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Literary Speculative Fiction :: A Webinar with Lidia Yuknavitch — July 17

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

Literary Speculative Fiction :: A Webinar with Lidia Yuknavitch Are you writing toward the territory of speculative fiction, the polyphonic novel, or literary innovations in fiction that take you off-road, possibly off-map? In this webinar we will talk about some recent examples of Literary Speculative fiction, explore some narrative strategies, and open up a few writing portals for practice. Good examples to eyeball ahead of time: Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel, The Overstory by Richard Powers, The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin Lidia Yuknavitch is the author of the short story collection Verge (Riverhead Books), the novels The Book of Joan (Harper Books), The Small Backs of Children (Harper Books), and Dora: A Headcase (Hawthorne Books), and the anti-memoir The Chronology of Water…

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$125

Meng Jin & K-Ming Chang in Conversation With Rachel Khong

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

Meng Jin’s debut novel, Little Gods, was praised as “spectacular and emotionally polyphonic" (Omar El-Akkad) and “meticulously observed, daringly imagined” (Claire Messud). Now Jin turns her considerable talents to short fiction, in ten thematically linked stories. Written during the turbulent years of the Trump administration and the first year of the pandemic, these stories explore intimacy and isolation, coming-of-age and coming to terms with the repercussions of past mistakes, fraying relationships, and surprising moments of connection. Moving between San Francisco and China, and from unsparing realism to genre-bending delight, Self-Portrait with Ghost (Mariner) considers what it means to live in an age of heightened self-consciousness, seemingly endless access to knowledge, and little actual power. Gods of Want (One World) features stories that center the bodies,…

Continue readingMeng Jin & K-Ming Chang in Conversation With Rachel Khong
Free

Vince A. Liaguno & Rena Mason in Conversation With Tananarive Due, Jennifer McMahon, Alma Katsu & Nathan Carson

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

Other Terrors (William Morrow) is an anthology of original new horror stories edited by Bram Stoker Award winners Vince A. Liaguno and Rena Mason that showcases authors from underrepresented backgrounds telling terrifying tales of what it means to be, or merely to seem, “other.” Offering original new stories from some of the biggest names in horror, as well as some of the hottest up-and-coming talents, Other Terrors will provide the ultimate reading experience for horror fans who want to celebrate fear of “the other.” Be they of a different culture, a different background, a different sexual preference, a different belief system, or a different skin color, some people simply aren’t part of the dominant community — and are perceived as scary. Humans are almost instinctively…

Continue readingVince A. Liaguno & Rena Mason in Conversation With Tananarive Due, Jennifer McMahon, Alma Katsu & Nathan Carson
Free

The Punch-Up: Unleashing Your Humor on the Page

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

You have a sense of humor, but find it hard to translate that humor into your writing? You know what you’re going for, but feel like it’s falling flat? Explore methods and get tips on finding the funny in this “writers’ room” session. Bring your essays, stories, monologues, and screenplays to share. Access Program We want our writing classes and Delves to be accessible to everyone, regardless of income and background. We understand that our tuition structure can present obstacles for some people. Our Access Program offers writing class and Delve tuitions at a reduced rate. The access program for writing classes covers 60% of the class tuition. Most writing classes have at least one access spot available. Please apply here for access rate tuition. Contact Susan…

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$80

Ling Ma in Conversation With Alexandra Kleeman

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

What happens when fantasy tears the screen of the everyday to wake us up? Could that waking be our end? In Bliss Montage (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), Ling Ma — author of Severance — brings us eight wildly different tales of people making their way through the madness and reality of our collective delusions: love and loneliness, connection and possession, friendship, motherhood, the idea of home. A woman lives in a house with all her ex-boyfriends. A toxic friendship grows up around a drug that makes you invisible. An ancient ritual might heal you of anything — if you bury yourself alive. These and other scenarios investigate the ways that the outlandish and the ordinary are shockingly, deceptively, heartbreakingly alike. Bliss Montage crashes through our…

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Free

Writing the Ensemble Cast

Literary Arts 925 SW Washington Street, Portland, OR, United States

In this generative workshop, students will work on creating artful characters focusing on plot, characterization and point of view. At the end of six weeks, students will created a 10-15 page manuscript of their work-in-progress and received detailed feedback from the instructor. This class is ideal for students at work on a novel or short story collection with several main characters. Access Program We want our writing classes and Delves to be accessible to everyone, regardless of income and background. We understand that our tuition structure can present obstacles for some people. Our Access Program offers writing class and Delve tuitions at a reduced rate. The access program for writing classes covers 60% of the class tuition. Most writing classes have at least one access…

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$285

Reading: Paul Haeder

Rose City Book Pub 1329 NE Fremont, Portland, OR, United States

Paul Haeder has been a journalist since he was 17. He writes a column for Street Roots called Finding Fringe. Haeder crisscrossed Latin America, Europe and Vietnam. He eventually landed in the Pacific Northwest, now residing on Oregon's Central Coast. He is a social worker for veterans, foster youths, adults with developmental disabilities and those in homeless circumstances, and others battling addiction and recently released from prison. Haeder is a prolific writer of poetry, short fiction, memoir and environmental polemics. He is also the site director in Lincoln and Jefferson counties for an anti-poverty initiative through Family Independence Initiative. His latest book, Wide Open Eyes: Surfacing from Vietnam, is a collection of intertwined short fiction based on his own work in Vietnam 25 years ago.

Free

Exploring Fiction Narratives: How’d They Do That?

Literary Arts 925 SW Washington Street, Portland, OR, United States

When was the last story you read that really changed you? Maybe you thought about it for days, weeks, you’ve re-read it over the years. And maybe you said to yourself, “I wish I could write like that. How’d they do that?” This course is all about the how. In this combination craft and workshop class, we will read and dissect the work of writers from different times and places and we’ll answer the question: how did they do that? What makes a story good? What makes it feel complete? What details will strengthen a story and enhance plot and which are unnecessary? How do writers use their words to evoke emotion, create setting and carry us through the story effectively and make a story—or…

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$285

Margaret Killjoy in Conversation With Robert Evans

Powell's City of Books 1005 W Burnside Street, Portland, OR, United States

Spaceships, man-eating mermaids, swords, demons, ghouls, thieves, hitchhikers, and life in the margins. Margaret Killjoy’s stories have appeared for years in science fiction and fantasy magazines both major and indie. We Won’t Be Here Tomorrow and Other Stories (AK Press) collects the best previously published work along with brand new material. Ranging in theme and tone, these imaginative tales bring the reader on a wild and moving ride where they’ll encounter a hacker who programs drones to troll CEOs into quitting; a group of LARPers who decide to live as orcs in the burned forests of Oregon; queer, teen love in a death cult; the terraforming of a climate-changed Earth; polyamorous love on an anarchist tea farm during the apocalypse; and much more. Killjoy writes…

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Free

Submission Deadline: The Gravity of the Thing

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

We are open for submissions for our seasonal online issues during the months of March, June, September, and December. To submit your work, please visit this page during our open reading windows, or subscribe to our monthly newsletter to receive email updates. The Gravity of the Thing accepts defamiliarized works in the following general categories: Short: Tell us a story in 3,000 words or less; we are interested in fiction, creative nonfiction, self-contained excerpts, and genre-bending forms. Flash: A fiction, creative nonfiction, or genre-bending piece under 500 words. Poetry: Share up to three poems, prose poems, or multimedia works for a combined count of 500 words or less. Six Words: A poem or story in six words; you may share up to five stories per submission, but only one will be chosen. Baring the Device: Essays for our…

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Free
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