Latest Publication:
Italian Boss, Housekeeper Bride
Publisher: Harlequin Mills & Boon
Sharon Kendrick's course at the watermill is:
"Writing romance"
Saturday 9 May - Saturday 16 May 2009
"Sharon Kendrick writes an edgy romance with tons of tension, passion with a dynamic alpha hero and a delightful heroine."
"Kendrick's book is sizzling hot and full of passion and emotion."
Sharon has written more than 60 books for Harlequin Mills & Boon. She regularly tops the Waldenbooks list in North America as well as selling well all over Europe, Asia and South America. She gives many talks and workshops and loves interacting with other people in particular nurturing the passion and talent of new writers.
Sharon knows at first hand how difficult it can be to write a book on your own and recognises the value of some time away with like-minded people to hone up your ideas and really get your book moving.
She says: “Everyone thinks a writer's life is a terribly exciting one (and when the book is going well, believe me - it's brilliant) but it is also a very isolated one. You sit at your desk and create a world of fantasy and sometimes you think the outside world doesn't exist (it does, doesn't it?!)”
She says of her own literary beginnings: “I grew up in a little house underneath the flight path of Heathrow Airport -- but I was always off in a world of my own, so I never really noticed the sound of the airplanes (except for Concorde, of course!). There was nothing very much to do where I lived. The nearest cinema and swimming pool were a bus-ride away and there were never very many buses. As I didn't have any brothers or sisters I spent nearly all my spare time reading.
”When I was twelve I asked for `The Complete Works of William Shakespeare' for my birthday and used to spend hours in my room studying it and learning the speeches and the sonnets. It was magical to discover that I could be Lady Macbeth or Cleopatra whenever I wanted and I guess that's when I first learnt how powerful the written word could be.
"I wrote my first book at the age of thirteen, in the back of one of my school books - it was set in a boarding school and featured identical twins who were fighting evil (!) and I did all the illustrations for it myself (both girls had raven bobs and were not a million miles away from Cleopatra!). Sadly, this early manuscript has been lost!
"I left school at 16 and had millions and millions of different jobs – I demonstrated ironing-board cupboards in a very posh department store and then got sacked for attracting the wrong kind of customer! I walked up and down a London high-street wearing a sandwich board advertising a job-agency and I was the cook on board a double-decker bus which "did" Europe in just three weeks! After this I became a nurse and travelled to Australia, where I drove an ambulance through the desert. But I had always wanted to write.. and if you want to write then it's no good just talking about it. You have to just sit down and do it.
"My very first book for Harlequin Mills & Boon was called Nurse in the Outback -- and it doesn't take a great stretch of the imagination to work out what it was about! It was published exactly as I wrote it with no changes (beginner's luck!) and it sold very well."
Since then Sharon has hardly looked back and has become one of Harlequin Mills & Boon’s most prolific writers. She’s very happy to share the benefits of her vast experience in writing romantic fiction and her intimate knowledge of what publishers are looking for in a romantic novel.
Sharon says: "On the first afternoon we'll have a meet-and-greet. In particular, I'd like everyone to bring two to four pages of the beginning of a romance along with them."
Saturday
Arrive and settle in at mill.
Sunday am
Destroying myths about romance. Do's and don'ts. What makes a classic romance?
Sunday pm
The writing process. Plot-driven, or character-led? Ask writers to go away and invent a hero and heroine for the following day's class.
Monday am
Importance of characters. Dissection of alpha-male. Making a heroine that reader's can identify with.
Monday pm
Detail and back-story.
Tuesday am
Story-lines. Logical loopholes. Talking through a plot.
Tuesday pm
The Importance of emotion. What makes the group emotional?
Wednesday - excursion day to Lucca
(transport there is included in the price of your course)
Thursday am
Narrative. Getting the right balance. Style.
Thursday pm
Effective dialogue. Ask group to go away and write two pages of dialogue between hero and heroine - this can be anything - first meeting/pivotal love scene/argument.
Friday am
Sex.
Friday pm
Selling your story/agents/nuts and bolt stuff.
Obviously, this isn't completely prescriptive - the format is likely to vary and change depending on the participants' needs. There will also be a Writer's Clinic - where people can discuss their particular problems.
The first was in The Times, when Sharon was up against a very illustrious bunch of literati in front of an audience of 350 at Olympia!:
"The star of the day was Sharon Kendrick, who displayed wit, passion and humility and preposterously confessed to not knowing what a split infinitive was!"
The following was from a writing course organised by the Southern Daily Echo:
"Sharon Kendrick made me look at writing in a completely different way and I feel I have learned so much from her."
Then from the Winchester Festival Literary weekend, when Sharon was a course tutor:
"I've always wanted to write romance and Sharon Kendrick made me believe that I could achieve my goals."
