“At the center of everything we call ‘the arts,’ and children call ‘play,’ is something which seems somehow alive.” ― Lynda Barry, What It Is
“Craft is both much more and much less than we are taught it is.” ― Matthew Salesses, Craft in the Real World
CLASSES
Single session and multi-week classes and workshops are scheduled once enough folks have signed up for the interest list. Add your name to one or more interest lists to be contacted in the coming months for your day and time preferences. All classes meet virtually over Zoom unless otherwise stated and require real-time participation.
Interest lists now open for the following classes (click for details):
- “At the center of everything we call ‘the arts,’ and children call ‘play,’ is something which seems somehow alive.” ― Lynda Barry, What It Is
- “Craft is both much more and much less than we are taught it is.” ― Matthew Salesses, Craft in the Real World
- 1-day Craft Class: Shaping Point-of-View (Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry)
- 2-week Craft Class: The Surreal for Underrepresented Bodies (Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Scriptwriting)
- 6-week Generative Workshop: “Exploration & Invention” (for writers & artists & researchers)
- 8-week Fiction & Memoir Workshop: Craft, Community, and the Stories that Shaped You
- 8-week Fiction & Memoir Workshop for Trans Writers
*Payment plans and work trades may be available by arrangement.
1-day Craft Class: Shaping Point-of-View (Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry)
What do a story’s verbs, adjectives and even sentence length have in common? Each of these ingredients provides vital information about whose perspective we’re seeing from and what they are thinking and feeling.
On a sentence level, our choice of whether to use a character’s pronoun (“she”) instead of her name (“Belinda”) gives important information to the reader, either bringing them into a character’s head or intentionally holding them at a distance.
Here, you will become acquainted with the tools of point-of-view and practice writing distinctive lines that pull readers in by the ear. Lecture, discussion and lively examples from contemporary fiction and memoir will provide jumping-off points for structured writing exercises designed to help you integrate new skills.
Leave class with a packet of POV prompts and a craft skillset applicable to all future prose projects.
- Meets on Zoom for 3 hours on a Saturday or Sunday. $60-$120/person.
- Class will focus on fiction and creative non-fiction, but writers of all backgrounds and interests welcome
- Adults 18+ serious high-school-aged writers are welcome with prior approval.
2-week Craft Class: The Surreal for Underrepresented Bodies (Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Scriptwriting)
For decades, only a few sorts of bodies have appeared in American literature. For writers with “other” bodies, this can cause us to either exclude our experiences from our work or to flatten them to be easily understood by editors and readers. Metaphor and the surreal can help us evade this double-bind, while also being a playful and exciting way to blend fiction and non-fiction across varied genres. Through discussion, structured writing exercises, and close readings of texts by Megan Giddings, Hilton Als, Therese Mailhot, Chelsea Desautels, Rachel Yoder, Chelsea Vowel, Mona Awad, and April Daniels, this workshop will guide participants through techniques they can use to introduce or enhance the use of metaphor and mystery in their work. Participants will walk away with 10+ pages of new writing, prompts adaptable for future use, and an expanded craft skillset for expressing personal experience in bold, imaginative ways.
- Meets on Zoom on two consecutive Saturdays or Sundays, 2.5 hrs/session. Sliding scale (pay what you actually can): $100-$200*.
- Requires about an hour of additional reading and writing per week.
- Beginner to advanced writers welcome (ages 18+; experienced high school-aged writers considered with prior approval).
6-week Generative Workshop: “Exploration & Invention” (for writers & artists & researchers)
A playful workshop for fiction, nonfiction, poetry, comics, games, multimedia, hybrid, and unknown forms
Based on a class taught in SFSU’s MFA program, this workshop brings together people of diverse experience levels and artistic backgrounds who wish to re/discover a sense of play or beginner’s-mind orientation in their creative process.
The first class will help participants identify a topic, repeated action, motif, or question that they will use as framework for the subsequent weeks. Between weekly class meetings, participant will use a “field notebook” (physical, virtual, or figurative) to collect fragments related to that core theme or idea.
