a Start Your Novel workshop
In-person Workshop
at The Coastguard Cultural Centre, Tramore, Co. Waterford
10 am to 3 pm
(Doors open 9.45 am)
TBD 2026
€70
Booking and payment is through TidyCal. Select the workshop time, enter your details and pay by card via Stripe. Your booking is confirmed by email and a reminder email is sent out 24 hours and 1 hour before the workshop starts.
for novel dreamers and imaginers…
… learn novel craft for your first draft…
Dear Novel Dreamer,
This workshop will go deeper into your novel idea, developing novel craft, and creating ways to get to ‘The End’. We’ll do that through character development, descriptions, dialogue, plotting, and writing strategies for you to start and write the first draft of your novel.
You’ll learn enough novel craft to write your first draft.
What you’ll learn in this workshop:
Novel basics including layout, genre, and length.
Develop characters in thoughts, speech, body, and background.
The sensory and telling details in descriptions.
Enhancing plot with subplots and other story structures.
How to drop into scene to write your novel.
Resilience strategies to keep your writing going through your first draft.
Pre-work NOTE: This workshop assumes that you’ve done the Your Novel Idea workshop. There will be a recap of what was covered in the first workshop so please bring your workbook from that workshop with you. A summary page for your novel ideas will be in the Your First Draft workbook.
IMPORTANT NOTE: None of your ideas need to be shared with others during the workshop.
Your first draft is freedom
It’s the flight of ideas forming across the page in words.
It’s words that create images, sounds, senses, and actions into being.
It’s about what happened and what happened next.
It’s your dream realised in scenes and chapters.
It’s the start of life of a novel.
Writing can feel like a lonely process, so an in-person workshop can help you meet other writers who may be going through the same experiences as you.
Also, a location outside of your home gives you space to focus on your writing needs and your novel.
All the novel first draft prompts are in a workbook to help you record your novel ideas at the workshop and afterwards when you’re back home.
The workshop is in the Main Gallery upstairs at the Coastguard Cultural Centre in Tramore, Co. Waterford. I love the incredible views of Tramore Bay.
At the Coastguard Cultural Centre, there’s an on-site Café and you’ll be able to purchase take-away options before we start and during breaks through the workshop.
There’s free parking near and around the centre. For accessibility, there’s a lift inside up to the Main Gallery.
A pdf copy of the slides, and any other references and resources, from the workshop will be emailed out to you after the workshop.
I’m a Novel Navigator.
I help you do your novel, trust your journey, overcome self-doubt and make novel writing a part of your life.
For over a decade, I’ve facilitated writers in creative and novel writing groups.
Trained with the Cert. in Creative Writing for Publication and the Two Roads program at Maynooth University (Kilkenny Campus) with Suzanne Power and John MacKenna.
Received a Regional Bursary (Literature) residency award for the Tyrone Guthrie Centre.
I write science fiction: author of ‘The Alien Eve’, have poetry and short fiction in two anthologies ‘Hammered Glass’ and ‘Word Weavers: A First Anthology’.
I know the dream of being a novel writer and I know that taking the first step of anything can be the hardest thing to do. It is both scary and exciting to want to write a novel.
Remember, you’re already a writer.
Book your place and let’s go deeper into novel craft so you can continue your novel journey.
This is for Novel Dreamers.
For your novel.
a Start Your Novel workshop
In-person Workshop
at The Coastguard Cultural Centre, Tramore, Co. Waterford
10 am to 3 pm
(Doors open 9.45 am)
TBD 2026
€70
Booking and payment is through TidyCal. Select the workshop time, enter your details and pay by card via Stripe. Your booking is confirmed by email and a reminder email is sent out 24 hours and 1 hour before the workshop starts.