Hi everyone,
Please forgive this brief break from our regularly scheduled programming! I’m so thrilled to announce that I have 3 brand new classes that I’ll be teaching over the next two months:
All of them are one-day generative seminars ranging from 1 to 2.5 hours, taught on weekends for maximum accessibility. More details on each specific class below.
Every single time I have taught the book proposal class, numerous students have asked for a query letter writing workshop.
Here you go!
If you're ready to query agents but aren't sure how to begin, this is the class for you. In this 1 hour seminar, we'll break down that most intimidating of documents, the query letter, paragraph by paragraph so that you can tackle it with ease. By the end of class, with the help of generative prompts, you'll already have a letter that is a work in progress.
Please note that this seminar is for nonfiction writers only.
Sunday, May 28th, 1-2pm Eastern.
Is it feeling increasingly difficult to contain your memoir project to one genre? Can you not help but reach for cultural criticism and historical citations, or are you a journalist struggling to suppress the urge to report out certain aspects of your book? It sounds like you've got a hybrid, or blended, memoir on your hands.
In this 2 hour class, we'll establish what, exactly, makes a hybrid memoir, in language that will help define your project for agents and editors. We'll discuss how to structure the sprawl, and look at memoirists who get the blend just right. By the end of class, you'll have the template you need to both articulate and sell your project, as well as the narrative techniques you need to move forward with confidence.
Sunday, June 11th, 1-3 pm Eastern.
How do we give ourselves permission to tell the untellable? "Truth" is one of the most impossible concepts to reckon with in a story, and it is a question of both craft and ethic. In this class, we'll discuss how memory works, but also how group think, generational, and societal dynamics shape and impact not only a narrative, but a self.
We'll examine the texts of memoirists who've tackled this question like Melissa Febos and Maxine Hong Kingston, and also consider theoretical frameworks that help us reckon with hauntings and ghosts. Trauma-informed generative writing prompts will help us explore our own past family dynamics and self-limiting beliefs.
This class is both a container and a permission slip for those writing their way through the underworld of their own stories.
Sunday, June 18th, 1-3:30pm Eastern.
I hope to see you there!