joining her big brother and staying at school all day. Both of them. At school. All day.
I must admit, Dear Reader, I expected to be a tad melancholy about my little ones growing so speedily and being away from me for such a long time each day. That was before they organized what will always be referred to as The Great Tomato War in which my offspring and various neighborhood hooligans lopped MY beautifully ripe tomatoes at each other, while laughing like maniacs, and claiming it was just like a snowball fight. My garden will never be the same. I may never be the same. (And I'm very suspicious about those red stains on my dear husband's clothes and his claims to be an innocent by-stander caught in the crossfire.)
Somewhere during the day long clean up, I realized: Both of them. At school. All day. But without my little dears running around me all day, what would I do? Then, a lightblub moment: I could take a writing class. I investigated a few options and decided online classes would be the best fit for me. Here is a list of online writing classes in a variety of price ranges:
Online Classes for Writers
FREE
1. From Study.com 10 Universities Offering Free Writing Courses Online
2. From Class Central – 19 Free Online Courses to Improve Your Writing
3. MOOC--Massive Open Online Courses offers both free and for-fee courses in creative writing.
Mixed Up
Words
of the
Month:
Bear vs. Bare
Bear, as a noun, can be a large furry animal or someone who is grumpy, but as a verb it can mean to tolerate, to support something, to accept something as responsibility, to carry something, to
give birth to a child.
In a sentence: Bears do not have the right to bear arms.
Bare, as an adjective, means uncovered as in bare arms or a bare hillside or a bare floor. It can also mean simple or minimum, the bare facts. As a verb, it can mean to uncover something (as in the lion bared his teeth) or to expose something that had been concealed (as in the detective bared the facts of the cover-up).
So the right to bear arms is not the same as the right to bare arms.
Or, putting them together: I can't bear to have bare feet on hot pavement. I don't know how bears can stand it!
Note--Classes offered at university for free tend to focus on literary fiction, technical writing, short stories and essays. If you're interested in writing long-form genre fiction you might find more help elsewhere.
ECONOMICAL
4. Storycraft Training with Dr. Stan Williams. Each episode can be rented for 30 days prices ranging from $3.99 to $7.99 and for renting and $7.99 to $17.99 for purchased. All ten episodes can be rented for $79.99 and purchased for $129.99. Dr. Williams has tons of free information on his blog and while he's teaching specifically for screen writing, most of his lesson are applicable for novels and short stories.
5. WANA international—Business Classes, Craft Classes, Life Style Classes, Social Media Classes–some with start and stop dates and some on demand classes that can be taken when you wish. Prices range from $35 to $160.
Also from Kristen Lamb https://warriorwriters.wordpress.com/ with free writing tips.
6. WriterUniv.com -- Mary Buckman and Laurie Schnebly Campbell. Classes change monthly and are from $35 to a high of $135.
ECONOMICAL TO PRICEY
7. Margie Lawson Writer's Academy Courses. Lecture packets are $22, online classes are $40 and up. Her in person Immersion Classes are currently $625 and her Cruising Writers Cruise this winter is $1650.
8. Savvy Authors --You have to join the website. It's has a free basic membership, but Premium Members get discounts on classes. Classes run from $30 to $400.
9. Storyfix.com – a lovely newsletter/blog with tons of writing information and Story Coaching all from Larry Brooks. The newsletter is free. He has a free video workshop. His eBookstore books range in price from $0.99 to $2.99. His writing books available from Amazon range in price from $2.99 to $13.15. His story coaching ranges from $49 for a pitch evaluation to a full manuscript analysis for $1350.
10. Holly Lisle – tons of courses from a free 3-week Flash Fiction class to $9.95 Single-Topic writing Clinics like Create a Character Clinic or How to Write Page-Turning Scenes and the $497 How to Think Sideways Ultra: Career Survival School for Writers.
CONSISTENTLY PRICEY
11. Writer's Digest University--Wide variety of classes from a low of $147 for Picture Ebook Mastery to a high of $799.99 for Advanced Novel Writing
12. Writers.com–a wide variety of classes from How to Start a Blog at $160 to Travel Writing Master Class for $445
13. Gotham Writers–a wide variety of class online and in NYC from $395 for the online version to $1745 for One-on-One Tutoring
Happy learning--and writing!
Betty Wryte-Goode