Writing Workshop

Write What You Know: Memoir, Novels & Personal Essays

Have you dreamed of turning a personal experience or family story into a written work of art? What does it mean to “write what you know?” Drawing from your lived experience and emotional truth can provide powerful scaffolding for a story. We’ll cover internal and external methods of mining the truth, types of writing to create, how to overcome fears, when to reframe facts to best serve the story, as well as marketing, branding, privacy, and legal considerations. Lisa will touch upon examples from her own experience of using her family’s story to create her award-winning novel, Everything We Thought Was True. This workshop will be interactive and include questions and answers. You’ll walk away feeling more empowered to effectively capture your personal story on the page and share it with the world.

Coffee and snacks will be served, and Lisa's novel Everything We Thought Was True will be available for sale.

About Lisa:

Lisa Montanaro is part no-nonsense Italian American New Yorker and part sunny Californian. She has a unique background as a performer, teacher of deaf students, lawyer, executive coach, productivity consultant, speaker, and author. Lisa writes book club fiction featuring complex characters breaking barriers and fighting to truly be themselves despite obstacles in their way—including the time they live in and societal stigmas. Her nonfiction writing revolves around productivity, life-work balance, branding, writing, and career issues.

Lisa’s debut novel, Everything We Thought Was True, released January 2025 by Red Adept Publishing, and won first place for LGBTQ Fiction in the International Firebird Book Awards. Lisa is also the author of The Ultimate Life Organizer: An Interactive Guide to a Simpler, Less Stressful & More Organized Life, published by Peter Pauper Press in 2011, and contributed the chapter “The Brand Called You” in the anthology Launch Pad: The Countdown to Marketing Your Book in 2024. As a Branding, Business, Mindset, and Productivity Coach for writers, Lisa provides support for all stages of a writing career. Lisa serves as webinar host for the Women's Fiction Writers Association (WFWA).

When not writing, Lisa enjoys cycling and hiking with her veterinarian husband, tending to her garden, and chasing after her rescue dogs. Lisa has enjoyed living snow-free since 2012 in Northern California, where she’s made it her mission to sample the wines of the region. Visit her website at www.LisaMontanaroWrites.com and subscribe to her Prosecco & Prose newsletter.

Also check out other Arts events in Bedford, Workshops in Bedford, Literary Art events in Bedford.