After a fun and informative day at Saturday’s Rock Hill Intensive Writing Workshop, those of us who attended from the midlands are psyched up and ready to plan our own workshop for this fall. Although we’re working on another anthology, we decided to publish a book every other year and to host a local workshop in 2015.

Our minds are abuzz with things to consider. Where and when will we host it, and how much should we charge for attendees? Although we’ve considered a couple of venues, this is something we’ll have to consider more carefully. Affordability, size, number of rooms, and ambience are all important considerations. We’ll provide boxed lunches and tons of good information, and the registration fee will be affordable for the leanest of purses.

The Rock Hill workshop had more sessions that we’re equipped to handle right now. Instead of an all-day intensive, we’re looking at a 9-1 time frame. There were twenty-four classes on topics ranging from story telling to flash fiction on Saturday. Novices, we’re looking at four, maybe six, classes. But what should our topics be? That pretty much depends on feedback we get from our possible “audience,” writers in Camden and surrounding areas.

I’m thinking of writers who are just getting started but need a little nudge and a few pointers. There are also people right around Camden, Bishopville, Wisacky, Sumter, Florence, Lugoff, Elgin, and Blythewood who are ready to publish and are looking for guidance on crafting the perfect query. Others want information on journaling, writing dialogue, or starting a family memoir.

With the understanding that we can’t provide answers to everyone’s questions, we’re beginning the process by asking Midlands writers what they’d like to know more about. If you want to know more about poetry, let us know. If you think you’d like to try your hand at flash fiction, we need to know that too. And what about self-publishing? That might be something to consider with those who are ready to get their work out into the world sooner than later.

Bottom line: We want to encourage people to take pen to paper or fingers to keyboard. In the words of Elie Wiesel, “God made man because He loves stories.” Ready to share yours?

If you live in the Midlands of SC and would like to learn more about SCWW (South Carolina Writers’ Workshop) and/or some topics on writing, please let me know either here on this blog or at jpbowers3@gmail.com.