03/24/2022
If you are writing a pirate story, OIRW has a class for you - The age of the Sale Part I
The Age of the Sale Part I (Craft/History)
Presented by: Cindy Vallar
Dates: APR 4th – 29th, 2022
Fee: OIRW Member $25| Non-Member $35
Course Description:
The sight of tall masts with billowing sails paints a romantic image that brings to mind times when wooden ships scudded across the waves, traveling to distant ports. While a ship spends much of her time at sea, she is also tied to the land. It is where she is born and where her crew resides. It is where her stores and cargos are housed. It is also her ultimate destination whenever she departs her home port.
The purpose of part one of this workshop is to provide a basic knowledge of ships from the Middle Ages through the nineteenth century when steam replaced wind as the principal power for moving a vessel from one port to the next, as well as nautical language, seaports, trade, and the necessary documents a ship requires to conduct that trade.
The lessons, handouts, and assignments illuminate what a writer needs to craft a believable maritime world for their characters. At the end of the workshop, Cindy offers to provide a free edit of a chapter from participants’ manuscripts.
(Please note: It’s not necessary to take both parts of this workshop, but doing so is recommended. Part 2 focuses on the sailors, ship life, and other aspects of the maritime world at sea.)
Instructor Bio:
A retired librarian, Cindy Vallar began researching pirates in college while working on The Rebel and the Spy, a historical novel involving Jean Laffite and the Battle of New Orleans. She is the Editor of Pirates and Privateers, a monthly history column on maritime piracy that is now in its twenty-first year of publication. She also reviews piratical and maritime fiction and non-fiction books, and maintains an annotated list of the best piracy and maritime sites on the web. For fourteen years, she wrote “The Red Pencil,” an editing column profiling authors and comparing pieces from their published novels with early drafts of those works, for Historical Novels Review. She is also a freelance editor and historical novelist. She belongs to the Historical Novel Society, Historical Writers of America, the National Association of Independent Writers and Editors, the Laffite Society, the Louisiana Historical Society, and the National Maritime Historical Society.
Outreach International Romance Writers Chapter of RWA® offers online workshops and classes through the Outreach Online Campus.
