New Writing South
POINTS OF FICTION
in association with Brighton and Hove Libraries
A new series of 11 all day creative writing events with leading writers
and publishing professionals. Book all 11 sessions
for the price of 9, or any 5 for the price
of 4, or just book any session individually. All
sessions will be held in the Learning Centre at the Jubilee Library, Brighton
and run from 10am-4pm unless stated otherwise
Session 1: 4 October 2008
Finding Your Voice
with Shaun Levin
You are what you read. A writing voice is strengthened and shaped by the writers we engage with. And yet, how do you create a voice that is uniquely yours? Play! Take risks! Write from passion! Our opening session will look at how to successfully recognise, uncover and build up your writer's voice through practical writing exercises and group discussion.
Shaun Levin is the author of Seven Sweet Things and A Year of Two Summers. He has taught creative writing for over ten years at Morley College, The Groucho Club, the BBC and Bishopsgate Institute, amongst other places. He is editor of the literary journal, Chroma.
Shaun allowed everyone to develop a distinct style and tone
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Session 2 - 18 October 2008Plotting and Structuring
SOLD OUT
with Susannah Waters
How to create plot-lines that engage, intrigue and shape your fiction. If reading a book is taking a journey, then plot is the perfect timetable with no missed connections and a smooth return. Susannah Waters demonstrates different plotting methods and uses various techniques to pin your characters to an organic and motivated plot, without killing them off in the process - unless you want them dead, that is. The day will involve a lot of planning, some pleasing flow charts, and writing.
Susannah Waters has published the novels LONE GONE ANYBODY (Black Swan), COLD COMFORT,and is currently working on her third. Susannah also writes for the stage, is an Associate Tutor at the University of Sussex, as well as a regular tutor for the Arvon Foundation and was short-listed for the Pendleton May Award in 2004.
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Session 3 - 22 November 2008
Seducing the Reader
with Bernardine Evaristo
Using your unique voice to set original tone and perfectly pitched genre.
Plus how to introduce irresistible characters, establish landscapes and set up conflict.
Bernardine Evaristo's first fully-prose novel BLONDE ROOTS (Penguin 08) is a slavery story with a difference: Africans enslave Europeans. She has previously merged poetry with fiction in Soul Tourists (Penguin 05), THE EMPEROR's BABE (Penguin 01) and LARA (ARP 97). In 2007 she co- edited the Granta/British Council New Writing anthology NW15 with novelist Maggie Gee. She writes a creative writing column for Mslexia magazine, has received several literary awards and is a Fellow of both the Royal Society of Literature and the Royal Society of Arts. Visit www.bevaristo.net to fill in the gaps.
BOOK TICKETS
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Session 4 - 6 December 2008
Points of View
with Diana Beaumont and Farah Reza
Two publishing professionals look at cohesion and how to establish an overview. The session will also cover getting to grips with, first, second and third person narratives and look at reliable and unreliable narrators.
Diana Beaumont was senior commissioning editor (fiction and non-fiction) at Transworld for eight years. She worked at Hodder & Stoughton and Thames & Hudson before that. Diana is now with the Rupert Heath Literary Agency and also works as freelance editorial consultant/script doctor. Her clients include leading literary agents, publishers and authors.
Farah Reza teaches creative writing at City Lit and has had stories in Tales of the Decongested (Apis books) and Calabash. She is is the editor of Anti-imperiaism: A Guide for the Movement and has had various features published in magazines, including New Humanist and Socialist Review. She received the Royal Literary Fund Writers' Pool award for the first draft of her novel in 2006.
BOOK TICKETS
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Session 5 - 17 January 2009Characterisation
with Louise Wener
How to create and develop real characters that make the reader care and an insight into just some of the methods used to achieve this.
Louise Wener was a singer with the band Sleeper before becoming a novelist and is now the author of four novels: Goodnight Steve McQueen, The Big Blind (retitled The Perfect Play), The Half Life of Stars and Worldwide Adventures in Love. She teaches novel writing and poker, and has a new band 'Huge Advance' with partner Andy.
BOOK TICKETS
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Session 6 - 21 February 2009 Dialogue
with Stella Duffy
Creating characters’ voices and using differentiation and dialogue in prose. How to incorporate dramatisation within fiction. Distinguishing when to use dialogue, and when exposition.
Stella Duffy has written six literary novels including The Room of Lost Things and State of Happiness, both of which were longlisted for the Orange Prize, as well as five novels in the Saz Martin crime series. She was co-editor of the anthology Tart Noir from which her story Martha Grace won the CWA Short Story Dagger. She has written eight plays, over thirty short stories, and adapted State of Happiness as a feature film. She is also an actor and director. Photo: Ben Smith
BOOK TICKETS
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Session 7 - 21 March 2009
Theme and Premise
with Courttia Newland
Character, core conflict, subtext, conclusion and change. Can fiction say something other than the subject?
Courttia Newland published his first novel, The Scholar in 1997. Further critically acclaimed work followed, including Society Within and Snakeskin. He is co-editor of the anthology IC3: The Penguin Book of New Black Writing in Britain and has short stories featured in many other anthologies including The Time Out Book of London Short Stories: Vol 2 and England Calling:24 Stories for the 21st Century. His latest books include a novella, The Dying Wish, and a collection of macabre short stories, Music for the Off-Key. In 2007 he was shortlisted for the Crime Writers' Association Dagger in the Library Award.
BOOK TICKETS
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Session 8 - 18 April 2009Pace and Weight
with Mavis Cheek
A master of manners and observational comedy Mavis Cheek looks at techniques for variation in pace. Where to increase, where to slow and the use of weighting. Mavis Cheek is an inspiration. After twelve years working for art publishers, she attended Hillcroft College for Women graduating in Arts with distinction. Her first novel, Pause Between the Acts, won the She/John Menzies First Novel Prize. Since then she has written a further eleven novels including Janice Gentle Gets Sexy, Mrs Fytton's Country Life, The Sex Life of My Aunt and Yesterday's Houses, all critical acclaimed and commercially successful.
Her concise, ironic and zeugmatic style is a sustaining joy on every page: you want to read whole paragraphs aloud to anyone who’ll listen. – Independent on Sunday
BOOK TICKETS
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Session 9 - 23 May 2009
Prose and Language
with Susannah WatersThis day will put a microscope to the hundreds of small choices writers make when constructing a sentence, a paragraph, or a page of fiction. By looking at examples from participants' chosen authors, you will attempt to get beyond simply admiring someone's writing style, and learn how to identify what it is they actually do, and incorporate these techniques into your own writing. You will be analyzing syntax in depth, and using different short writing exercises throughout the day in order to stretch your own writing muscles out of their habitual patterns.
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BOOK TICKETS
Session 10 - 26 June 2009
Editing and Re-Writing
With Helen Francis (More guests to be confirmed)
Strategies for approaching the rewriting stages of your work. Including advice on working positively alone and with other writers. Synopsis writing for the next stage.
Helen Francis is Senior Editor at publishers Faber and Faber.
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Session 11 - 18 July 2009
Going Public
Join an array of speakers and guests including literary agents, commissioning editors, publishers, publicists, e-publishing experts and professional development guides. How to approach agents and publishers, insights into the publishing world, marketing strategies, time-management, doing your own PR, conventional, self and e-publishing, sources of market information.
One to one intensives
Practical workshops
Talks and seminars
Question and answer sessions
Guest speakers
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