Joanne Dobson--Writer, Teacher, Speaker

1/24/08-3/27/08: How to Write Pageturning Fiction, Thursday, 7 p.m., Hudson Valley Writers' Center, Sleepy Hollow, NY

NEW--Additional Classes: 4/3, 4/10, 4/17, 4/24
Contact maureen@writerscenter.org to register.

2/6/08-2/27/08: How to Write Pageturning Fiction, Wednesday, 7 p.m., Ridgefield Library, Ridgefield, CT

4/19/08: Memoir Writing, Saturday 2-5 p.m., Brewster Library, Brewster, NY

5/8/08: Guest panelist, Somers League of Women Voters Luncheon, Le Chateau, North Salem, NY

9/6/07 - Writing Detective Fiction
10 a.m. Wilton Library
Wilton, CT

9/8/07-9/29/07 - Memoir Writing
Saturdays, 10 a.m.
Ridgefield Library
Ridgefield, CT.

9/17/07 - Bronx Noir
Writing the Bronx
Fordham University
4 p.m.

9/20/07-11/8/07 - How to Write Pageturning Fiction
Thursdays, 7 p.m.
Hudson Valley Writers Center
Phillipse Manor, NY

11/4/07 - Reading from Bronx Noir and Discussion
Sunday, 2 p.m.
Mahopac Library
Mahopac, NY

Joanne has a rare ability to combine passion for her subject with a real interest in each listener's experience and hearty good humor. The classroom or lecture hall with Joanne in it never becomes either pious or slack--everyone, including her co-teachers, is always fully engaged.
Francis G. Couvares, E. Dwight Salmon Professor of History and American Studies, Amherst College

Teacher of Creative Writing

At Fordham University, Manhattanville College, and the Hudson Valley Writers Center I have taught courses in Writing Mystery Fiction, Writing Page-turning Fiction, Writing the Short Story, Writing the Novel, and even, with Kate Stone Lombardi, Writing Suburban Life. I'd be happy to discuss with directors of College Summer Writing Programs the possibility of bringing my skills and experience to your school. Please email me for more information. I can easily tailor my courses to meet your needs.

"Draws her audience in . . . complete command of her subject . . . keeps the interest going to the very end."
Neal Steinberg, Director, North Salem Free Library, NY

Library Speaker

In places as varied as Ridgefield and Wilton, Connecticut, Oberlin Ohio, White Plains, North Salem and Brewster, New York, libraries have offered my programs to enthusiastic patrons. These programs include:
Women of Mystery: The women who created the hard-boiled female private eye: Sue Grafton, Sara Paretsky and Marcia Muller. Four sessions, lecture and discussion, with a film from the California Center for the book.
Whodunit and How: A workshop in writing mystery fiction. Can be tailored for one all-day session, one three-hour session, or for four to six weekly sessions with classes on genre, plotting, characterization, setting, suspense writing and prose style.
Writing for your Life: A workshop in memoir writing, one to six sessions. Lectures on craft, writing exercises, critiques.
"I dwell in Possibility": The mysterious life and enigmatic poetry of Emily Dickinson, New England's recluse poet. Lecture and discussion.
Murder by the Book: The popularity of the bibliomystery. Lecture and discussion.
What Great-Grandma Read: Blockbuster Women's Novels of the Nineteenth Century. Abandoned women, cross-dressers, and firebrands. Lecture and discussion.
From the Hand Press to the Internet: How books have been made, marketed and read in America, from the 16th-century Bay Psalm Book to the 19th-century Dime Novel, to contemporary electronic publishing. Lecture and discussion.