Workshops
There are no available registration dates at this time.
NOTE: This class will be held in a live, online format using the Zoom Platform
Class meets Mondays 5-7pm ET for six sessions (Apr 5th, Apr 12th, Apr 19th, Apr 26th, May 3rd, May 10th)
There will also be One-on-one sessions with the instructor
Inspiration? You have to get that on your own. But the nuts and bolts of craft——such as how to use setting, how to create characters, how to guide the plot, and how to make vibrant dialogue—well, that I can teach you. In this course, we’ll study six points of craft, from setting to dialogue, from pacing to character. We’ll look at published short stories and novel excerpts, and examine why they work (or don’t). In each session we’ll also have time for a short writing exercise, which you can choose to read aloud to the group or not. This won’t be a workshop—we won’t be reading and critiquing students’ writing—but you’re welcome to bring in questions and even short selections from your work that pertain to the craft point of that week.
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Instructor: Sarah Van Arsdale
Sarah Van Arsdale’s sixth book, a poetry collection, was published by Finishing Line Press in October 2021. She is the author of four books of fiction and a single book-length poem, titled The Catamount (Nomadic Press, 2017), illustrated with her watercolors. Her fourth book of fiction, a collection of novellas titled In Case of Emergency, Break Glass, was published by Queens Ferry Press in 2016. Her third novel, Grand Isle, was published by SUNY Press in 2012. Her second, Blue, winner of the 2002 Peter Taylor Prize for the Novel, was published by the University of Tennessee Press in 2003, and her first, Toward Amnesia, was published in 1996 by Riverhead Books.