Upcoming Classes

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• Novel Knockout Camp (Kristie Smeltzer)

  • Start
    June 10, 2025
  •  
  • End
    July 29, 2025
  •  
  • Schedule
    8 sessions
  • Location
    Online — Instructor will provide Zoom link
  • Spaces left
    1

  This class will meet online for 8 sessions starting Tuesday, June 10, from 6:30 – 8:30 PM.

  Description:

  Are you ready to turn the heat up on your novel this summer? Join this class to set personal writing goals, learn about novel writing-related topics, get feedback on your work, and make real progress writing or revising your book.

  Class participants will meet with Kristie one-on-one early on to talk about their novel and set goals for what they will accomplish during the class. Sessions will include topics and activities related to novel writing, such as evaluating concepts, avoiding common pitfalls, and analyzing successful novels comparable to our own. Participants will have the opportunity to workshop two or more chapters of their work in progress. Near the class’s conclusion, writers will meet with Kristie again to revisit their goals and plan to sustain momentum going forward.  NOTE: Students taking this class will receive a 20% discount if they elect to take Kristie’s, seminar on writing page-turning chapters, which is viewed as an excellent companion seminar to the novel camp.

  This class is a good fit for novelists with a partial or full draft as well as those starting out, if writers will be able to complete a couple chapters during the eight weeks.

  About the Instructor:

  Kristie Smeltzer's fiction has been published by Scribes*MICRO*Fiction, MonkeyBicycle, Atticus Review, and others. She is currently working on several novels. She earned her MFA in creative writing at the University of Central Florida. Kristie has taught at WriterHouse since 2016, and her students have gone on to publish their work in literary magazines, with small presses, and through large publishing houses. She also helps others tell their stories as a developmental editor and writing coach. Learn more at www.kristiesmeltzer.com. 
  

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• Start Writing Now: A Fiction Workshop (Tina Tocco)

  • Start
    June 23, 2025
  •  
  • End
    July 28, 2025
  •  
  • Schedule
    6 sessions
  • Location
    Online via Zoom -- instructor will provide link
  • Spaces left
    3

  Register

  This class will meet online for 6 sessions on Mondays from 1:00-3:30 PM, June 23 through July 28.
  

  Description:

  Have you always wanted to try your hand at fiction writing, but never took the leap? Maybe you’ve put down your pen for a while and need a jumpstart. Come experiment in this low-stress, generative class! If you’re thinking, “But I don’t have any ideas,” don’t worry! We’ll use fun prompts — music, sounds, images, objects, etc. — to kindle your imagination. Expect to write to at least one prompt in every class and to comment on your classmates’ pieces. Since this workshop is generative, we’ll stick to positive feedback and optional sharing to keep everyone’s experience relaxed and fun. You’ll walk away each week with at least one new piece of writing and the tools to continue on this path. In addition, you’ll receive (completely optional) take-home exercises to keep you writing during the week, PDFs of all in-class prompts, and other resources to help you with your writing. Who knows? You might even start some pieces you’d like to turn into something more! NOTE: Returning students are welcome, as there will be new material used in this class.

  About the Instructor: 

  Tina Tocco is a Pushcart Prize nominee. Her work has appeared in New Ohio Review, River Styx, Crab Creek Review, Roanoke Review, Hobart, Passages North, Potomac Review, Portland Review, Harpur Palate, and Italian Americana, among others. Tina’s writing has also been featured in various anthologies, including The Best Small Fictions 2019 (Sonder Press, 2019), Best Nonfiction Food (Woodhall Press, 2020), and The Haunted States of America (SCBWI-Henry Holt, 2024). A recipient of multiple awards, Tina was a finalist in CALYX’s Flash Fiction Contest and longlisted in The SmokeLong Quarterly Grand Micro Competition. She earned her MFA in creative writing from Manhattanville University, where she was editor-in-chief of Inkwell, the university’s national literary journal.

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• Write On! Summer Camps for Young Writers

  • Start
    July 14, 2025
  •  
    11:00 AM
  • End
    July 25, 2025
  •  
    3:00 PM
  • Location
    WriterHouse
  • Spaces left
    0

  Join waitlist

  5/19/25 -- Camp Registration is now full for both sessions. You can register for the waiting list and will be contacted if a space opens up.

  Description:

  Session 1: Rising 6th to Rising 8th Grade Students
  

  •  July 14 — July 18
    
  • 11 AM to 3 PM
    

  Session 2: Rising 9th to Rising 12th Grade Students
  

  •  July 21 — July 25
    
  • 11 AM to 3 PM
    

  Unleash your creativity in this week-long writing workshop! You will have the freedom to write what you want (fiction, non-fiction, poetry, songs!) while also learning specific tools and techniques that are crucial to all types of writing. We will explore and discuss a variety of writing across genres, and use prompts and exercises to help you dive into your writing. We will also engage in activities around town to spark inspiration and creativity. Throughout the week you will have the opportunity to share ideas, work on something new or a work-in-progress, get feedback, and refine your work. Join us on this writing adventure!

