AUGUST 17-31, 2011
Workshop Title: Fat Free Writing or How to Avoid Wordiness in the Editing Stage
Instructor/s: The Grammar Divas
Cost: $20
Visit HEART OF DIXIE'S WEBSITE TO REGISTER.
Description: Fat-Free Writing or How to Eliminate Wordiness in the Editing Stage
Do ever-shrinking word counts and dwindling editor reading time have you thinking you need to put your prose on a diet? Wordy sentences and unnecessary phrases clutter writing, turning an otherwise good manuscript into an overweight tome. Cut the fat and enhance your chances of garnering an editor's attention. The Grammar Divas demonstrate techniques to identify and correct common author mistakes. Discover how to identify which words add meaning to a sentence and which just take up space. Learn alternatives to wordy, verbose, overstated, or pompous phrases. Devise strategies to help you write precisely what you mean every time.
Bios:
Annie Oortman... Grammar wasn't Annie Oortman's first love (actually, it was a cute boy in her second-grade class named Henry Talley) or even her second (avoiding barn work). However, after getting an A for content but an F for readability on a third-grade book report, she learned having great ideas was one thing, communicating them well on paper another.
Annie became a disciple of the church of Proper Grammar and card-carrying member of The Society for the Promotion of Good Grammar (www.spogg.org). Nowadays, she diagrams sentences for fun (yes, for fun), corrects her children when they say "I did good on the test" (I did well.), and argues with fellow grammar devotees on the acceptability of ending a sentence with a preposition (don't do it).
BTW, Annie is hoping to see her name on the cover of a fiction novel soon... very soon. (And, if you’re wondering, Henry Talley never even noticed Annie as he had a mad crush on blonde-haired, blue-eyed Libby Boxler.)
Darlene Buchholz... Darlene fell in love in the first grade with a boy named Neil. He shared his crackers and milk at recess after someone took her snack and never got caught. She’s loved romance and intrigue ever since. By the third grade, she discovered Nancy Drew mysteries and developed a great passion for perky heroines who drove convertibles (proof they were in charge of their own lives). She wrote her own one-hundred-page mysteries, giving the heroine a much better hero than wimpy Ned Nickerson, who seemed more fashion accessory than hero. What woman wouldn’t prefer a cowboy or a cop named…well, Neil, of course?
Darlene never thought of grammar as a challenge. It was, instead, a tool to help her express the ideas she felt passionate about. She served as a peer mentor in junior high and high school. Becoming a high school English teacher was a natural for Darlene. She loved sharing ideas expressed in great literature and exposition.
Now, family raised, Darlene has decided to write stories again. She writes romantic suspense, and sometimes her heroines drive trucks rather than convertibles. Her heroes are still cowboys and cops. She hopes to publish soon.
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