If you can't go to a writers' workshop, at least you can get some of the advice. William Ketter, Tom French, Sebastian Junger and others share their tips for top storytelling at Poynter. My favorites:

The inverted pyramid lead on a story of more than three paragraphs is an "instrument of Satan," and "formulaic" fourth paragraph nut graphs are overrated.

To "convey the vividness of the world ... quote people talking the way they talk."

To get your voice into any story, find one thing -- a detail, a quote, a paragraph, a metaphor, a transition -- that pleases you.