Marion Roach Smith, award-winning author of four mass market books, former New York Times staffer, NPR commentator and long-time teacher of memoir, has moved her classes online, and she is having more fun that ever. Want to join in? It’s easy. There are four live, online classes. All are limited in size — some as small as 6 students. Two are taught several times each month.
The classes:
Memoirama
Here’s the promise of the class: Taught in one session with Q&A time at the end, this class will give you the tools to get writing immediately. Memoirama is for those who want to learn the basics, ask some questions and get right to work, perhaps then moving on to one of my classes that feature in-depth critiques and peer review.
Memoirama Part 2: Structure Your Book
Here’s the promise of the class: Taught in one live class, this interactive experience allows you to send in the rough draft of your book’s argument and work with Marion to map it out beat by beat, chapter by chapter and scene by scene so that you can go home with a working structure.
Writing What You Know
Here’s the promise of the class: Flannery O’Connor said that anyone who survived childhood has enough material to write for the rest of his or her life. She’s right, of course. But writing about yourself and your crazy (or not-so-crazy) family can be the big vein, if you’re ready, or the brick wall, if you’re not. This course will help you dig among your stuff and get it down on paper in some interesting, funny, enlightening, compelling, readable and possibly saleable way.
The Master Class
Here’s the promise of the class: Beginning in July 2017 and running through December, 2017, this class will get you a first draft of your book. The Master Class is for those who are dedicated to getting that first draft written in that time frame. I use a method taught to me by the best editors in New York publishing and used to write and publish my four mass-market books with four of the world’s best publishing houses. Learn how to do it right with a small group of dedicated writers who will be invested in your success.
About the teacher
Marion Roach Smith is the author of four mass-market books, all of which contain a large degree of memoir. Her most recent book is The Memoir Project: A Thoroughly Non-Standardized Text for Writing & Life, (Grand Central, 2011). Under the name Marion Roach, she is the author of The Roots of Desire: The Myth, Meaning and Sexual Power of Red Hair, (Bloomsbury, 2005); co-author with famed forensic pathologist Michael Baden, M.D., of Dead Reckoning (Simon & Schuster, 2001); and author of Another Name for Madness, (Houghton Mifflin, 1985). A former staff member of The New York Times, she has written for The New York Times Magazine, Prevention, The Daily News, Vogue, Newsday, Good Housekeeping, Martha Stewart Living, Discover and The Los Angeles Times. A former commentator on National Public Radio’s “All Things Considered,” until recently she had a talk show on Martha Stewart Living Radio, Sirius/XM 110.
For more information, please visit Marion Roach Smith’s online classes page.
