Writers will gather on March 27th for the 19th Annual Western Reserve Spring Writers Conference at Lakeland Community College in Kirtland, OH. From 8:30 in the morning until 1:30 in the afternoon, participants attend their choice of three hour-long classes. Among the variety of topics this spring are “Writing for Children: Words and Illustrations” (Annette Sheldon), “Creating Credible Characters” (Debbie Alferio), and “The Scoop on Agents” (Holly Jacobs). Each hour contains four subjects to choose from, and everyone is encouraged to hop classrooms within the hour if there’s more than one they’d like to catch. The conference ends with a networking reception, refreshments, book sale, and author signing.

Unique to this conference is “Forming a Writers’ Group”, a special session facilitated by Diane Campbell Taylor. Her work has been published in The Plain Dealer and Grit magazine. The goal is to help writers get together to form their first writing group. “This is a wonderful, shot-in-the-arm way to learn more about the craft and business of writing and to make friends with other writers. Many writers groups – and success stories! – have been born as a direct result of these conferences,” says Conference Coordinator Deanna R. Adams. Deanna has just released her new book, Cleveland’s Rock and Roll Roots. (Deanna has also written a fabulous memoir called Confessions of a Not-So-Good Catholic Girl. I interviewed her about it on The Writing Show.)

The cost of the conference is $65, and for an additional fee of $10, writers can register for prearranged editing sessions with award-winning editor Nancy E. Piazza, a published writer with 21 years of editing experience. She works with novels, short stories, nonfiction books, articles, essays, memoirs, blogs, and letters for aspiring and published writers through her business, Writeperson Ltd.

For more information, including the bios of all the conference presenters, and to register, please click here. Enrollment is still open. Hope to see some of you there!