#ArtLitPhx: Five Story Ideas a Day, Every Day (Writer in Residence)

artlitphx

Date: Saturday, May 4, 2019

Time: 2:30 PM – 4:30 PM

Location:

BRiC Training Room
Tempe Library, 3500 S. Rural Rd.
Tempe, Arizona 85282

Cost: Free

Event Details:

18 yrs+

This hands-on workshop helps increase your creativity by showing you how to get new material for short stories and novels in unexpected places. You’ll never have to worry about originality again – just come prepared to write. Lead by Writer-in-Residence Betty Webb.

For more information visit: tempepubliclibrary.org/TempeWrites

#ArtLitPhx: Character: The Arc and the Covenant (Writers in Residence)

artlitphx

Date: 03/13/2019
Time: 10:00 AM – 12:00 PM
Location: Library Meeting Room A, Tempe Public Library, 3500 S. Rural Rd., Tempe, Arizona 85282
Cost: Free

Event Description:
A well-rounded character is critical for believability. All fiction requires some a level of suspension of disbelief, but “real” characters make the plot, and ultimately the story, more believable. This workshop will explore a variety of methods for creating multi-faceted, compelling characters who won’t fall flat.

QUESTIONS? 480-350-5500

FEE: None

REGISTRATION: Not required

#ArtLitPhx: POETRY WORKSHOP – Merle Nudelman: “Ekphrasis Poetry”

artlitphx

Date: February 12, 2019
Time: 6:30pm – 8:30pm
Location: Changing Hands Tempe, 6428 South McClintock Drive, Tempe, AZ 85283
Cost: $25+

Register for the event here.

Event Description:
Poet Merle Nudelman hosts a creative writing workshop on ekphrasis poetry.

Ekphrastic poems are written in response to works of art and engage with the subject piece. Ekphrasis dates back to Homer’s description of Achilles’ shield in the Iliad. For the past eleven years Merle Nudelman has been part of a collaboration between the Long Dash Poetry Group and studio artists of the Women’s Art Association of Canada. Many of the poems in Merle’s most recent collection, The Seeker Ascends, were born of this artistic exploration. The Seeker Ascends follows the poet’s emotional and spiritual journey during and after her son’s arduous battle with cancer. The Seeker Ascends is a meditation on strength, survival, healing, and love.

Merle Nudelman will discuss the process of crafting ekphrastic poems. She will illustrate this literary form with some of her own ekphrastic poetry from The Seeker Ascends accompanied by the paintings that inspired these poems. Participants in this workshop will have the opportunity to experience this creative process directly by writing their own ekphrastic poems in dialogue with original paintings that will be displayed. Participants will also have the option of sharing their poems with the group.

WORKSHOP DETAILS
Cost: $25 + fees.
Refunds will not be issued within one day of the event.
Bring pen/pencil and a notebook.

ABOUT THE HOST
Merle Nudelman is a poet, essayist, memoirist, educator, and lawyer. She has written five books of poetry ̶ most recently The Seeker Ascends. Merle’s first collection, Borrowed Light, won the 2004 Canadian Jewish Book Award for Poetry and a prize in the Arizona Authors Association 2004 Literary Contest. Merle’s prize-winning poems appear in literary journals, zines, and anthologies in Canada and in the United States and her essays have been included in academic texts. Merle teaches memoir and poetry writing and gives workshops on healing through writing. For the past eleven years Merle has been part of a collaboration between the Long Dash Poetry Group and studio artists of the Women’s Art Association of Canada. Many of the poems in Merle’s most recent collection, The Seeker Ascends, were born of this artistic exploration.

#ArtLitPhx: Writing Sci-fi & Cli-Fi with Malik Toms

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Event Description:

Unnatural Disasters: Writing Sci-Fi and Cli-Fi in a Changing World with Malik Toms

Dates: Mondays, December 3 – 10, 2018, 5:30 to 8:30 p.m.
Type: Generative Workshop, Lecture
Genre and Forms: Fiction, Science Fiction
Cost: $149 Regular, $135 ASU, $109 Student

To learn more and register, visit http://piper.asu.edu/classes/malik-toms/unnatural-disasters

About the Class
We sit on the edge of possibility. From Roddenberry’s sliding doors and tablet PCs to Atwood’s dystopian floods, our stories point the way to possible futures. This is a class about writing those futures. Participants will explore the basic elements of creating strong fiction and learn how to weave those elements into the extraordinary worlds we carve out of fringe science and the environmental issues shaping our tomorrows. Participants will engage with existing genre work ranging from Bacigalupi to Zelzany to learn the finer points of craft. Then participants will create new or revisit old works of fiction with an eye towards the future.

