This piece is a reprint. It was originally published in Just Write! Porto Substack on October 23, 2025.
For two years, the Porto Writers’ Workshop has been a Sunday sanctuary for writers seeking community, feedback, and creative growth. What started as a chance meeting at a Just Write! Wednesday Night meetup has blossomed into a thriving space where poets, memoirists, songwriters, and storytellers of all levels come together to share their work and sharpen their craft.
In this month’s Member Spotlight, we sit down with Lucianna Chixaro Ramos, the workshop’s founder and facilitator, to discuss the power of feedback, the importance of creative community, and why every writer—especially new ones—deserves to be heard. Her insights challenge the intimidating workshop stereotypes we’ve seen on TV and offer a refreshing vision of what constructive critique can really look like.
JK: Tell us about yourself and how the Sunday Workshop got started. What made you want to create a weekly writing feedback group?
LR: I’m a poet and creative nonfiction writer currently working on a memoir about violence against women and the justice system in the US. I moved to Porto in 2022, and I was feeling very disconnected from my writing community back in Florida. Then I got lucky—the very first time I attended one of the Just Write! Wednesday Night meetups, I met Hiten Chojer, who has been my collaborator for the two years that the Porto Writers’ Workshop has been running. (Although he is now moving to Madrid—you will be missed, Hiten!)
Hiten is also a multi-genre writer, so we had the idea to create a space that would support our need for community and feedback as we work on longer-term projects. The workshop is deliberately designed to upend some of the exclusionary practices I encountered during my 10+ years of attending writing groups in institutional and informal settings—like, for example, not being able to speak while your work is being critiqued! The goal was to make it accessible and supportive for writers of all genres, levels, and backgrounds. We wanted to flatten the traditional workshop hierarchy—everyone’s work and ideas are given equal importance.
JK: Walk us through what happens during a typical Sunday session. How does the workshop actually work?
LR: A typical Sunday workshop starts with a generative writing exercise I create for the session. Using the exercise, we write together for 10 – 15 minutes and then discuss what the prompt brought up for us. Some writers share their responses. The idea is to generate new work and forge a deeper connection with each other before we move to the feedback portion of the workshop. Then, we give and receive feedback on our works-in-progress. Each writer gets equal time to get feedback on their piece. At the end of each workshop, I send a list of texts, theories, and themes discussed to our WhatsApp community, in case it’s of use to the group-at-large.
JK: Why do you think so many writers are terrified of getting feedback on their work?
LR: I think this has to do with a number of factors. Part of it is how writers and writing workshops are portrayed in the media. Think back to You—during the first season of the show, Beck, the first love interest, attends MFA workshops with all the usual stereotypes. It’s a competitive and pretentious space, which lends itself to some funny scenes, but it’s not the reality of all workshop spaces.
Another factor is that, as creatives, we often identify very closely with our creative output. Writing—and all creating, really—is necessarily an emotional process. A negative critique of your piece can sometimes feel like a critique of your sense of self. That’s why it’s so important to learn not only how to give feedback, but also to receive it. To me, it’s an integral part of being a writer or any creative who has audience-facing work.
JK: Why is embracing feedback—rather than avoiding it—so important for writers?
LR: Giving and receiving feedback in a supportive way isn’t just essential to improving our craft. It’s an important life skill. Sometimes, the pieces submitted bring about difficult discussions on ethics, politics, or moral questions. It’s vital for us to keep having these open discussions in spaces where we can respectfully disagree. Feedback makes these discussions possible, and the workshop creates a space where it’s safe to express different views.
Another, simpler reason to embrace feedback is that sooner or later, every writer is going to receive a critique. Whether it’s from a happy reader, a nitpicky editor, or an inflammatory comments section, it’s good to foresee potential reactions to our work and learn how to respond in a non-reactive way. I believe very strongly in the principles of nonviolent communication, and I see the workshop not only as a place to improve our writing skills, but also the ways in which we communicate with each other.
JK: How do you make sure feedback in your workshop stays constructive and supportive rather than harsh or discouraging?
LR: Every participant has access to our workshop guidelines, which include tips for providing feedback. The four pillars of giving great feedback are simple: 1) stick to the writing, 2) read the work, 3) recognize that we are all individual readers, and 4) communicate your needs clearly.
I always try to remind the participants that part of the writing journey is knowing which critiques to incorporate in your work and which to discard. Not everyone will understand your project or process, but having access to different points of view is critical to understanding the reception of our work. It also helps to build confidence in our own vision. I also think modeling safe and supportive language sets the expectation that all participants will respond in kind.
JK: Can you share a story about a participant whose writing or confidence grew through the workshop?
LR: There are so many! I want to start by saying I can’t claim their progress. At the end of the day, they are the ones doing the work—I can only provide guidance and encouragement. One participant that comes to mind is someone who is extremely well established in their field and writes deeply thoughtful pieces that explore how capitalism and globalization affect our individual human experience. Despite their success outside of writing, they had no publishing experience. Once, they mentioned to me they were hesitant to share their work for fear that it wasn’t “interesting” enough. Imagine! It has been lovely to see their confidence grow over the year that they have attended. They are now interested in submitting to magazines.
A very cool example is Lex, who is primarily a songwriter. She started composing and playing guitar and piano as an adult. Every so often, she brings us new lyrics, and we get to hear the sketch of the composition. It has been fascinating to see her take our feedback and the initial sketch for the piece and turn it into fully produced songs. You can check out her music on Spotify.
JK: What would you say to new writers, especially those who are hesitant about joining a workshop?
LR: My advice to new writers is to remember that your voice matters. People say they write for a hundred different reasons, but what it comes down to is that we write because we have something to say. You deserve to be heard even if you’re new to this, even if you have no publications (or if that’s not your end goal), and if what you write comes from a place of joy or catharsis. Your feedback and your work are still important.
For writers on the fence about joining a workshop, I encourage you to try different formats until you find one that works for you. No one group is the best fit for every writer, but with a little effort, you can find one that matches your needs.
JK: After two years of running these workshops, what’s been the most rewarding part for you?
LR: Creating community: that’s the most rewarding part of hosting the workshops for me. Since the beginning of my career, I have always dedicated a part of my time to creating opportunities for writers. In graduate school, I created editorships for each genre our literary magazine published, so that younger writers could gain experience. I’ve now also partnered with another writer whom I met through the workshop group to create Entrelinhas, a weekend writing retreat that focuses heavily on community and fostering connections between writers.
On a deeper level, I see so much need for moments of face-to-face connection and understanding. When we meet, we laugh, we hone our writing and communication skills, and occasionally, when a piece is very moving, there are misty eyes in the mix. But more importantly, we support each other, celebrate our successes, and hold space for conversations that can be hard. I think the real value of the workshop can’t be measured in publications—although we’ve had plenty of those—it is the relationships and friendships built through it.
