Post #59 – Women’s Memoirs, News – Kendra Bonnett and Matilda Butler
Today, Kendra and I are excited to tell you about two opportunities open to women who want to teach a memoir writing workshop and/or are interested in attending the premier women’s memoir conference.
Teaching a Women’s Memoir Workshop
Would you like to teach a workshop on women’s memoirs? Here’s your opportunity. Story Circle Network (SCN) is in the planning stages for its Sixth Stories from the Heart Women’s Memoir Conference. SCN is the leading organization dedicated to helping women find ways to share their stories. In 1997, Dr. Susan Wittig Albert founded SCN in order to help women tell their life narratives, or as they say, “help women choose to be the authors of their own lives.” Susan, as you may know, is the author of multiple award-winning series including China Bayes, Cottage Tales of Beatrix Potter and her new series Darling Dahlia Mysteries as well as her memoir Together, Alone: A Memoir of Marriage and Place and her even more recent An Extraordinary Year of Ordinary Days.
While Susan is the guiding light, SCN is about much more. A group of strong, wonderful women who serve on the board and committees, who teach online classes, who edit publications, who manage book reviews, who volunteer to help with conferences and who lead story circles devote their energies to helping other women discover who they are by expressing their own stories. Every other year, SCN sponsors an incredible event called Stories from the Heart. It is always held in Austin and this next time it will be April 13-15, 2012. Maybe we’ll even get to see the Texas state flower, bluebonnets, in bloom.
SCN’s call for papers for workshop presentations ends of September 15. If you are interested, be sure to submit your proposal by then.
Attending the Best Women’s Memoir Writing Conference
Many women enjoy attending SCN’s workshops and benefit from meeting other women at Stories from the Heart. Kendra and I will be there and we definitely hope to see you. We’re giving a pre-conference workshop on the afternoon of Friday April 13. Our workshop is called:
It’s 10 pm, Do You Know Where Your Story Is? Seven Steps to Successful Story Structure
Here’s the way we describe the session:
Do you get so involved in the mechanics of writing that your true story gets lost? Do you worry about story structure but aren’t sure how to develop, much less follow, one that is appropriate for your story? You want to write from your heart and tell your story. Yet, just like a house without a strong foundation and frame, the elements of your writing—character development, emotional expression, sensory description, strong dialogue, and time and place—may collapse under their own weight without a well-designed and executed framework for your memoir.
In our pre-conference workshop, we’ll arm you with a powerful set of tools, techniques and devices to build a framework for your writing that will let the meaning of your story shine through. We call our simple, seven-step process Structural Alchemy™.
Let’s play the Build-A-Story Game: Memoir-Writing Edition and in the process have fun building our memoirs by mixing and matching the components of a well-structured story. You’ll play, write and share in this workshop.
As a bonus, you’ll leave with an extra copy of our Build-A-Story Game that you can share with your writing group or writing friends. Come join us for an afternoon of story structure fun that will prepare you to successfully frame your memoir.
Start making your plans now to attend SCN Stories from the Heart VI in Austin in 2012. Be sure to save the date. Want to get the best early registration price? Early Bird Registration ends February 15.
