Tag: Online Class

January 14 – February 10, 2008

Enrollment Information: http://www.occrwa.com/classes_January.htm

COST: $20 for OCC members, $30 for non-members
Enrollment deadline: January 12, 2008
Moderator: Kitty Bucholtz at kittyrosebucholtz@yahoo.com

ABOUT THE CLASS:

Pitch Perfect: Getting to the Heart of your Romance Novel or Women’s Fiction Story (for pitching and for querying)

Everyone needs to learn how to pitch. Okay, maybe everyone except those few heavy hitters who have the luxury of only having to share a vague idea about a story with their editors because their stuff always sells well (we hate them, but let’s move on…).

So, the rest of us need to be able to present our story ideas within query letters, synopses, and during frightening agent and editor appointments at writing conferences!

•Can you use a 3-word phrase to describe your story? How about in one sentence?
•Can you capture the essence of your tale in 25 words or less?
•When your listener wants to know more about your story, do you know what to say and, more importantly, what NOT to say?
•Do you know the biggest benefit of having an agent or editor appointment at a national or regional writing conference?

The main goal of this class is to help you understand the different types (and lengths) of pitches you need to prepare, and for you to learn several ways and styles of organizing your pitch (that you can utilize in query letters as well as agent/editor appointments).

What do you get? If you read and comprehend all the lectures plus complete all the assignments, you will create your very own pitch that you can utilize for query letters, synopsis blurbs, and/or as a verbal pitch to agents and/or editors at conference appointments. Or, this process will clearly point out where you need to do some more work on your story. It might be a painful awakening that you have some serious revising to do, but it will be time well spent.

Either way, you’ll have gotten to the heart of your story.

About the Instructor:

After much hard work and the help of many other published and unpublished writers, Janet Wellington sold her first romance manuscript in 1998. Now, in addition to her own writing, she also teaches writing workshops at conferences and online. And she believes in giving back to the writing community and coaches other writers on craft and how to navigate the publishing maze through her business called Wellington Word, where she offers line-editing and manuscript critiquing.

Her favorite mantra is: If you’re going to dream, dream big…and do it! And she adds, “Getting published is a miracle achieved by four things: (1) Courage, (2) Perseverance, (3) Luck, and (4) Talent…usually in that order!”

PITCH PERFECT with Janet Wellington
January 14 – February 10, 2008

Enrollment Information: http://www.occrwa.com/classes_January.htm

COST: $20 for OCC members, $30 for non-members
Enrollment deadline: January 12, 2008

For more information, please see the website http://www.occrwa.com/classes_January.htm or email moderator Kitty Bucholtz at kittyrosebucholtz@yahoo.com

Why erotica? Why now?

Sex isn’t the taboo it once was. HBO’s Sex in the City made it okay to pop a vibrator into your shopping bag along with a pair of stilettos. Women want that same freedom in choosing the books they read.

It all started with FANNY HILL. Considered to be the first erotic novel, the memoirs of this woman of pleasure by John Cleland published in 1749 was the subject of the 1966 landmark Supreme Court case that opened the door to publishing erotic fiction in the United States. Since then, men have had all the fun. Now it’s time for women to get in on the reading action.

What we read mirrors what’s going in our society. No surprise then that erotic fiction is so popular. According to a recent study by the Kaiser Family Foundation, the number of sex scenes aired on TV has doubled in the last seven years. Seventy percent of shows on TV include some sexual content–double what the figure was in 1998.

Lesson 1: Overview: the history of erotic romance

Lesson 2: Subgenres of erotic romance: historical, contemporary, paranormal, fantasy and futuristic

Lesson 3: Erotic language — which words to use, not to use, etc.

Lesson 4: Coming up with an idea

Lesson 5: “A Hero’s/Heroine’s Erotic Journey”

Lesson 6: POV: 1st vs. 3rd; how to think like a man; head hopping vs. bed hopping

Lesson 7: Research

Lesson 8: Erotic romance is not –the difference and what publishers want

About the Instructors:
Jina Bacarr is the award winning author of Naughty Paris and The Blonde
Geisha from Spice Books. Lyndi Lamont writes erotic romance, including
male/male for Amber Heat, the erotic imprint of Amber Quill Press.

Enrollment Information:
Cost: OCC members $20 and Nonmembers $30
Enrollment deadline: October 13, 2007

For more infromation, see the website http://www.occrwa.com/classes_October.htm
or e-mail online class moderator Lori Pyne at luv2write@gmail.com