January 21, 2012

 

 

      Circles of Desire: A Workshop for Refining Your Plot and Synopsis (Fiction or Creative Nonfiction)

 

    What do your characters really want—and what’s keeping them from getting it? In a fresh twist on the protagonist/antagonist, or conflict, model of analyzing a story’s structure, author and editor Barbara Brannon helps you tighten and focus your plot, create a persuasive synopsis, and craft your one-sentence “elevator speech.” This workshop is useful for anyone with a work of fiction or nonfiction in any stage of completion, from early idea to late draft. Bring your materials for one project—ideas, notes, outline, manuscript, whatever you have—to this hands-on session.   

   

 

 

March 17, 2012

 

    Guest speaker, Marcia K.Preston, will discuss in her morning session:  The Mystery or Suspense Novel.  In the afternoon  she will provide hands-on experience in the topic:  Conversations that Count:  The Art of Good Dialogue.

 

    Marcia Preston (M.K. Preston) grew up on a wheat farm in central Oklahoma. From her father she learned the art of storytelling; from her mother, a reverence for books; and from Oklahoma’s red earth, a love of wildlife and the outdoors.

    Writing as M.K. Preston, Marcia is the author of an Oklahoma mystery series featuring Chantalene Morrell, daughter of a Gypsy mother and a redneck father. Song of the Bones won the 2004 Mary Higgins Clark Award for suspense fiction, and also the 2004 Oklahoma Book Award in fiction. The first book in the series, Perhaps She'll Die, was nominated for the 2002 Mary Higgins Clark Award, and for Macavity and Barry awards in the Best First Mystery division.

    Her most recent novels are general fiction. The Butterfly House, under the byline Marcia Preston, hit number one on the HeatSeekers hit of debut fiction in the United Kingdom.  Others include The Piano Man (April 2006) about the emotional and psychological results of a heart transplant; Trudy's Promise, the story of a young mother's fight to regain her son when they are separated by the Berlin Wall; and The Wind Comes Sweeping, set on a wind farm and cattle ranch in Oklahoma.

    Marcia earned degrees from University of Central Oklahoma, taught in public high schools for more than a decade, and worked for a time as PR and publications director for the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City. As a magazine writer for many years, she also edited and published ByLine, a trade magazine for aspiring writers. Marcia lives with her childhood sweetheart and first husband (it’s the same guy) beside a creek in central Oklahoma, where she gardens and dodges tornadoes.

Check out her website and blog at:http://www.marciapreston.com/

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May 19, 2012

  

    

    Guest speaker, Jenna Hodges Struble, will talk about the use of poetic language in novels and short stories.

      Enhance your work to take the reader on a sensory journey that they will wish has no end. Learn how to write more descriptively with exercises and techniques from Jenna Hodges Struble.

     Jenna has been writing for over 20 years, is a published poet and recording artist with her spoken word.  She has taught creative writing to youth and adults for four years in the Amarillo area under the umbrella of the Writer’s Voice Program at the Amarillo YMCA.  She has also been a guest instructor at the Austin International Poetry Festival and Y of the USA.  Jenna has helped develop creative writing curriculum for several YMCA’s and youth poetry organizations around the country. Jenna is recently married to acclaimed creator and author for Image Comic’s Li’l Depressed Boy, S. Steven Struble.