A FINE-TUNED ENGINE (Prose Magic)

Catherine McLean

Learn the secrets, tips, and tricks to cutting words, tightening prose, and staying within word counts and page limits.

NOTE – To practice the techniques covered, please bring three hard copy pages of a work in progress, double spaced, 1" margins all around, the widow-orphans feature turned off, and three highlighters (yellow, blue, and pink).

AVOIDING DEAD ENDS (Advice from Published Authors)

Fritze Roberts

A panel discussion hosted by Fritze, answering your questions about the road to publication and what advice published authors wish they’d had when they first got started writing.

BACK TO THE GARAGE (Inserting Backstory Elements)

Catherine McLean

Flashbacks, recalls, remembrances, recollections–how not to stop the story's flow and still get in the necessary back-story elements.

BRIDGES (Stage Playwriting: From Page to Stage)

Debra R. Sanchez

Is it time to cross the bridge from a basic text to a stage-script?
Can your short story work as a play?
What about your poem? Your novel?

Writing for the STAGE is not the same as writing for the PAGE. It is also not the same as writing for the SCREEN.

This workshop will focus on basic principles of writing for live stage performance:

• Elements of a Play
  • Character Development
  • Dialogue and Monologue
  • Setting
  • Stage Action/Directions
• Formatting
• Markets

Workshop includes hands on exercises, if time permits.

CARE FOR YOUR KIDDIE CAR (Writing for Children)

Janyce Brawn

We spot the kiddie car we want to ride. Will it support our ideas? Can we make its vocabulary accessible for the age or grade we want to reach? What special tools do we need to make it zoom with delight and joy for young readers? In this workshop, we will discuss why we need to write engaging stories for children and what makes a children’s book a favorite for many generations. We will talk about how to craft a story after you’ve found that nugget of an idea and what vocabulary is appropriate for their ages. Writing short and tight but still conveying all the necessary meaning is critical. The story may be for children, but we can have a richer and a deeper meaning for adults who may read it to a child. We will discuss the various kinds of children’s books for different age levels and how to have exciting page turns, by adding tension or danger to keep the reader hooked into the story. Thumbnails, story boards and book dummies and how to send a manuscript to an agent or publisher will be discussed. There will be a question-and-answer time at the end and a handout will be available at that time. Let your kiddie car zoom ahead with joy!

CHANGE THE FLUIDS (Getting the Craft into Your Paragraph)

Timons Esaias

The paragraph is the basic unit of fiction writing, and we rarely teach it. This will be a discussion on how paragraphs work, and how to ensure they actually do something other than keep the header and footer apart. Will include The Unwritten Rule: Avoiding the Stomp, and malt balls. Will also involve simple exercises for getting various things (conflict, plot, characterization) onto the page.

[Please bring 6-8 non-consecutive, non-dialogue, paragraphs of your own, four sentences or more each, to work on.]

CHATTING WITH FELLOW TRAVELERS (Writing Dialog that Shines)

Mary Sutton

Good dialog brings power to your story and engages readers. This course will show you how to write strong, realistic dialog that sounds like real people - without all the annoying “real dialog” traits.

FROM ATLAS TO GPS (Word Choice Matters)

Janet L. Pierce, Ph.D.

Come and explore the various types of words used in Historical Fiction and other genres. The careful use of accurate, time-appropriate language draws readers into your story, while an excess of idioms and expressions can turn into incomprehensible gibberish, much like Jabberwocky. Conversely, too little appropriate language leaves us with a blank slate for the time period.

Participants will examine words that people used in the past and what they may or may not mean today. We will play a game to discover just how much we know about different words from various time periods and their real meanings (and how they can be applied today). We will discuss the balance of using age-old expressions—what constitutes too much and too little. Participants will share their experiences in selecting vocabulary relevant to their time periods in their novels. By the end, writers of all levels will gain a deeper understanding of the complexity of word choice and its impact on our stories.

A handout featuring resources for checking vocabulary will be provided at the conclusion of the session.

