From Reluctant Author to Movie Deal with Geri Spieler Sometimes the project chooses you! “How did I get here?” Geri Spieler asked herself as she reminisced about her writer’s journey. “I never wanted to write books, and especially a book about Sara Jane Moore, the middle-aged mother and doctor’s wife who shot at President Ford […]
A Literary Agent’s Guide to Sharpening Your Manuscript, with Elizabeth Kracht The bad news: even really good manuscripts have weak spots that can be sufficient to garner rejections from agents and publishers. The good news: most of these problems are easy to fix—once the writer knows how to identify them. Over her career, literary agent […]
The Magic of Fantasy with Eric Witchey Prior to the mid-twentieth century, fantasy had been viewed as the domain of children, not adults. J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings forever transformed public perception. For the first time, fantasy could be considered serious literature, its masterworks on par with the classics of any other genre. […]
April 11 7PM : Writing for Younger Readers: The Art of Edutainment with Two-Time Emmy Winner, Sindy McKay-Swerdlove Apr 4, 2022 | Speaker, Writing Children. Young adult. These rank among the most lucrative genres in today’s competitive market. But although they are easier to read, they’re not necessarily easier to write. Crafting a compelling and […]
You Can Be a Winning Writer with Joan Gelfand Craft, Commitment. Community. Confidence. Winning writers draw upon all four. Praised as “the clearest roadmap to success,” the four Cs system has yielded spectacular results for CEOs and doctors, college professors and MFAs, playwrights, and poets. For over ten years, Joan Gelfand has presented the four […]
June 13 7PM : The Art and Craft of Writing your Memoir with Linda Joy Myers Memoir writers struggle with two things: how much truth to tell and how to structure their story. We’ll tackle both of these issues as we look at the art—and heart—of writing a memoir. This month’s speaker, Linda Joy Myers, […]
“Series and Series Identity in Popular Fiction: Why to Consider Writing a Series,” with Ross Browne Your odds of successful publication can improve considerably if your novel is conceived as (or has the potential to work as) a series. This is no surprise to anyone who enjoys settling down with a new book in a […]
Crafting Short Stories, With a Focus on Journal/Contest Submissions, with Brent van Staalduinen A short story is the epitome of literary economy. Less is more. Edgar Allen Poe once wrote, “A short story must have a single mood and every sentence must build towards it.” No room for fluff or filler. Just pure narrative propulsion that […]
October 10th 7PM : “Revision, Transformation, and Success,” with Jennifer Givhan Sep 28, 2022 | Event, Speaker, Writing Hollywood has portrayed Mozart as a creative freak who dashed off perfect first drafts. This is a myth. His compositions underwent extensive revisions prior to performances. As Orison Swett Marden points out, “Great writers have ever been known […]
Nov 14 at 7PM: “Crash Course on Writing a Mystery” with Hallie Ephron by Tatyana Grinenko | Oct 23, 2022 | Speaker, Writing Nothing hooks a reader like a masterfully written mystery. Anthony Horowitz has observed, “As far as I’m concerned, you can’t beat a good whodunnit: the twists and turns, the clues and the […]
Powerful Plotting Workshop : Jan 28, 2023 from 9:00AM-2:30PM by Tatyana Grinenko | Dec 13, 2022 | Workshop, Writing Powerful Plotting Workshop with Jordan Rosenfeld Getting down the bones or “architecture” of plot is an essential part of writing a compelling story. You may know where you want the story to go, but getting there […]
March 11th at 10AM: “Subplots, Complications, and Secondary Characters” with Martha Conway Feb 23, 2023 | Speaker, Writing When your characters stop talking to you and start talking to each other, your writing is going well. When a subplot neatly links back into the main narrative in a way you couldn’t anticipate, your writing is […]
April 8th at 10AM: “Imaginative Realms: The Authentic in the Fantastical” with Keith Ekiss by Tatyana Grinenko | Mar 18, 2023 | Speaker, Writing Many of our literary classics were in fact written as genre fiction for the masses. Examples include Bram Stoker’s Dracula (horror), H.G. Wells’s The Time Machine (science fiction), J.R.R. Tolkien’s The […]
May 13th at 10AM: “Riveting Array of Character Quirks & Foibles” with Ellen Kirschman, Mystery Author & Clinical Psychologist Apr 24, 2023 | Event, Speaker, Writing Stan Lee, the pioneering writer of Marvel Comics, achieved unparalleled success by merging classical mythology with modern psychology, featuring heroes whose god-like powers were balanced by their all-too-relatable human […]
June 12th at 6:30PM : “Creative Book Launches that Draw an Audience,” with Isidra Mencos May 26, 2023 | Speaker, Writing What if you held a book launch and nobody came? It has happened quite often, even to authors who are now household names. Margaret Atwood drily recounts, “I did a signing to which nobody […]