Writing Workshops

About My Talks, Presentations & Workshops

I can tailor my presentations and writing workshops to your requirements.

The kind of things I can cover are:

• Fiction writing
  • Short story writing
  • Flash fiction writing
  • Writing competitions
  • Market research and submitting for publication
  • Self-publishing
  • Many other aspects of fiction writing
• Blogging / running a website
  • How to make money from your blog / website
  • Key points you need to consider when setting up a website
  • Identifying your audience
  • Creating content your audience will find useful
  • Marketing and promotion
  • Many other aspects of running a website (this list could contain hundreds of bullet points if I don't stop now)
• Writing workshops
  • Fun writing exercises/tasks
  • Writing quizzes
  • Guarenteed publication (via my writing challenges)
  • Story performance (the importance of reading events)
  • Many other fun activities

To give you an idea of what to expect, at fiction writing presentations I usually talk through key points writers need to understand, to give their work the best chance of being published.

The talks are usually broken down into sections. For example, one of my writing workshops is structured like this:

1. Introduction

I talk briefly about my background and experience, so listeners understand why I'm qualified to be a guest speaker.

2. Judging

I run the popular To Hull And Back humorous short story competition. It offers large cash payments to the winners and one of the most sought after and unique prizes in modern literature. Around 500-600 entries are submitted to the competition each year from writers all over the world.

I talk about the common mistakes I see writers make through judging the competition, and share some surprising statistics regarding how many writers fail to obey the rules or understand the terms and conditions when they enter.

3. Writing

In this part of the presentation I cover many aspects of 'what it is' to be a writer and the things you need to consider when writing a story for publication.

All of the above is based on my real-life experience as a published writer.

4. Publishing

I speak about the importance of allocating time to marketing and publishing an author's stories.

Again, all the information is based on real-life experience.

5. Questions

I invite questions and input from the audience throughout a writing workshop, but cover most queries at the end.

Writing Resources

After the event, I share my PowerPoint presentation with everyone who attended. It contains links to lots of useful writing resources.

Things I’ve Previously Added To Writing Workshops

Writing Exercises

At previous presentation, I've included flash fiction exercises for the attendees to try out. I usually base these on the writing challenges I run.

The nice thing about that is that every story written is published, by me, in support of charity. This means attendees can become published authors by partaking in the exercises at the event. I publish the stories on my website and in professional books in print and eBook format.

Short Story Examples

I've also been asked to go through some examples of successful short stories at events. In the past, I've send out copies of stories that have won the To Hull And Back short story competition for attendees to read prior to the event. I then talk about why they won.

I also use my own published short stories as case studies. The strengths and weaknesses of the stories are discussed in detail and, where possible, I share feedback from editors and publishers about the stories.