About the Instructor
Malik Toms was born and raised in Harlem, New York, and is a 20+ year veteran of the pen and keyboard. He did his undergraduate work in Sociology at Iowa State University, working as a drug rehabilitation counselor before returning to college to pursue a graduate degree in Creative Writing. He published his first short story at the age 18 after two years of “No thanks.” Since then he has worked as a freelance author, which is a bit like being a freelance mercenary minus all the bullets and moral ambiguity. His work has appeared in over thirty publications including multiple anthologies and a stand-alone novella. A graduate of Iowa State’s Creative Writing MFA program, Malik Toms polished his writing skills crafting cyberpunk and steampunk fantasies on the way to multiple Origin and Ennie award nominations including six Ennie wins. Malik also was part of the Shadowrun Returns video game team which won Diehard gameFan’s PC Game of the year in 2013. He is presently hard at work writing his first fantasy thriller. Malik currently lives in Arizona where he is regularly super-smashed by at least one of his three video game obsessed boys. When he isn’t writing, he’s teaching writing and sociology at community colleges throughout the Arizona desert, and maybe watching a lot of TV.

Authors Talk: Anna Geary-Meyer

Today we are pleased to feature author Anna Geary-Meyer as our Authors Talk series contributor. In this podcast, Anna discusses the process of creating her short story, “Natural People,” which she says was “born through a writing exercise.”

Anna describes how one day, in a writing workshop sponsored by The Reader Berlin, she was given an assignment to write on the mythical “Adaro” creature. Based on her having worked in several different startups at the time, she “ended up fashioning this…merman-like spirit into a hyper-exercised, hyper-optimized boss character,” who acts as a negative force in the life of the protagonist. This, she says, relates to the overall theme of animals in her story, and the degree to which they’re found throughout the piece.

Anna states that the “crux of the story is the main character’s realization that, to find a home in the world, she has to make one herself,” and that,  while “I didn’t write with this theme in mind, it’s where I was at as a person.” She continues that the main character “could only really begin to find a home in herself and her environment…when she accepts this feeling of being lost”, which occurs both literally and metaphorically. Eventually, Anna concludes, the main character is able to “find a rhythm in her own body.”

You can read Anna’s story, “Natural People,” in Issue 21 of Superstition Review.

#ArtLitPhx: Joseph Cassara Workshop and Reading at Changing Hands Bookstore

 

#ArtLitPhxJoseph Cassara Workshop and Reading at Changing Hands Bookstore

Date: June 28

Location: Changing Hands Bookstore,

300 W Camelback Rd Ste 1, Phoenix, AZ

Event Description:

PC Rising and Changing Hands Bookstore have teamed up to bring you a free workshop from Joseph Cassara. The workshop runs from 4:00 PM to 5:00 PM.

The topic of Cassara’s workshop is “world building”. Joseph shares his process for researching and building rich, authentic worlds through his prose. This exclusive workshop is available to all PC students, faculty and staff.
After the workshop, stick around to hear Cassara read from his new novel! In addition to Cassara, you will hear readings from two other exciting emerging authors—Tommy Orange and Fatima Farheen Mirza. This reading starts at 7:00 PM.

Joseph’s new book, “The House of Impossible Beauties,” is a gritty and gorgeous debut that follows a cast of gay and transgender club kids navigating the Harlem ball scene of the 1980s and ’90s. Find out more about the book here. https://www.josephcassara.com/book/

Joseph Cassara was born and raised in New Jersey. He holds degrees from Columbia University and the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. He was a 2016-17 writing fellow at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Massachusetts. His debut novel, titled The House of Impossible Beauties, was chosen by Barnes & Noble as a Discover Great New Writers selection. He is an assistant professor of creative writing at California State, Fresno.

