Fire up the computer or do it the old school way and sharpen that pencil. It’s time to get back to work of writing.

It could a memoir, a mystery or something completely different. It could be a complete novel or just a thought in a wanna-be writer’s head. Wherever writers are in the process Pima County Public Library is ready to help with its spring writer in residence.

Margo Steines is sitting in the advisor seat this session. An experienced and published writer, Steines will be available for eight 30-minute one-on-one sessions beginning Tuesday, Feb. 17, at the Flowing Wells Public Library, 1730 W. Wetmore Road. Other sessions will be held from 10 a.m. to noon Wednesdays, beginning Feb. 18.

Writers at any level of skill and genre are invited to consult with Steines, who holds a master’s degree in creative writing from the UA, where she studied nonfiction writing. She also teaches at Pima Community College and has published several works including her memoir, .

“My primary business these days is I work as a creative coach for writers, so this is work that I love,” she said.

Steines uses the word, “holistic,” when she talks about coaching. It’s an important word when applied to writing.

“I think a lot of people think you leave your personal stuff at the door, you leave your diversions at the door and whatever else,” she said. “But I think that especially as a nonfiction writer the way you’re living, the way you’re fitting your writing into your life, all of those things are very much part of the process, so I like to meet people where they’re at.”

She likes to ask the writer lots of questions.

“My goal, really, always, no matter the project or the context, is to guide someone toward their own creative instinct,” she said.

Steines wants people to come. She wants to guide writers in the way they want to go, so she has this advice.

“People should just come with an open mind,” she said. “The way to have the best experience in any kind of creative thing is to have an intention, like, ‘This is what I’d like to get out of this experience or direction,’ but not (come with) a checklist.”

Anyone interested should know that sessions tend to fill up quickly and that there is a limit of one session per week per person. Sessions run on the following schedule: 10 a.m. to noon Tuesdays through April 28, and 10 a.m. to noon Wednesdays through April 29.

Registration opens one week before an appointment time and can be found online at bit.ly/4rCUraY1. 

Participants younger than 18 must be accompanied by an adult or guardian.

Besides the one-on-one consultations Steines is holding three workshops. Registration is not needed for these.

There’s the Memory Excavation for the Writer, from 10:30 a.m. to noon on Saturday, Feb. 28, at Flowing Wells Library. 

“For the memoirist, memories are currency,” Steines said. “Our stories and experiences are what we bring to the table. As nonfiction writers, our relationship to the truth, and to accuracy, is the foundation of our contract of trust with our readers. And yet, it can be surprisingly difficult to conjure up the details of experiences from long ago (or even…from not so long ago!). So, what’s a writer to do?”

In this seminar, participants will unpack the value and limitations of memory. Steines will guide the workshop through a holistic memory excavation process and then bring that to memories so they can be brought authentically into the work. 

Then there is Writing the Nonfiction Scene, from 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Saturday, March 14, at the Tucson Festival of Books, Room 119 in the Manuel Pacheco Integrated Learning Center (ILC), 1500 E. University Boulevard. 

“Learning to write an immersive true-to-life scene will allow you to create your own narrative building blocks, which you can use to construct any type of prose you are interested in writing,” Steines said.

This generative seminar will offer a high-level introduction to the uses of scenes in creative nonfiction writing. Participants will have an opportunity to create a new scene of their own. 

Then “together, we’ll enact sample scenes to experience what dialogue sounds like read aloud and what narrated movements look like in real time and space,” she added. “We will think together about when and where to use scenes in creative nonfiction and leave with a new or renewed attunement to the craft function of scene.”

There’s also Writing Parenthood, from 10:30 to noon Saturday, April 18, at Flowing Wells Library.

“Parenthood is a radical experience that often comes with huge shifts in identity, lifeways, and our understandings of what it means to be alive, in community, raising humans,” Steines said. “As writers, we come to the page to process, analyze, and make meaning of our experiences, and yet parenthood (certainly early parenthood) leaves little room for the kind of reflection that literary work demands.

“This generative seminar will serve as a space to consider where your work as a writer and your life as a parent intersect. We will think together about how to work with these intersections, considering where they make the work more challenging and what we can do to navigate those challenges, as well as where they make the work richer and what we can do to pull from that well.”

For information on Margo Steines, visit margosteines.com. 

Pima County Library Writer in Residence

WHEN: 10 a.m. to noon Tuesdays through April 28, and 10 a.m. to noon Wednesdays through April 29

WHERE: Flowing Wells Library, 1730 W. Wetmore Road

COST: Consultation appointments and workshops are free
INFO: bit.ly/4r8wBEk