Iowa Writers' Workshop

This summer I attended a week-long session at the famed University of Iowa Writer's Workshop. (ANYone can get in for their summer sessions.) The workshop was on writing memoir, and I submitted 20 pages of some of my deepest, best (and most revealing) work yet. I was a nervous wreck (I was in the bathroom for a good part of the night prior to the day of my critique). But I had decided to go for it in this workshop. I figured that sharing my work with other writers (who would be nervous about sharing their own writing) may be the safest way to put it out there. It was a huge leap of faith, and it turned out very well. The teacher and classmates were very supportive and encouraging and they offered some good critiques. It was a big breakthrough for me as a writer (although I haven't written much of anything since - I'm going to seriously settle down and do some writing after the Christmas holidays). Here I am with my teacher (third from left, in the blue shirt, in back) and my fellow classmates.