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The North Carolina Writers' Network has announced its 2021-2022 Online Series, featuring noted authors and talented teachers from North Carolina and beyond. This annual, virtual series offers a class in October and then one class per month, December-March.
Registration will open on a class-by-class basis. The cost is $35 per class for NCWN members, $55 per class for non-members. Space is limited.
October's class will be led by NCWN Trustee Katie Winkler. "The Big Share: Alternative Forms of Publication in a Digital Age" (Multigenre) will discuss some of the non-traditional publishing avenues available to writers, such as podcasting, blogging, editing literary journals, producing performances, and more—outlets that keep writers engaged with their communities without costing too much.
Michael Zapata, author of the novel The Lost Book of Adana Moreau, named a Best Book of the Year by NPR and the A.V. Club, among others, will lead December's online class, "At the Beginning of the World: Writing Historical Fiction" (Fiction). How do you fill a past world with a story that may or may not have happened? We’ll discuss research practices (how much is enough?), worldbuilding, fact vs. fiction, and realist vs. experimental approaches.
Travis Rountree, an Assistant Professor of English at Appalachian State University, will lead the online class in January, "Writing through Memory: Exploring Places and Spaces of Public Memory." Dr. Rountree's research interests include queer archival research and pedagogy, Appalachian rhetorics, place-based pedagogy, and public memory studies. His book is forthcoming from University of Kentucky Press: Hard to See through the Smoke: Rhetorical Remembering of the 1912 Hillsville, Virginia Courthouse Shootout.
In February, NCWN will once again host an open-forum Q&A on the subject of publishing. Kristina Marie Darling, Editor-in-Chief of Tupelo Press and Tupelo Quarterly, will talk briefly on small press publishing and the world of literary journals, and then take questions from participants over the course of ninety casual, conversational minutes. Kristina also is a poet, essayist, and critic.
Jennifer Givhan's "Subverting Expectations: Stranger Things, Duende, & Writing into the Upside Down" (Poetry) will wrap up the 2021-2022 series in March. In this generative workshop, writers will pen poems that subvert expectations and locate and (re)create maps to the underbellies, to the duende world where madness and abandon often eclipse logic and where, as Tracy K. Smith writes, “skill is only useful to the extent that it adds courage and agility to intuition.” Jennifer's honors include a 2015 National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship and a PEN/Rosenthal Emerging Voices Fellowship.
"Thanks to all of you who provided us with wonderful conferences and Zoom opportunities during this crazy COVID year," says NCWN member and frequent online class participant Marla Dunham. "It was a great inspiration and also fun to connect with writers all across the state, and I have managed to make a new friend as a result."
The online series is available to anyone with an internet connection, or who even owns just a telephone. Each class is video archived and made available to registrants for repeated viewings.
Watch www.ncwriters.org and our social media channels for registration information.
The nonprofit North Carolina Writers’ Network is the state’s oldest and largest literary arts services organization devoted to writers at all stages of development. For additional information, visit www.ncwriters.org.
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The North Carolina Writers' Network encourages the serious pursuit of writing excellence. But that doesn't mean we can't have serious fun.
On Thursday, August 12, at 7:00 pm EST, NCWN will host its first-ever online Game Night.
This event is free, but space is limited. Register here.
Game Night will function as a progressive night of entertainment. Writers will be randomly assigned to a game room and switch rooms every twenty minutes. All writers will get to play in all rooms.
Games include:
- Collaborative story: Build a tale sentence by sentence over the course of the evening with tens of other writers!
- Lit-Triv Pursuit: Test your knowledge of North Carolina books and authors with a fast-paced, challenging game of trivia!
- Obit Mad Libs: Create obituaries for fake humans, working off prompts!
"Even though venues are opening back up and people are getting more comfortable meeting in-person, offering an online event like this still has its advantages," says NCWN Communications Director Charles Fiore. "An online event means not having to drive anywhere. It means being able to roll from family dinner right into a marvelous shindig without so much as putting on your shoes. And most importantly, it allows the Network to fulfill its mission of connecting writers all across the state and beyond. At Game Night, we expect to host players from all over, from the mountains to the sea."
Registration is open.
Game Night is available to anyone with an internet connection, or who even owns just a telephone. Instructions for accessing the event on Thursday, August 12, will be sent to registrants no less than twenty-four hours prior to the start of the event.
The nonprofit North Carolina Writers’ Network is the state’s oldest and largest literary arts services organization devoted to writers at all stages of development. For additional information, visit www.ncwriters.org.
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- Category: Network News
Over the past 18 months, the North Carolina Writers' Network has hosted many online classes and programs. Now, for the first time ever, video recordings of past online conference sessions are available to the general public.
NCWN members and non-members may purchase past classes a la carte or purchase all the classes from a past conference at a discounted rate. NCWN members receive an additional 45 percent off.
To view all class options, and place your order, click here.
Fiction writers might enjoy "Make a Scene: Emotional Building Blocks of Fiction" with Quinn Dalton (from the 2020 Cabin Fever Conference); "Imagniation and History" with Matt Gallagher, "Wait, Wait...Do Tell Me" with Art Taylor, and "Magical Objects" with Leah Hampton from the 2020 Writingest State Online Conference; and "Dramatic Tension and the Core of Hope vs. Fear" with Zelda Lockhart from the NCWN 2021 Spring Conference.
Poets will be enriched by Timothy O'Keefe's "More than Meaning" from the 2020 Cabin Fever Conference; "The Bird's Nest: Place & Environmental Ethos in Organic Form" with Allison Hedge Coke from the 2020 Writingest State Online Conference; or "Form and Freedom" with Ashley Lumpkin, which she taught at the NCWN 2021 Spring Conference.
Several classes are of interest to the creative nonfiction writer, many of which have crossover appeal: "The Art of Writing Memoir" with Randal O'Wain, "Writing Your Life: Turning Personal Stories into Universal Narratives" with Bridgette A. Lacy, and "Narrative Medicine: Stories of Illness & the Power of Reflective Writing" with Aimee Mepham (2020 Cabin Fever Conference); and "Writing Trauma" with James Tate Hill from the NCWN 2021 Spring Conference.
Other classes cover how to publish, how to tour and promote your book, how to read your work out loud to others, and much, much more.
Purchasing a video or set of videos allows access to the course on your own time, at your own pace. Stop and go back and listen again so you don't miss anything; watch as many times as you'd like, in perpetuity. Once you place your order, you will be sent a link to the video(s) along with the password(s). The videos will be available to watch online.
There are no plans currently to make classes that were part of the NCWN Online Series available for purchase. Those classes are recorded and made available to registrants less than 48 hours after the class ends; the recordings are made available to NCWN members one year after the class takes place.
The non-profit North Carolina Writers’ Network is the state’s oldest and largest literary arts services organization devoted to all writers at all stages of development. For additional information, visit www.ncwriters.org.