Explore two concepts: magical realism & place-based writing in the short story "Light is Like Water" by Gabriel García Márquez.

Learn about types of games, building a portfolio, and getting your first gig as a game writer.

Transforming worldbuilding, ideas, characters, and research notes into the first chapters of your novel.

Identify your core strengths and interests, and how to use them to generate new ideas.

Tools to create dialogue that captures readers' imagination while supporting plot and story.

What are the cliches and overused tropes of science fiction, and how can we use science as writers to build more realistic worlds?

Learn about types of games, building a portfolio, and getting your first gig as a game writer.

Elements of a query letter and how to make yours stand out.

You'll find useful line edit techniques in this step-by-step demonstration, whether you're trying to squeeze into a work count or make every sentence dense with flavor.

What are the cliches and overused tropes of solarpunk and cli-fi, and how can we dig deeper as writers to find fresh approaches? How do writers balance the tough issues of climate change with a compelling narrative?

How to Submit to Literary vs. Speculative Markets

Tips for Writing Essays on Speculative Fiction Topics

Add visual appeal to your story by communicating with artists using effective instructions

Planning and Writing a Trilogy

Learn useful tricks to hide infodumps that pack tremendous explicatory firepower but also create a more graceful story.

This workshop is dedicated to exploring how trans and nonbinary people exist in systems—legal systems, magic systems, and epic sci-fi bureaucracies alike.

Learn basic and intermediate techniques for web-based research and how to find, evaluate, and organize information on virtually any topic.

Create convincing worlds for your characters and readers to explore.

Deciphering the Types of Editing, What You Can Do for Yourself, and How To Do It!

Making a Faith Your Readers Can Believe In

How to write unforgettable horror by creating memorable creatures

Writing Tiny Tales of Terror

Learn how to use tools developed to study folklore in your storytelling

Learn basic and intermediate techniques for web-based research and how to find, evaluate, and organize information on virtually any topic.

A six-session guided intensive with strategies for creating flash fiction, giving and receiving feedback, writing prompts, and writing exercises.

June 8 – July 3, 2025 Looking to bring a more personalized and dynamic writing and critiquing experience to your summer? Our popular Flash Fiction Groups are back! With lectures and prompts by this year's Flash Fiction Mastermind Brian Evenson, participants in a flash fiction group will write and submit a flash fiction story each week, learn a variety of critique methods and exchange critiques with peers, and receive guidance to sharpen their storytelling skills—all in a supportive, small-cohort setting.

Worldbuilding for speculative fiction and games can be a daunting task. This class offers creators a deep dive into foundational aspects of building inclusive worlds: Ideology, Religion, Cosmology, Research, and more.

Reference librarian Melody Steiner will walk you through the How Tos of research techniques and finding sources. You'll learn how to organize and synthesize what you find and how to make the process engaging and exciting.