  Register online or send a check to WriterHouse, PO Box 222, Charlottesville, VA. Please complete and return the permission slip as campers will not be able to participate without it.
  

  About the Instructor:

  Erin has taught English and Creative Writing for over a decade and received her MFA in Creative Writing from Antioch University in 2024. 

  In addition to working with students at WriterHouse for the past ten years, she has been a judge for the Writer‘s Eye Creative Writing Contest hosted by the University of Virginia’s Fralin Museum of Art. She has also been a student and teacher-counselor at UVA’s Young Writers Workshop. She has attended two week-long workshops for Teachers as Writers at Bard College’s Institute for Writing and Thinking in 2014 and 2016 and received an author fellowship to attend the Martha’s Vineyard Institute for Creative Writing in 2021. Before she began teaching, she studied Journalism and English at New York University and received her undergraduate degree in English from the University of Virginia. In addition to writing, Erin loves reading, hiking, practicing and teaching yoga, cooking, being outside, traveling, and spending time with her sons Noah and Jacob, and friends.

  
  

  
  

  
  

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• How to Write Page-turning Novel Chapters (Kristie Smeltzer)

  • When
    July 19, 2025
  •  
    1:00 PM - 4:00 PM
  • Location
    Online — Instructor will provide Zoom link
  • Spaces left
    4

  Register

  This seminar has been rescheduled from June 21 to July 19.

  Description:

  Chapters can be tricky to write effectively. They must feel like a complete unit—satisfying in their own right—while also building towards the whole story. They’ve got to answer some reader questions while inspiring new ones, keeping folks reading after bedtime.

  In this seminar, we’ll discuss the different types of work that chapters can do. We’ll explore chapter structure and techniques to infuse chapters with both character and plot development. We’ll also discuss how genre norms inform chapter expectations in fiction. If you’re ready to progress past episodic chapters to tautly written tension builders, this seminar’s for you.

  Participants will leave with greater confidence in their ability to write page-turning chapters. Fiction writers will get the most out of this seminar, but creative nonfiction writers (primarily memoirists) may also benefit from participating.

  About the Instructor:

  Kristie Smeltzer's fiction has been published by Scribes*MICRO*Fiction, MonkeyBicycle, Atticus Review, and others. She is currently working on several novels. She earned her MFA in creative writing at the University of Central Florida. Kristie has taught at WriterHouse since 2016, and her students have gone on to publish their work in literary magazines, with small presses, and through large publishing houses. She also helps others tell their stories as a developmental editor and writing coach. Learn more at www.kristiesmeltzer.com. 
  

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• Making it New: Poems in Response to Myth and History (Margaret Mackinnon)

  • When
    July 19, 2025
  •  
    1:00 PM - 5:00 PM
  • Location
    WriterHouse
  • Spaces left
    1

  Register

  This seminar will meet in-person at WriterHouse for one session on Saturday, July 19 from 1:00 to 5:00 PM.

  Description:

  As Ezra Pound urges, writers are always called to “make it new.” Some writers have discovered what is “new" by looking at what is old, creating poems based on characters from myth or history. At times, such poems can be a way to speak of deeply personal concerns without resorting to a confessional mode. Elizabeth Bishop, for example, never wrote directly about her struggles with alcohol, but her poem based on the Biblical story of the Prodigal Son seems to reflect her own experience. Other writers, like Tracy K. Smith and Eavan Boland, use little-known individuals from the past to show how parts of our history are overlooked. Carol Ann Duffy, drawing on the myth of King Midas, creates an imaginary “Mrs. Midas” who speaks about the layered complexity of a marriage. Is there a character, either real or fictional, who reflects some aspect of your own experience? Some person whose narrative mirrors your own? In this one-day seminar, we will look at poems by other writers that address this theme, and we’ll also discuss poems written by members of the group.

  About the Instructor:

  Margaret Mackinnon is the author of two collections of poetry, The Invented Child (Silverfish Review Press 2013), winner of the 2014 Literary Award in Poetry from the Library of Virginia, and Afternoon in Cartago (Ashland Poetry Press 2022), winner of the Richard Snyder Memorial Publication Prize. Her work has appeared in The Hampden-Sydney PoetryReview, Image, Poetry, Blackbird, and other journals. She attended Vassar College and the University of North Carolina, and she received her MFA in poetry from the University of Florida. She lives with her family in Richmond.

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