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Summer Writing Camp
This is a five-week multilevel group course that covers five types of writing and focuses on strengthening five different skill sets. We cover poetry, short story, fiction genres, creative nonfiction, and memoir. It’s $250 for the course. Recordings will be available if you miss a live session.
During the course, you get:
-a two-hour in-person live Zoom session
-a one-hour weekly group silent writing / Q&A Zoom
-feedback from your course facilitator and your peers
-the opportunity to read others’ writing
-new cool writer friends
-a community and network of peer writers
About the course:
This is a course that takes the gate-keepers off of what it means to be a writer and that allows you to explore. It’s Socratic meaning what you think and feel matters. For me, there are no right or wrongs answers, and the more openly curious we are about what could be instead of what we think should be, the more we expand as writers. As a course designer and former professor at the University of South Alabama, I have cultivated a passion for helping people discover their inner artistic genius and creativity. As a professional writer and editor and publisher, I can say that I’m passionate about helping people set themselves free creatively. I work incredibly well with beginners, so if you’re not sure if this is a good investment for your time, send me a message through the contact us form on the About page with your questions. I’m happy to answer questions.
Class descriptions
June 29: Poetry
The poetry course will describe and provide opportunity during the class to play with different poetic styles that are highly approachable such as the villanova, haibun, limerick, haiku, rhyme schemes, and, of course, prose. Strong word choices and brevity will be the focus of the class this week.
July 6, Short Story
In writing short story, we examine what the requisite components of a short story and a story in general are. We discuss how short stories are essentially the chapters that comprise a book but with a larger thematic scope. The short story course skills we will focus on are organization and structure.
July 13 Writing genres (fiction)
This course will take what we’ve covered in terms of writing description and organization and structure and will cover the various genres you can write in. This will include larger containers like fiction and nonfiction but will break them down into their smaller components. You’ll learn the nuances of what is required in romance, sci-fi, historical fiction, adventure, mystery, speculative, psychological thriller, contemporary, upmarket, and literary (yes, I would argue literary is a genre, despite it wanting to be its own container). You will get specialized support in writing a short story in a genre of your choosing as part of this week. The skill we will focus on is plotting.
July 22, Creative Nonfiction
This multi-level offering will start with the personal essay—the nonfiction essay. Learn what a nonfiction essay is, what one should contain, and practice writing one throughout the week. The skill we focus on developing is description.
July 27, Memoir
Memoir is a descriptive personal story that makes you both narrator and protagonist of your story. How do we approach memoir? What are the different types of memoir? What is legal in memoir? So many questions and more are answered during this course, and you will be able to amalgamate this five week course into one impacting endeavor—tell a story about a scene from your life. Prompts are provided for guidance, and instructor feedback is available throughout the week. This week the focus will be on the subjectivity of truth and the reality of when we tell ours, the ink bleeds yellow.
This is a five-week multilevel group course that covers five types of writing and focuses on strengthening five different skill sets. We cover poetry, short story, fiction genres, creative nonfiction, and memoir. It’s $250 for the course. Recordings will be available if you miss a live session.
During the course, you get:
-a two-hour in-person live Zoom session
-a one-hour weekly group silent writing / Q&A Zoom
-feedback from your course facilitator and your peers
-the opportunity to read others’ writing
-new cool writer friends
-a community and network of peer writers
About the course:
This is a course that takes the gate-keepers off of what it means to be a writer and that allows you to explore. It’s Socratic meaning what you think and feel matters. For me, there are no right or wrongs answers, and the more openly curious we are about what could be instead of what we think should be, the more we expand as writers. As a course designer and former professor at the University of South Alabama, I have cultivated a passion for helping people discover their inner artistic genius and creativity. As a professional writer and editor and publisher, I can say that I’m passionate about helping people set themselves free creatively. I work incredibly well with beginners, so if you’re not sure if this is a good investment for your time, send me a message through the contact us form on the About page with your questions. I’m happy to answer questions.
Class descriptions
June 29: Poetry
The poetry course will describe and provide opportunity during the class to play with different poetic styles that are highly approachable such as the villanova, haibun, limerick, haiku, rhyme schemes, and, of course, prose. Strong word choices and brevity will be the focus of the class this week.
July 6, Short Story
In writing short story, we examine what the requisite components of a short story and a story in general are. We discuss how short stories are essentially the chapters that comprise a book but with a larger thematic scope. The short story course skills we will focus on are organization and structure.
July 13 Writing genres (fiction)
This course will take what we’ve covered in terms of writing description and organization and structure and will cover the various genres you can write in. This will include larger containers like fiction and nonfiction but will break them down into their smaller components. You’ll learn the nuances of what is required in romance, sci-fi, historical fiction, adventure, mystery, speculative, psychological thriller, contemporary, upmarket, and literary (yes, I would argue literary is a genre, despite it wanting to be its own container). You will get specialized support in writing a short story in a genre of your choosing as part of this week. The skill we will focus on is plotting.
July 22, Creative Nonfiction
This multi-level offering will start with the personal essay—the nonfiction essay. Learn what a nonfiction essay is, what one should contain, and practice writing one throughout the week. The skill we focus on developing is description.
July 27, Memoir
Memoir is a descriptive personal story that makes you both narrator and protagonist of your story. How do we approach memoir? What are the different types of memoir? What is legal in memoir? So many questions and more are answered during this course, and you will be able to amalgamate this five week course into one impacting endeavor—tell a story about a scene from your life. Prompts are provided for guidance, and instructor feedback is available throughout the week. This week the focus will be on the subjectivity of truth and the reality of when we tell ours, the ink bleeds yellow.