By the time you read this, I’ll be teaching a Writers weekend workshop in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. We’ll be covering the basics of plotting, character, submitting to agents and editors, and book promotion. Doesn’t sound like I have much time left for a tan, but that’s ok. I burn like year-old newspaper over a match.

At a recent book talk, someone asked me about the usefulness of workshops. Writers do workshops regularly. Sharon and I have both attended the Antioch Workshop in Yellow Springs, Ohio. I’ve been to Iowa Summer program as well. For me, they are a way to recharge my writing batteries and get excited about my current project, whatever that might be. I tend to suffer from ennui every time I get to about the three quarters mark of a project.

I have had some bad experiences at workshops. If you’re going to a workshop for validation or help with improving a project, you need to find someone who shares or understands your vision for a project. At one workshop, a future Pulitzer Winner waved away my work. “This is just mystery.” That’s not helpful. The mark of an excellent writer to me is stepping outside your work to see through the eyes of another writer. The best example I can give for this is the late Ed McBain took over Craig Rice’s The April Robin Murders and completed her unfinished manuscript – without notes or outlines or any idea of who was the murderer. He not only wrote the book, he did it so well that a reader cannot determine where she ended and he started. Not only that, but the ending matches what Craig had done in her earlier works. What a great example of what a talented writer can do with the work of another. I only hope I can work half that well with the attendees in Mexico.