Koile and Merce to speak at the writing workshop

Cristie Merce

Wendy Koile

Wendy Koile, an honorary member of Coshocton’s Write-On Writers Guild, will lead the morning session of their Joy of Writing Workshop. It will begin shortly after 9 a.m. on Saturday, Oct. 14, in Frontier Power’s Community Room, 770 South Second St., Coshocton.

She will be arriving from Canton. For the past five years, she has been working full-time for Central Ohio Technical College as an instructional designer and English adjunct. At C.O.T.C., she teaches English composition.

Her non-fiction book titles include “Geneva on the Lake: A History of Ohio’s First Summer Resort”; “Legends and Lost Treasure of Northern Ohio”; “Disaster of Ohio’s Lake Erie Islands”; and “Lake Erie Murder & Mayhem.”

Her presentation will focus on finding our way out of a writer’s slump in order to rediscover the joy of writing. We will look at the real root of the problem which causes us to procrastinate or make excuses for not writing. Once we understand our “slump,” we can then shift our mindset and remember why we began writing in the first place. Through short, hands-on activities, attendees will gain a better insight into their own unique challenges ad motivations when it comes to writing. “Best of all, participants will rediscover the Joy of Writing once again,” Koile said.

Cristie Merce has been a member of Coshocton’s Write-On Writers Guild since 2004. Many of us know her as the person who is passionate about writing our memoirs. One of her favorite sayings is, “When an old person dies, you lose a library .”

She has written 30 books, and has had one published, “The Woes & Wisdom of Eldercare.” After working 28 years as an elder caregiver, she retired, and later wrote her book, by hand.

Merce’s afternoon workshop session topic is not related to either of those two areas. Other than giving a few preliminary instructions, she will be giving participants paper, comic strips, scissors and glue sticks. Then they will create a phrase or a sentence without using a pen or keyboard. It will be fun to see what each person can create from what they have at hand.

Registration begins at 8:30 a.m. Saturday, Oct. 14. Cost is $15, which includes a continental breakfast, the workshops, writing exercises, a light lunch, new books for sale, a bake sale, raffle drawings, freebies, and folders with handouts.

This Joy of Writing Workshop is planned to be informative, fun and motivational. It will be concluding around 3:15 p.m. No pre-registration is required. Authors are welcome to share a table to sell their books during break times.