WHAT ARE THE STORIES ONLY YOU CAN TELL?

I’ve taught writing at five universities, at conferences, and privately for three decades, including in 2019 the first fiction workshop for the new MFA program at Drexel University in Philadelphia, PA. My students and private clients have gone on to attend graduate school in writing, to self-publish, and to become published authors of acclaimed short stories, novels, and nonfiction at major publishing houses.

These intensive, inspiring, focused workshops are limited to two to five students each. We’ll meet on Zoom or in a lovely space (see image below) a short walk from the Jenkintown/Wyncote SEPTA regional rail station, just outside Philadelphia. Yummy snacks are provided.

In addition, I’m available to teach at conferences, libraries, community centers, schools, and elsewhere.

TO SIGN UP or find out more, email janet.thewordstudio@gmail.com.

TO PAY Once your participation is confirmed, you can pay via check or PayPal. Depending on when you sign up, it may be possible to split the payment in two.

PAYMENT POLICY A commitment to take a workshop is a commitment to pay in full. Fees are nonrefundable except in the case of a medical emergency.

What Students Say >>

Upcoming Workshops

To learn of upcoming workshops, write me at janet.thewordstudio@gmail.com and I’ll sign you up for my mailing list, to which I send a newsletter a few times a year with updates.

Finding Your Gold

For someone who’s inclined to write, any powerful, formative experience is a nugget of gold. By working from that material, you can create moving stories that forge a strong bond with readers and motivate you. So what are the stories that only you can tell, because of what life has given you? In this three-hour workshop, through my talks, several guided exercises that will generate new writing, and our discussions, you’ll expand and deepen your story resources and invigorate your approach. Handouts will supplement our meeting and give you materials to continue working with for years to come. All levels and genres welcome.

Classic Fiction Workshop

 This is a classic workshop limited to five writers. Participants will submit writing and critique others' fiction. I’ll teach you the art of close reading to help you reach a heightened awareness of what’s on the page—and not on the page—and how these affect how we experience the work before us. You’ll learn to better verbalize and understand your reactions to the work, receive feedback on your own work and craft guidance tailored to your manuscripts’ needs, and gain support and encouragement from me and the group. And most of all, you’ll make significant progress on your manuscript in process. The workshop will meet five times, biweekly. Each writer can submit up to about 15 pages (about 3750 words) twice during the workshop.

If interested in a future round, please email me at janet.thewordstudio@gmail.com.

Other Workshop Offerings Have Included These:

Discover Your Story Structure and Develop Your Story

This intensive class, with three sessions of three hours each, is a highly effective way to focus and direct your efforts for months or years to come. What is the premise of your story, memoir, or novel? How do you get to the heart of what you want to reveal and create a structure that reveals this? Our class will guide and support you in answering these questions and in building a story structure that can carry you to the end of your manuscript. We’ll examine what a story premise is, discuss our premises, spin out our plots, try several methods of structuring those plots, and break them down further to get at the heart of what we want to explore and reveal. Then we’ll get some key moments on the page. I’ll offer guidance on issues of craft, process, confidence, getting past blocks, and other concerns. I’ll also provide methods to help you work at home in a writing diary. Handouts will supplement our meetings. All levels and genres welcome. Maximum enrollment is five.

Morning Jump-Start

“I want to write, but I can’t find the time.” Sound familiar? This workshop gives you two hours a week to jump-start your efforts. It offers imaginative prompts designed to open doors into new areas of writing and thinking, whether for a project in process or for something new, whether fiction or memoir. We’ll write, share work as desired, and discuss aspects of craft in a warm, inspiring atmosphere. Take this chance to make sure you get writing done, and use the scenes and ideas you generate to spur further writing for months to come. All levels welcome.

The Writers’ Toolkit

Do you have the tools you need to craft memorable fiction? This workshop offers a chance to learn or polish fundamental skills for writing powerful fiction and to practice some in every class. Through interactive talks and exercises created and tested over decades of teaching, you’ll learn about finding the stories only you can tell, crafting plots, creating convincing settings, writing genuine dialogue, forging complex characters, using sensory details, exploring voices, and understanding and utilizing points of view. Includes a half-hour private session with me, in person or on the phone, on your work in progress. Handouts will supplement our meetings. All levels of fiction writers welcome. Seven sessions of 3 hours and a half-hour private meeting with Janet on an eighth day.

The Voices in Your Head

The voices in a piece of writing—narrators and characters—are amazing living things that come off the page and become real to us. Writers can create many—perhaps innumerable—voices. What voices do you want to explore? There are ways of speaking and thinking that are distinctive to your family, places you’ve been, cultural environments you know. Through talks, exercises, and discussion, you’ll bring more of these unique voices to the page. Three-hour class.