Saturday Morning Workshop–This Saturday! Join us!

Next workshop:  Saturday, October 10, begins at 9 AM in LA 141 on GCC’s Main Campus  

Dr. Virgil Mathes — The Nitty Gritty: Research and Creative Writing        

Virgil Mathes and Josie

How do writers find out the nitty gritty details that sometimes come up in our fiction (Could you really DO that with a sucking chest wound? . . .  How do you make a bomb?)

How do writers know all that they need to know to make their stories (and poems and scripts, etc.) believable and authentic?  Dr. Mathes will discuss, in his usual lively manner, different methods for finding out this kind of information that will make your settings and plots authentic.

The CRW Saturday Workshop takes place in LA-141 at GCC Main from 9:00 AM to 11:30 AM. Light refreshments are provided.  Bring your own water and coffee.

for more information on Dr. Mathes:  http://www.virgilmathes.com/writin-the-river/archives/06-2015

October 21: Free Association Open Mic Featuring Dan Ramirez and Traveler Contributors!

October 21, Free Association Open Mic

Featuring a reading with GCC’s own Dan Ramirez and other Traveler contributors.

This month’s open mic will feature the 2014 contributors to Glendale Community College’s literary arts magazine, The Traveler, and will also feature past Traveler contributor Dan Ramirez reading from his new book Flashes from the Molcajete.

Open mic begins at 7:00 p.m. with Traveler readers and Dan Ramirez to follow.

Location:  GCC’s main campus, SU 104-A/B/C

Free Association Wednesday, 16 September, 7 PM, SU-104! Don’t Miss It!

Free Association open mic poetry series
 
**The first of the new semester!  Don’t miss it!   This month we are feat’ing Lenny Lianne!                    
 
                     Lenny Lianne
 
Wednesday, September 16th
FREE and open to the public
open mic starts at 7 p.m.hosted by Shawnte OrionGlendale Community College
(in Student Union room 104)
6000 W. Olive Ave.
Glendale, AZ 85302Lenny Lianne is the author of four books of poetry, most recently THE ABCs OF MEMORY (ScriptWorks Press).  She has an MFA in Creative Writing (Poetry) from George Mason University and has read her poetry on both coasts and in between.

Saturday Workshop: Creating Believable Characters

Please join us for our first Saturday morning workshop.

Workshops are also open to community members.  Bring a friend! 
They are free!  (And they come with juice and breakfast goodies.  For this workshop only, bring your own coffee.) 
 Mark, head shotDate: September 12
Time: 9:00-11:30 a.m.
Where: LA 141
 
Description:
  Creating Believable Characters
Are you tired of dull lifeless characters?  Do you want people to read your characters and be able to relate to them? Do you want to have fun writing dynamic characters?  Join GCC’s Saturday Creative Writing workshop series September 12. 
 
Screenwriter Mark Viquesney will give some helpful tips on breathing life into your characters no matter what genre you write in.
Please contact Kimberly Mathes for more information at Kimberly.Mathes@gccaz.edu.

Free Association Open Mic — Wednesday, September 16 at 7 p.m.

Free Association open mic poetry series
**The first of the new semester!  Don’t miss it!**
This month we are feat’ing Lenny Lianne!
Wednesday September 16th
FREE and open to the public
open mic starts at 7pm

hosted by Shawnte Orion

Glendale Community College
(in Student Union room 104)

6000 W. Olive Ave.
Glendale, AZ 85302

Lenny Lianne is the author of four books of poetry, most recently THE ABCs OF MEMORY (ScriptWorks Press).  She has an MFA in Creative Writing (Poetry) from George Mason University and has read her poetry on both coasts and in between.

Two Short Story Deadlines This Week!

Greetings Writers!

Two short story contest deadlines this week:

Barthelme Prize for Short Fiction, August 31 deadline — 500 word max. Flash fiction, prose poetry, micro-essays.  $17/up to three entries, includes subscription.  See http://gulfcoastmag.org/contests/barthelme-prize/

Short Story America Prize, September 1 deadline (midnight PST) — 500 min/12K max word limit.  All types. $15/entry.  http://www.shortstoryamerica.com then “contest”

Like the lottery, you have to enter to win!!!

Good luck, all.

Register now for Dialogue class! Just a few days left!

DIALOGUE Class Being Offered this Fall, 2015! Register Now!

Course: DIALOGUE (CRW 203)

Section: 35265

Instructor: Jeff Baker

When/Where: MW, 11:00-11:50, CL 43 (Hybrid)

In CRW203 – Dialogue, you will read modern stories and plays, learn to choreograph multi-character scenes, practice conveying dialects in text, and likely eavesdrop on conversations (for academic purposes only) at various inexpensive restaurants around the valley. In doing so, you will learn the methods behind such brilliant and engaging conversations as:

“Hi! How are you?” he asked.  / “I’m fine,” she said.

And:

“What do you want to do for dinner?” she asked. / “I don’t know, dear. What do you want to do for dinner?” he replied.

And the modern classic:

“Sup?”

Ultimately, this is a writing course with the laser focus of learning effective dialogue techniques and strengthening scene development. (And, you know, avoiding the staleness of the examples above.)

Jeff Baker, PhotographJeff Baker is a graduate of Arizona State University’s MFA program and earned his BA from the University of Florida. He has published stories in various literary journals; worked as a prose editor for Hayden’s Ferry Review; written scripts and developed environments for online video games; co-wrote crude, independent film shorts about souls and whiffle ball; and once worked as a ghost writer on a novel about heroic cheese mongers in space, but left the project due to creative differences.

Jeff has been teaching for ten years and he has taught creative writing and other English courses for Glendale, Estrella Mountain, and ASU. He is a lover of novels and flash fiction, a student and admirer of creative nonfiction and poetry, a dabbler in stage and screenplays, a backseat driver, only partially organized, an Aquarius, a proponent of long and complicated lists, and a believer that reading can make a person a better writer.

When he grows up, he would like to be an astronaut.

2015 Short Story America Prize

from T.D. Johnson

The 2015 Short Story America Prize is open for entries through September 1st. Open to all short story/essay genres.  Word limit: 500-12000 words.

First Prize: $500 and publication in Short Story America, Volume Five. Runnerup: $250 and publication in Volume Five. Third Prize: $125 and publication in Volume Five.

Finalists will be notified on September 20th. Winners will be announced at the Short Story America Festival and Conference, September 25-26 in Beaufort, South Carolina.

$15 reading fee per entry.  For more details on Short Story America, the print anthologies (Volumes I-III), the Festival ($45 all-event pass), and/or to enter your story or stories, go to www.shortstoryamerica.com.  The site also has a good online “classics” library of short stories and essays.

P.S.  Short Story America was first to publish Gary Lawrence’s “Why I’m Here,” which appears in SSA’s 2012 print anthology, Volume II.  A second story of Gary’s, “Garage Sale,” is in SSA’s 2013 anthology, Volume III.  SSA also helped him publish his short story collection Baffled.  Gary teaches composition and CRW170/270 (introduction to, and intermediate fiction) online at GCC, and will be presenting (again!) at this year’s “Second Saturday” creative writing workshop series (November 14, 9-11 am, GCC, short story sequences).