Annette McGivney

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Brick by Brick: How to build an engaging narrative
Taking on a large writing project without first figuring out your narrative structure can be like embarking on a road trip without a destination in mind. In this workshop we will get down to the nuts and bolts of building a narrative structure that creates a solid scaffolding for any fiction or nonfiction genre. We will discuss the difference between a story topic and the narrative engine that drives a story. We will also explore character development, pacing, scene setting and adhering to a simple outline. The workshop will include hands-on exercises analyzing structure and applying these principles to your own work.

Wild Words: Writing about our relationship with Mother Earth
Whether it is describing a beautiful sunset or our life-long attachment to a certain forest, finding the right words to capture the awesomeness of the natural world is challenging. In this workshop, we will explore various ways to write about a landscape, outdoor experiences and spiritual or emotional connections to wild places. How do you make the reader feel like they are watching the sunset with you? Can you get the reader to love a patch of land as much as you do? We will spend time outside, experimenting with various techniques and attempting to paint a picture with words.

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Wendy J. Fox

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He Said / She Said: Writing Dialogue
Dialogue can help propel a manuscript forward, give insight into character, and create movement on the page—or it can fall awfully flat as filler. In this workshop, we’ll look at some sample sections of successful dialogue that lend insights into the quirks of the people inside of a story and simultaneously advance plot. We’ll also work on our own sections of dialogue writing in a generative workshop. Participants should come away with a stronger sense of how to better use this aspect of storytelling.

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Short Stories:

What makes a good short story? And, what are short stories for? In this workshop, we will look at a brief example story and examine elements like style, voice, character, and narrative. In addition, we will discuss how both emerging and established writers can use short fiction to advance their writing. Finally, we will take these ideas to our own pages and write, beginning to craft a draft.

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Monica Barron

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​Scaffolding a poem

Scaffolding is a practice (and you can do this in any genre—I’m using poetry) in which genre knowledge is applied to words, sounds, phrases, lines, breath, and emotions and/or ideas to discover a shape for the writing (the poem in my case). As a consequence of attempting that, if you like what you discover, you keep it. If you don’t, you discard your attempt and ask yourself what else you know about poetry (or fiction, or nonfiction) that could help the poem (fiction or nonfiction) develop.

Note-Booking for Peace
This session is a turning of our attention toward peace in our lives. The key tool in our work is the notebook—this is a massive umbrella term for how and where you collect and remember the stuff of your life. Makers (or artists if you prefer that term) often draw on materials stored in the notebook. We will also do a mapping exercise, envisioning where the peace is in our lives. And then, time permitting, we will start imagining a piece, a work, that represents or explores
peace in your life or in the life of an imagined other. The two writers leading this session are both writers and editors of a digital publication called wordpeace.

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Lisa C. Taylor

She Did What? Surprise in Fiction

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Tension is everything to a story. When characters go through predictable paces, readers lose interest quickly. My goal is to take you on an immersive journey into the element of surprise in your writing— so that it not only works, but it will also transform your story or creative nonfiction, keeping your reader with you for the entire bumpy ride. You will leave with new ideas for writing or revising existing stories.

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Freeze the Moment: Using a Freeze Frame Technique in Poetry and Prose

We will discuss and practice the technique of freezing a frame in your poem and story to slow down movement. It can become a pivotal moment that sends your reader somewhere unexpected. As you become a dispassionate observer, your writing will unfold in a cinematic way. You can write about a landscape, people, or just eavesdrop on a sleepy town.

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