James Gunn’s online writing workshop is being offered again

Science fiction Grand Master James Gunn is once again offering his online writing workshop on science fiction. If you have always wanted to write science fiction and considered doing a workshop to improve your skills, you couldn’t pick a better online workshop than this one. I should know, I went through the workshop in the summer of 2008 and it proved invaluable to me.

Prior to the workshop, I’d sold a couple of stories, but I wasn’t always sure what I was doing right or wrong in a given story so it was very hit and miss for me. For instance, no matter how often I submitted to Analog, I always got their form letter rejection. After taking the 8-week online workshop, I submitted the story I wrote in the workshop to Analog. I didn’t sell the story, but I got a detailed, page-long rejection letter, encouraging me to send more stories. I did that and two stories later, I sold “Take One for the Road” to Stan, which appeared in the June 2011 Analog. I am certain that I would not have sold to Analog as quickly as I did had I not taken the workshop. The skills I learned there were practical and made me a better storyteller.

But the workshop is more than that. Despite being online, I met people in the workshop who became trusted first readers and critiquer’s of my stories. That has been invaluable and their feedback in the years after the workshop have made my stories even better.

I highly recommend the workshop. You can get all of the details over at Willis Couvellier‘s LiveJournal post: “James Gunn’s Online Workshop is Back.” There’s a bunch of information over there, but if anyone has specific questions about my experience in the workshop, drop a comment here or get in touch with me (see my Contact page) and I’d be happy to answer your questions.