A little bit of background
My doctor placed me off work in April of 2016 due to medical reasons. I discovered I needed to find something to keep me busy so I turned to writing fiction. I had dabbled with it in the past, but not seriously.
I quickly realized I needed help. I didn’t know if my writing was any good. After checking out a number of writing support groups, I came across The Write Practice, headed by best-selling author, Joe Bunting. Within this group, I found a community of established and aspiring writers who help and support one another by reading and critiquing the work of others. And not only that, the website offers courses, writing contests, blog posts, writing tips… basically everything someone needs to become a writer. I had found exactly what I needed; I was home.
After participating in a writing contest and being blown away at the exceptional support by the administrators, moderators, and other members, I decided to join the community as a regular member. A year later, I signed up for a publishing course being offered called Write to Publish, an 8-week course led by Sarah Gribble, another accomplished author, which teaches writers how to get their work published.
Then tragedy struck. My mother passed away from natural causes in November of 2017. Seven months later my world fell apart when my 22-year-old son took his own life on June 16th, 2018. I postponed the course, more than once, as I tried to manage my grief and my shattered world. Sarah couldn’t have been more understanding and compassionate. She told me I can wait to take the course when (and if) I’m ready.
Write to Publish
It’s been nearly a year and a half since I lost my son. I’ve been an active member of The Write Practice (with lots of breaks due to medical complications and bouts of writers’ block due to the never-ending grieving process). I even managed to write the first draft of my novel through The Write Practice 100-day book program. Mindcrawlers is due to be published in 2020.
I am finally ready and excited to be taking the Write to Publish course I’ve been putting off for so long. The course started on October 28th and our first assignment was to write a draft of a brand-new short story, which I’m proud to say I accomplished. Next week we’ll be writing another one. Then, over the next six weeks, we will learn the steps to turn a writing piece into a published story. I don’t know the details yet, but am looking forward to finding out!
So what happens next?
At the end of the course, we will be publishing one of the two stories we write and perfect throughout the course. How exciting!
A big part of what I’ve learned so far is that receiving and providing critiques is a huge part of the process. Oh, and having a presence online in the form of a website is essential.
Every Monday we receive a group of lessons and an assignment to complete by Friday. Each Saturday, we are presented with a ‘website challenge’ which involves posting our progress on our websites or making changes to them which will help us grow our audiences. So this post will be the first of many about this wonderful course. We are also sent an inspirational email from Sarah every week to check in to make sure we are doing okay, to congratulate us for completing our lessons and assignment, and to answer any questions we have.
So far I’m loving the course! I must go now to read and critique more stories!
Wow! Your blog is very well put together and inspiring! You’ve certainly learned a lot in such a short amount of time. I’m looking forward to all your works. Now there’s something special to read in 2020! Mindcrawlers is such an intriguing title.
Thank you so much Laura! I am so happy you enjoyed my post. Yes, I’m pretty excited about Mindcrawlers! I’ll be working on it once this course is over.
Love your blog, Jen. Your journey is a book in itself. Is Mindcrawlers fiction? What genre? Will you be self-publishing or publishing through a house? Since I’m in the learning process on all this, just curious about the process and timeline involved. You seem to have accomplished quite a bit in such a short time. Kuddos.
Thank you LInda! Mindcrawlers is a psychological thriller which I’m super excited about. I’ll be self-publishing (unless something changes). I still have a draft or two to do and then it will be time to share it with the world! I’ll keep writing updates about the book here on my blog.
Jen
Hi Jen. Thank-you for sharing a bit about your grief (and grieving). I have better than a foggy notion of how it changes one’s world! I am so impressed that you continued to write while navigating grief. I had joined The Write to Practice (now it is Write to Publish) back in 2018 and learned so much. I think we may have ‘met’ in there. At the time I was a brand new writer and had fun learning how to write short stories and then getting one published in https://shortfictionbreak.com/retsnom/. My world took a turn in February (2019) when my husband was diagnosed with esophageal cancer spread to the liver. In April he died. (We would have been married 45 years in August 2019). I’m getting back into writing now. In the interim, I felt connected to other writers in Joe Bunting’s facebook group by reading the posts in there. This is such a strong and supportive writing group that I can’t say enough good things about. Your talents are needed in our world. Keep creating. All the best, Victoria
Hi Victoria,
My heart breaks for your loss, I am so sorry. We met before during last year’s fall contest, if I’m not mistaken. I remember your wonderful story. Writing is a positive distraction from grief; I’m glad we are both doing it. Yes, Joe’s group is amazing, I can’t imagine not being part of his supportive community. Keep writing!
Take care,
Jen