“Dancing with delight words of inspiration come out to play singing as Dawn’s light lets them spread their wings and fly.”
Myfanwy is a lover of words, their beauty and power. She is fascinated by the creative art of transforming thoughts and ideas into stories that entertain, comfort, inform or inspire.
She is a teacher, mentor and a prize winning short fiction writer. Over the past 15 years she has written and taught themed creative writing. This includes historical, romantic and crime fiction, time slip, science fiction and fantasy, poetry, using words effectively, moneyless marketing and transforming ‘Art into Words, Words into Art’. She has run workshops in venues as diverse as Blenheim Palace, Oxford City Museum, hospitals (Historical Fiction for University Medical students) and a park where she also performed a sports themed rap ‘Glastonbury style’.
Her workshops are designed to provide the opportunity and encouragement for ‘budding’ writers to achieve their creative objectives and aspirations; to widen their knowledge of the art of creative writing and to ‘stretch the boundaries of their imagination’.
All of the participants on a recent workshop agreed that it was an ‘excellent session’ and each then added how they felt they had benefited personally in the two hour session. Their achievements included ‘firing up their creativity’ and coming away ‘full of inspiring ideas’.
The approach she takes to writing is a practical one. Myfanwy is dedicated to providing writers with the opportunity to practise and experiment with the range of skills. These are tailored to the type of fiction and creative writing that they would like to master. She also encourages them to enjoy writing and become more confident in their own potential. To achieve this she uses structured activities and tasks, which provide a safe framework for them to progress towards their own goals. This has led her to pioneer and compile a range of community based and themed anthologies.
She is also a champion of the significance of local history and how it can be used to encourage community awareness through the medium of historical fiction writing.
Myfanwy enjoys acting as one of the features editors of the Historical Novels Society Review magazine (www.historicalnovelsociety.org). She has written commissioned articles on the craft of writing and has had over 120 stories published in the UK and Australia including historical and romantic fiction. Myfanwy has also had stories broadcast by the BBC and is the author of ‘Historical Fiction Writing – A practical guide and tool-kit’ written with the generous assistance of the
well-known authors Bernard Knight, Bernard Cornwall, Michael Jecks and 50 other amazingly talented contributors from the UK, USA, Australia and New Zealand.
Information about new workshops will be posted on this site and tweeted on https://twitter.com/MyfanwyCook . Please do contact Myfanwy if you are interested in her designing a workshop for your writing group, organisation or friends.
“I learned more than I ever could dream of, and I enjoyed every minute of the time we spent together.” Marit Christina Lie, Norwegian television journalist.
“Myfanwy is excellent. This is the second workshop I have attended and she is clearly skilled in multiple genres. This was well planned and well executed.”(N.T.)
“Excellent and engaging session, excellent resources available to do practical exercises”
(Year 4, Medical Student)
“Sheer enjoyment!” (Wendy B.)
