A Learning Process.

I had my first session with Tracy Hickman last week. I signed up for his Scribe's Forge course, as I'd previously threatened to do, and thoroughly enjoyed it. We had a 90 minute webinar, where he taught us via webcam, and we responded and asked questions by typing as we looked up pages in a workbook.

Obviously a face-to-face workshop would be better - it would certainly suit my learning style, but I'm limited here in Australia.

I've written on the dearth of Spec-Fic workshops in the local scence before. Writers Victoria runs them from time to time, and I've recently completed a good Jack Dann course there. I also did a two day workshop with Sean Williams a few years ago, and I spent three months being mentored by Paul Haines.

Most of these, however, were based on critting each others work and developing our own stories. The Tracy Hickman workshop is based around some writing theory and method, and this is something I've longed for.

Already it's given me better ideas on how to construct stories and characters, and that's only after the first session.

It's all learning, and that's something I continue to do. I look back at stories that I wrote even just a year ago, and can see how I could have improved them. I analyse elements of short stories I read, and see what works and what doesn't. But mostly I try to apply what I've learnt to my new writing.

I always learn a lot as I go. But a course or two in the basics never goes astray.

Workshop Shopping.

I recently completed the Jack Dann workshop, held at Writers Victoria. It consisted of five sessions, roughly a month apart. And while I found it very useful and valuable, it wasn't exactly what I'd thought it was going to be.

I guess I really wanted a masterclass.

There was an extremely diverse range of experiences among the participants - from a few who had never written a sentence before to a couple of us with a history of publications. As such, much of the critiquing was aimed at the beginners.

I read of writers in the U.S. that attend workshops held by Orson Scott Card, or Kris Rusch and Dean Wesley Smith, Mike Resnick, or other writing luminaries. You often need to audition, to submit a piece of writing to attend these workshops before the participants are selected.

I rarely see any SF workshops like that advertised here.

Earlier this year, I looked at an online course advertised by Tracy Hickman. It looked good, the price seemed reasonable but the time was wrong. I'd just signed up for the Jack Dann thing and was finishing up a university course. I decided I would wait until the second half of the year before applying.

I checked it out recently - credit card in hand, and was rather surprised to see that the course had been restructured to involve live online sessions and the price had increased dramatically. More than doubled, in fact.

I'll pass, for the moment. And I'm not disparaging Mr. Hickman. I'm sure his course is excellent. It's just that it's more than I'd planned to spend at that time.

Clarion in Australia is on indefinite hiatus and, even if it re-commenced, taking the six weeks required to attend would be far too costly. (And I think my wife would not be happy.)

If anyone knows of any great online workshops run by people who know their stuff and at a reasonable price, I'd love to hear about it.

I've found the biggest improvements I've made in my writing were immediately after the Jack Dann course, and the Paul Haines mentorship.

And I'm all for improving my writing.