Since announcing Dzanc's Creative
Writing Sessions a little over a year ago, Dzanc
Books has provided mentoring help for over 150 writers, including published
authors as well as students who, having gone through our DCWS,
had their first stories appear in literary journals. With more than 100
great authors to choose from among our list of writing mentors, and with a
program unique and less expensive that anything else being offered today, the
feedback to our program has been extremely favorable:
"Thank you so much. I'm
thrilled with my DCWS experience, and the level of thought and critique I
received. Tremendously helpful, I will definitely do this again."
--Marie Gauthier
"I can't say enough about
how valuable this process has been for me -- and will continue to be as I
digest her comments and revise my story. Her insight, encouragement and
suggestions are just what I needed. I will definitely participate in this
program again in the future! Thanks so much for the opportunity."
--
Jennifer Hollmeyer
In addition to reminding you of
the usual benefits of our mentoring
program, we're also
writing to announce a new summer-long special: In order to further spread the news of our fantastic
program beyond the scope of our own reach, we would like to offer free sessions to those who help us get the word out.
For every three sessions ordered by people who tell us that they heard about
the DCWS from you, we will give you a
free one hour session.
As a reminder, the DCWS is founded
on the principle that many authors' lifestyles do not afford them the
opportunity to obtain feedback on their writing - be it where they live, their
work schedule, or finances. We feel that all authors deserve the opportunity to
have their work reviewed. Unlike most of the current workshop opportunities -
MFA programs, Low-Residency programs, colonies, online classes, etc. - the DCWS
is unique in that it allows the writer to determine the parameters for their
own review sessions. With the DCWS, you sign up for what you want and need, not
some pre-determined program.
The DCWS is designed to provide a one-on-one working relationship with a
published author, allowing you to benefit from their experiences as writers and
teachers. As noted, over 100 great authors have already agreed to
volunteer their services as mentors in our DCWS program, including
award-winning authors and teachers such as: George Singleton, Myfanwy Collins,
Dawn Raffel, Elizabeth Crane, Peter Markus,
Katrina Denza, Laura van den Berg, Kevin Wilson, Brent Goodman, Jeff Parker,
and Robert Lopez. Writers participating
in the DCWS select an available author to work with, then have their work
critiqued and commented upon with the ability to have particular questions
considered as well.
The DCWS utilizes email to eliminate the
limitations of both time and distance in gaining access to feedback about your
work. Students will send their work and questions to us at Dzanc, and we
will then send all materials on to the mentoring author. The author, in
turn, will send their comments and responses back to us - typically within ten
days - and we will forward these comments to the students.
The program is being offered at an extremely
low rate: Many of the instructing authors volunteering their time to Dzanc do
similar work as freelancers and charge much greater rates than are being
offered here through the DCWS. Other workshops and writing programs charge a
lump sum of several hundred dollars up front. Not only does the DCWS allow you
to control and target your expenses, but 100% of the money brought in by Dzanc
by our DCWS goes to supporting the writing programs we run for students in
grades 4-12. These additional programs - currently being run nationally by
Dzanc - are offered free of charge to students who would not otherwise be able
to afford and experience these sort of writing programs.
The DCWS sessions are set up in hourly blocks
and can be ordered as follows:
1 hour - $20
2 hours - $30
4 hours - $50
The DCWS eliminates your need to
travel to a university. It also eliminates your need to lay out a few hundred
dollars up front for an eight or ten week online course. It allows you to jump
in and out when you are available, and also allows you to select from the list
of authors that have generously volunteered their time to this project. A full
list is available at our website. This list includes published novelists, short
story writers, flash fiction writers, poets and
non-fiction writers. If you're not sure which author to select, we'll be happy
to simply assign a writer to you.
For more information on our
Creative Writing Sessions program, please send an email to [email protected]. In order to sign
up now, head over to visiting the DCWS page at our website and select your
author. After deciding how many hours to work with your mentor, click on the
Paypal button that corresponds to that number, and fill in the mentor name in
the appropriate field, then we'll get you started immediately. Please remember
to add a note with your Paypal payment if somebody specific sent you our way.
Below are additional testimonials
to our service:
"I am so glad you guys have
this, I cannot tell you how pleased I am."
-- James Moore
"I
found the experience quite wonderful."
--
Caitlin Hamilton
"Thank you so much for your time and for
your words of encouragement. And thanks especially for being so straight with
me -- this is exactly the kind of tough coaching I need."
-- Michael Mussman
"Thanks
so much for the in-depth critique . . . Also, I'm applying your no-holds barred
editorial style to many of my other stories. I appreciate your time and
insights."
--
John Fox
"I wanted to let you, and Michele Battiste,
know that your program through her guidance has been extremely useful for me. I
had gotten to a point in my project at which I felt stuck, and I don't have an
effective writers group here in Japan
to help me. Michele's comments and critique reminded me of some long-standing
tendencies that I had forgotten I need to avoid, and she also made some
insightful points which were new ideas for me. Best of all, I am reinvigorated
and working hard on the project again. Thank you so much for that."
-- Jessica Goodfellow
And another student of the
sessions wrote up a really nice review over
at HTML Giant.
We hope you'll either take
advantage of the DCWS, or pass the word along to your friends that may be in
need of a little help with their writing. We believe our DCWS is the most
innovative online writing workshop being offered today. If you've got a
website, literary journal, literary blog, or any other means of spreading
information along, including emailing friends, we'd greatly appreciate your
spreading the word about the DCWS.
Sincerely,
Steven Gillis
Dan Wickett
Dzanc Books
www.dzancbooks.org
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