WRT #13 BONUS: FUELING OUR ENGINES (Thinking Outside of the Box: Stoking the Fires of Your Imagination)

Janyce Brawn

How do we stimulate our creativity? Actor and comedian John Cleese says, “We must Play!” Today we will fuel our engines with a variety of activities to just play. We all imagine differently. How do you express and explore your imagination to further your creative projects? In this workshop we will do a series of activities to consider what we see, touch, smell, taste and hear to stoke the fires of our imagination. By thinking outside of the box and using our 5 senses with various techniques we will investigate, for instance, how the taste of a sour lemon and the smell of peppermint can enhance our creativity. We will find that the feelings we have for certain types of music can increase our focus and boost our openness to generating new ideas and becoming more creative. In any art form you need negatives and positives for conflict to make a complete work. So, building spatial awareness through drawing negative spaces can foster imagination and creativity and help us imagine how the negative elements such as heartache, loss and hurt in our writing can create a more dimensional character. Imagining “what if” when we use word cubes, or a dictionary allows our imaginations to expand in a fun new way too. Art, music, and literature have always gone hand in hand and today we can play and explore how this works. At the end, participants will have new strategies to stoke their creative fires as they move forward in their future writing. A handout will be provided at the end of the workshop.

PLANNING TRIP TIME (Time Management for Writers)

Mary Sutton

We all get the same amount of time in our day. How can you fit writing into an already busy schedule? Learn some practical tips that will help you achieve your writing goals.

PORTALS 101: Doorways Through Space And Time From "Alice Through The Looking Glass" To "Stargate SG1" (Portal Writing)

Chuck Kienzle

We are all familiar with doorways. A step through the door from a bedroom to a bathroom takes us into a different space. The exit from a building takes us into the outside world.

Portals are plot devices in fiction that do the same. They allow characters to step from one world into Wonderland, Narnia, other planets, and other time periods.

This workshop will present examples of how portals have been used in mythology, fantasy, science fiction, romance, horror, manga, and other genres.

Each attendee will learn rules for how portals are created and controlled. After a time for discussion and answering questions, the participants will be given time to write an example of how portals could be used in their writing. Afterward, they will present their examples to the group and have a better idea of how to use portals to expand their stories.

A handout with examples and the rules will be given.

PUT THE TUNES ON (Writing Poetry for the Genre Markets: Mystery, Horror, Fantasy, SF, & More)

Timons Esaias

One of the easiest paths to publication is poetry written for the genre magazines and markets. Those markets are also more likely to pay, more likely to accept humor, and (if you’re still a fan of rhyme) more open to rhyme and form. Did we mention that there’s also an eager, enthusiastic audience?

The range of topics is so wide, that Timons’s mantra is: You Can Try Anything In Genre Poetry. It’s a great playground. Come join the fun.

ROAD SIGNS (Recognizing Road Signs of the Past in Historical Fiction Writing)

Janet L. Pierce, Ph.D.

The GPS of Historical Writing for your time period relies on accurate research in order for the writer to arrive at the story’s destination. Road signs guide a driver along the way. In this workshop writers will examine how to use the road signs of the past and present to accurately describe and label characters, actions, and settings on their writing journey. Signposts of world building such as the culture and geography of the time-period will help writers figure out how to be authentic as well as sensitive in their writing. After each concept, participants will pair with others to discuss applying the workshop ideas to their own writing journey. Then we will share this information as a group. A road map handout will be provided. This workshop is for novice to experienced writers of historical fiction. Participants are encouraged to bring their laptops to the session and examine their own WIPs through the lens of ideas presented. My power point will include internet sites and writing examples for discussion.

STUDYING THE ROADMAP (Learning the Craft of Writing Through Reading)

Fritze Roberts

“If you want to be an author, you have to be a reader.” And “To get published, you should know your genre.” You’ve probably heard these pieces of advice. But not every avid reader becomes a good writer in their favorite genre. So, what’s an aspiring author to do?

In this workshop we’ll discuss how to read like a writer. What questions to ask, what to pay attention to, and which books to read. You’ll learn to look at tropes, structure, language, and more. Analyze your favorite books to learn how it’s done.

WHERE AM I? (Discover the Map to World Building for Different Genres)

Janet L. Pierce, Ph.D., Chuck Kienzle, and Janyce Brawn

Does Geography overwhelm you? Do you ever forget landmarks, or lose your way? In this hands-on workshop participants will be given a road map (handout) that illustrates eight signposts of World Building. The PowerPoint presentation will provide examples for the driver to follow. Then each person will apply what they’ve learned to their own work in progress. This will enable the writers to create a world that is believable and engages readers. A Q & A at the DMV will help the drivers put their pedal to the metal and surge ahead to writing success.