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Meet the Teaching Artist: Michelle Lee on Getting Unstuck in Your Novel
by Writing Workshops Staff
An hour ago
Middle-grade novelist Michelle Lee gave herself a title she'd earned the hard way: the Queen of Quicksand. She'd been there more times than she cared to count, novel frozen on the page, all the standard advice long since exhausted. Go for a walk. Spend time away from your writing. Just write through the bump. Sometimes it worked. More often, it didn't. So she did what a doctoral-level English scholar and veteran of 4,000 students tends to do when the standard advice fails: she built her own toolkit, tested it across four ground-up rewrites of her second novel, and called her philosophy No Surrender.
This summer, Lee brings that toolkit directly to a small group of stuck writers. In Unstuck: Strategies to Move Your Novel Forward, a four-week online workshop at WritingWorkshops.com, the official education partner of Electric Literature, she guides participants through craft-based techniques for diagnosing exactly where and why a manuscript stalled. Writers submit up to 75 pages of their work-in-progress in Week 1, then learn to excavate the "Promises and Expectations" buried in their early chapters, re-energize scenes that lost their spark, and identify when bold moves are necessary: a point-of-view shift, a missing character brought back on stage, a setting set on fire.
The class is limited to ten students and meets Wednesday evenings via Zoom beginning July 8th. If your draft has been sitting in the murky middle a little too long, this is for you.
Here is our Meet the Teaching Artist Interview with Michelle:
Writing Workshops: Hi, Michelle. Please introduce yourself to our audience.
Michelle Lee: I'm Michelle Lee. Middle Grade Author. Poet. Picture Book Writer. Published in all kinds of genres. Mentor. Editor. Doctor. Former Professor. Mom & Wife. Wobbly bike rider. Terrible knitter. Fan of The Witcher, Bridgerton, The Amazing Race, Star Trek, Mixtape, Taylor Swift, and croissants. Maker of chickpea-chocolate-chip blondies. Eater of tofu and filet mignon. Lover of the Sparkly Eiffel Tower. Practical Dreamer.
Writing Workshops: What made you want to teach this specific class? Is it something you are focusing on in your own writing practice? Have you noticed a need to focus on this element of craft?
Michelle Lee: During the recent recording of a podcast, I called myself, "The Queen of Quicksand." Been there. Screeched to a standstill on many different projects. Most of the advice was physical: "Get your mind off it. Go take a walk. Work on other things. Spend time away from your writing. Just write through the bump (no matter if it's dreck)." Did that. Sometimes it worked; sometimes, it didn't. I knew if I wanted to make writing part of my life, drive my career, I needed to find intentional strategies that worked for me. Craft techniques. During the development of my second novel, I had to rewrite the manuscript at least four times from the ground up, if not more. I needed to really think about ways to keep me going, moving forward – No Surrender!
Writing Workshops: Give us a breakdown of how the course is going to go. What can the students expect? What is your favorite part about this class you've dreamed up?
Michelle Lee: Each session, I'll lead the class into the Strategies of the Day, we'll have a few minutes to test things out (silent writing, thinking) and then discussion! I don't like my classes to be too "lecture-y" – I like conversational workshops, which is why I tend toward smaller groups. I can't wait for writers to dig back into their work and dig themselves out of stagnation. To rediscover what brilliant elements they created and set into motion at the start, only to leave them (and themselves) hanging. I'm excited to learn what they see in new ways, based on my "Promises and Expectations" checklist!
"I can't wait for writers to dig back into their work and dig themselves out of stagnation. To rediscover what brilliant elements they created and set into motion at the start, only to leave them (and themselves) hanging."
Writing Workshops: Who was your first literary crush?
Michelle Lee: It probably was a character, like Encyclopedia Brown! I mean, the name alone?!
Writing Workshops: What are you currently reading?
Michelle Lee: My latest library haul: two middle-grade books – Barakah Beats by Maleeha Siddiqui and Unsinkable Cayenne by Jessica Vitalis.
Writing Workshops: How do you choose what you're working on? When do you know it is the next thing you want to write all the way to THE END?
Michelle Lee: I choose my projects when they come to me and won't let go. While I'm doing the dishes, showering, driving, reading other books ... I start to get butterflies. I fall in love.
Ready to fall back in love with your novel? Michelle's four-week workshop gives you practical, craft-based strategies to find your way back to the story that won't let you go.
Enroll in Unstuck →Writing Workshops: Where do you find inspiration?
Michelle Lee: The seeds are everywhere. I hate to admit it, but I do get lots of ideas from articles and posts (social media / news sources) Sometimes, it's a phrase, a word, an image. Sometimes, it's a magical tangent. Then, an entire story begins to unfold in my mind.
Writing Workshops: What is the best piece of writing wisdom you've received that you can pass along to our readers? How did it impact your work? Why has this advice stuck with you?
Michelle Lee: It's not something I received, but rather learned the hard way after writing for most of my life. It's cliche, but: Trust the process and keep going. If you really want to show your writing to the world, learn the craft. Find your own strategies to work through bumps (in your work and in life). Keep your eye on The End. You can do it. But it takes knowledge, time, and commitment. Also, find a critique community you can trust.
"I choose my projects when they come to me and won't let go. While I'm doing the dishes, showering, driving, reading other books ... I start to get butterflies. I fall in love."
Writing Workshops: What is the worst piece of writing advice you've received, read, or heard? Why is this something you push against in your own writing practice?
Michelle Lee: "You can't do that. Follow the Rules. That won't sell." Phooey. To a certain extent, you need to consider the expectations of a genre and of your reader. What are the norms / conventions? What are the lines no one crosses? Can you push them? Nudge them? Change them? Do you have a strong, purposeful, meaningful reason for changing them? Does your work, in its "being different," offer something compelling? Sometimes, you have to color in the lines, but sometimes, you must let your story be the funny horror-picture book.
Writing Workshops: What is your favorite book to recommend on the craft of writing? Why this book?
Michelle Lee: Where Do You Hang Your Hammock by Bella Mahaya Carter. It speaks to me on so many levels, but mostly it gets right to the heart of a writer's creative life.
Writing Workshops: What's your teaching vibe?
Michelle Lee: Friendly, Encouraging, Positive, Experienced, Inclusive. Safe space.
That "safe space" isn't just a throwaway phrase for Michelle Lee. It's the organizing principle behind every choice she's made in designing Unstuck: Strategies to Move Your Novel Forward: a small group, a conversational format, and a toolkit built from real experience on the far side of a stalled manuscript. In four Wednesday evening sessions this July, you'll walk away with a personalized "Promises and Expectations" checklist for your specific pages, a PDF workbook of strategies to use on every project going forward, and a concrete plan for where your story goes next. Ten seats. July 8th. Your novel has been waiting long enough.
Join Michelle Lee this July and leave with a clear path forward for your novel, a personalized craft checklist, and a room full of writers who know exactly where you've been.
Save Your Seat in Unstuck →WritingWorkshops.com is an independent, artist-run creative writing school and the official education partner of Electric Literature. Since 2016, we've helped writers strengthen their voice, develop a greater understanding of craft, and forge a path to publication.