#ArtLitPhx: Writing Group

 Every 2nd Sunday from 4:30 to 7 pm at Songbird Coffee and Tea house (812 N 3rd St, Phoenix, AZ 85004) Four Chamber Press and Songbird Coffee and Tea House will be hosting a writing group, the group is free and open to the public! If you are bringing work, please bring five to six hard copies in any style, genre or form (under 3000 words). Please note you do not have to bring work.

From Four Chambers Press:

“A lot of times, when we’re reading submissions for the magazine, we find ourselves thinking, Man. Wouldn’t we love to grab a cup of coffee with the person who wrote this and talk about their work? We love a good writing group. Not only is it one of the most direct and effective methods we know to get better as a writer and improve your work, it’s a great way to meet people and build community.”

 

#ArtLitPhx: WordPlay Cafe

Partnering with Creative Catalysts, the WordPlay Cafe’s open mic creates a platform for community members to become storytellers, poets, and musicians. It is here where artist have the opportunity to craft, mold, and present their work by simply showing up and putting their name on the list. Before open mic, each month WordPlay Cafe will feature a workshop led by professional poets and storytellers, highlighting the nuanced aesthetics of each respective medium.

Workshop is free, open to the public and starts at 6 pm, open mic is from 7 pm to 9 pm. The workshop and open mic will be held at Volstead Public House (105 W. Main Street, Mesa, AZ 85201) on February 8th, RSVP here.

#ArtLitPhx: Alejandro Zambra in Residency

Alejandro ZambraAlejandro Zambra will be in residency the first week of October – Cardboard House PressCALA Alliance, and Palabras Bilingual Bookstore is hosting three free events with Zambra throughout the week. These events include a bilingual workshop, a visit to ASU, and a talk at Changing Hands in Phoenix.

The New York Times Book Review named Zambra “the most talked-about writer to come out of Chile since Bolaño.” He has published poetry and five novels: Multiple Choice, Bonsai, The Private Lives of Trees, Ways of Going Home and My Documents. His stories have appeared in many publications, including The New Yorker, The Paris Review, Harper’s, Tin House, and McSweeney’s. He was also named one of Granta’s Best Young Spanish-Language Novelists in 2010. Born in Chile in 1975, Zambra’s fiction often explores how a society is haunted by legacies of the past. He often toys with originality and humor – his new book, Multiple Choice, is even written in the structure of Chile’s Academic Aptitude Test, the standardized college admissions test in Chile until 2003. In it, he explores how education and testing restricted art and ideas during the dictatorship.

The first event is a bilingual workshop titled “How To Forget How to Write Fiction.” The 12 workshop participants will “explore and break conventions of fiction writing based on a text about their first memories.” The workshop will be conducted in both English and Spanish, and it will take place October 3-6. Unfortunately, the deadline to apply for the workshop has already passed. However, if you missed the opportunity to apply, you can still attend the other two events!

The second event is a visit to ASU, in which Zambra will discuss his works and fiction. It will take place on Thursday, October 5 from 12:00pm to 1:15pm on the ASU Tempe campus in COOR 184. For more information, check out the Facebook page.

The third event is a bilingual talk and reading at the Phoenix Changing Hands Bookstore (300 W Camelback Rd, Phoenix, Arizona 85013). It will also take place on Thursday, October 5 from 7:00pm to 9:00pm. For more information, check out the Facebook page.

#ArtLitPhx: Rosemarie Dombrowski presents “The Art of Memory in 750 Words or Less”

Rosemarie DombrowskiRosemarie Dombrowski will be hosting a two-part writing workshop on flash memoir, titled “The Art of Memory in 750 Words or Less.” The workshop will take place at Changing Hands in Tempe from 6pm to 8pm on September 11 and September 25. Admission is $35 for both sessions.

During the first class, attendees will read and discuss examples of flash fiction and participate in a writing exercise. They will then receive a take-home writing prompt. In the second class, attendees will workshop their new, original piece of flash memoir and receive individualized feedback.

Rosemarie Dombrowski is a writer with a long list of accomplishments. She is the co-founder of the Phoenix Poetry Series, a poetry editor for Four Chambers Press, the founder of Rinky Dink Press, a three-time Pushcart nominee, and the inaugural Phoenix Poet Laureate. She is also a Senior Lecturer at Arizona State University’s Downtown campus. You can read more about her accomplishments on her website.

For more information about the workshop and to register, click here.