Working With Me

My Experience:

As a longtime writing teacher and editor, I've had the opportunity to help hundreds of people shape a rough draft into something they're proud to have written. I've worked with every level of experience and confidence, from newbies to professionals, and in practically every prose genre imaginable. I love the personal engagement of talking with writers individually and diving deep into their projects.

My career began after grad school with freelance editing, where I learned to adapt to different modes of writing, from professional to personal to academic, each piece aimed at a specific audience and carrying a specific purpose. For 15 years, I taught writing one-on-one in the academic Writing Centre at Innis College, University of Toronto. There I helped undergrad students from all disciplines, many of them English language learners, who arrived week after week with assignments in various stages. I learned to assess a draft quickly and come up with a workable approach to learning for a 50-minute session. Typically, discussion would range from the goals of the assignment and the student's writing process, to its organization/structure, argumentation, research, and sentence-level expression. Much of this teaching involved supporting the student's personal growth: helping them discover what they already knew and could do, feel excited about their writing, and become confident and skilled editors on their own.

In 2007 I began teaching creative writing courses to undergrads for the first time, initially at Innis College and then also for other institutions and organizations. I'm now Assistant Professor in the Writing & Rhetoric program, University of Toronto, where I teach courses of my own design in fiction, creative nonfiction, and land-based writing. As faculty, I also mentor individual program students on larger creative projects. These days I can also be found teaching at Dalhousie University, NS, and offering workshops in the community.

Editing & Mentoring:

I offer manuscript evaluation, manuscript editing, and if desired, ongoing project guidance. I also mentor writers privately. I work with novels, short stories, and creative nonfiction (essays and memoirs).

Manuscript Evaluation: For a set rate, I will read your work, consult with you about it via the phone or Zoom, and offer a written evaluation of up to 10 pages. Typically this process takes up to four weeks.

If you are interested any of these services, please contact me to discuss your project.

Upcoming Writing Workshops: https://www.sharonenglish.net/workshops/