Field Notebook entries might include bullet lists, artifacts, impressions, observations, snippets, captain’s logs, journal entries, sound/video recordings, screenshots, doodles, tiny paintings, collages, interview transcript, quoted passages, stray thoughts, flash fiction, doggerell, or other material that remains in a “raw” (unpolished/incomplete) state. Field notebooks (shared in full or by excerpt) will be shared in digital form to a class forum where peers can leave questions, reflections, and non-critical creative responses. Other class activities include discussion of or response to assigned readings/viewings, show-and-tells, and guided exercises.
Throughout the class, participants will develop a tolerance for the discomfort of not-knowing and of the “boredom” (mystery) that precedes any act of creation. Together, we will notice and become curious about our preconceptions about our process, about art-making, and about who is or isn’t a real artist.
Gains from the completed course: (1) a personal collection of prompts and starting places to follow up on for one or more new projects, (2) a method for making emotionally-rooted work any time/anywhere, and (3) a long-lasting innoculation against so-called writer’s block and other forms of existential despair.
In a nutshell:
- Meets on Zoom for 6 weeks, 2 hours/session. Sliding scale (pay what you actually can): $180-$360*.
- All levels, all mediums, ages 18+. No specific experience required other than capacity for follow-through and a commitment to spend 6 weeks outside of your creative comfort zone.
- 8-10 participants
- Weekly time commitment in addition to class meetings: ~30-60 minutes divided between assigned readings/viewings and classmate forum responses, + self-determined time for “field notebooks” entries (min. 15 min./week)
- Required text (library or used copy is fine): Lynda Barry – What It Is
8-week Fiction & Memoir Workshop: Craft, Community, and the Stories that Shaped You
In this intimate, curiosity-centered workshop, we will think deeply about how and why we each tell stories in order to create and develop original work. Participants will be begin by defining a personal canon that might include songs, memes, tv shows, films, religious stories, folktales, and family legends alongside more typical published works. Assigned readings for the workshop will be chosen by workshop members, in order to help the group understand each writer’s specific aims and influences.
Each writer will submit their own original work twice, with the second submission consisting of a substantive revision. Submissions will be accompanied by a short letter outlining the author’s vision and guidelines for the group to follow in providing feedback. The group will use their understanding of one another’s “canons” and the information provided with the submissions to do wiser, deeper, and far more useful feedback than most of us are used to receiving in traditional workshops.
Our explorations will be guided by group discussion of Matthew Salesses’ Craft in the Real World, which all participants will need to begin reading before our first class.
Prepare for a fun, lively, collaborative workshop process, where we will collectively challenge all our assumptions about how and why we write and what it means to make our work “better.” Participants will leave with a revised story or novel excerpt, mastery of a writer-centered approach to editing, feedback/response letters from Luke and each group member, and supportive relationships with 7-9 other community-minded writers.
- Meets on Zoom for 8 weeks, 2.5 hours/meeting. Sliding scale (pay what you actually can): $320-$640*.
- For writers of prose ages 18+ who are committed to growing their skills and learning their craft. Must be interested in connecting meaningfully with other writers through the giving and receiving of thoughtful and generous feedback, and supporting others’ success. Must be able to commit to full duration of the workshop.
- 8-10 participants. Each writer will submit one story or self-contained novel chapter and a revision of that original submission.
- Typical homework will consist of: (1) reading and writing feedback letter to 2 workshop submissions (15 pgs or less) according guidelines provided by the authors, (2) one assigned reading (usually a story or novel excerpt), and (3) working on either your first workshop submission or its revision.
- Required text: Matthew Salesses – Craft in the Real World
8-week Fiction & Memoir Workshop for Trans Writers
A version of the fiction/memoir workshop listed above for only trans and maybe-trans writers (no gatekeeping here! if you think this might be a space for you, assume it is). I’d love to offer this if there is enough interest!
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Luke Dani Blue 
