STORIED

Service Description

Do you have a novel in you but aren’t sure how to get it out? Do you gravitate toward books and workshops that promise ways to finish a novel only to grow frustrated when life gets in the way? In Storied, we’ll work to build a writing process that works for you, using different models as a starting point. This is not a traditional workshop where we critique one another’s work; rather, the focus is on generating pages, learning to prioritize your novel, and finding the writing processes that work best for you and your goals. Over the course of four weeks, we’ll investigate different models of novel writing and experiment to see how you can alchemize what’s out there with what speaks to your heart. You’ll leave this workshop with a blueprint for continuing your novel-writing momentum. You’ll also receive a pdf workbook, a one-hour one-on-one manuscript discussion (you may submit up to 20 pages before this meeting), and access to a dedicated online forum (not Facebook!) so that we can cheer each other on and keep up accountability between meetings. Our sessions will culminate in a celebratory open mic of work generated over the four weeks. This workshop meets in-person with a virtual option, and all sessions are recorded. Novel writing is hard work, but no one said you had to do it alone. (Manuscript consultation available as an add-on service; please see https://www.porchlightliterary.org/about-5 for details. All Storied participants receive a 25% discount on Nicole’s offerings.) Nicole VanderLinden has over 20 years of experience leading and participating in writing workshops, and she currently serves as the fiction/nonfiction book review editor for Colorado Review and as a reader for Ploughshares. Her fiction and book reviews appear in various publications, and in 2020, Lauren Groff selected her story "The Names You Choose" as the winner of the New Ohio Review Fiction Prize. Recent work has been nominated for Pushcart Prizes, The Best of the Net, and The Best Small Fictions and has been long-listed for the St. Lawrence Book Award and the University of New Orleans Publishing Lab Prize. Nicole has been the recipient of an AWP Intro Journals award, and in 2021, she was awarded a Tennessee Williams fiction scholarship by the Sewanee Writers’ Conference. Nicole is currently finishing revisions on her first novel.