Upcoming Classes

Switch to Calendar View

• Generative Fiction IV

  • Start
    January 15, 2025
  •  
  • End
    March 05, 2025
  •  
  • Schedule
    8 sessions
  • Location
    Online via Zoom
  • Spaces left
    1

  This class session is open to previous participants of Generative Fiction I, II, and III. Previous participants will receive a registration code to complete registration and payment.

  Generative Fiction IV will take place online via Zoom. You will receive your link and other information directly from the instructor.

  Class will start 1/15/25 and run through 3/5/25, from 6:30 PM to 8:30 PM.

  A minimum of 6 people is required.

  
  

  
  

  Show details
• Short and Sweet: Structure in Short Nonfiction (Tod Olson)

  • When
    February 22, 2025
  •  
    10:00 AM - 1:00 PM
  • Location
    Zoom — link will be shared by instructor
  • Spaces left
    8

  Register

  Description:

  Everyone has a great personal story to tell, but how do you tell it well? What’s the heart of the story? What makes a good lead? A good ending? What’s the through-line? We’ll discuss some general principles, then take apart a couple of short narrative essays (yes, a little bit of pre-reading) to see how they work. Bring your own work in progress—a short essay, a chapter of a memoir, or just the germ of an idea. During the second half of class we’ll apply what we’ve talked about to your work. The class is designed to give writers of any level of experience some tools to create well-crafted personal essays or memoir chapters.

   Instructor Bio:

  Tod Olson is author of award-winning narrative nonfiction for middle-grade and young adult readers, including Into the Clouds: The Race to Climb the World’s Most Dangerous Mountain, the narrative nonfiction series LOST, and the historical fiction series How to Get Rich. He has traveled the country to report on the school shooting at Columbine, the murder of Matthew Shepard, drunk driving accidents, homeless kids, and other only slightly more uplifting topics. He has 30 years of experience as an editor and book developer for the education and school/library markets, and as a writer for Scholastic’s classroom magazines. He holds an MFA from Vermont College of the Fine Arts.

  Show details
• The Art of Losing: Poems on Love and Loss (Margaret Mackinnon)

  • When
    March 01, 2025
  •  
    1:00 PM - 5:00 PM
  • Location
    WriterHouse
  • Spaces left
    0

  Join waitlist

  Description:

  In her famous villanelle, “One Art,” Elizabeth Bishop describes a series of losses, from “door keys” and “the hour badly spent” to houses, cities, and even a significant loved one who is now gone. Her piece is an eloquent example of how poetry can be a means of exploring the intertwined experiences of love and loss. Poetry is one way we can speak about the ongoing presence of what is now absent. In this one-day seminar, we will look at how poems can reflect love and loss, whether that is the loss of a person, a place, or another part of our lives. We will be discussing contemporary examples of this theme, including Donald Justice’s “Men at Forty,” which looks back at a man’s lost younger years, and W.S. Merwin’s “For A Coming Extinction,” a poem that laments the potential future loss of an entire species. We will spend some of our time together reading and discussing the work of other writers, and we will also look at poems shared by members of the class.

  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 Poetry Review, 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.

  Show details
• Write On! Summer Camp for Middle Grade Writers

  • Start
    July 14, 2025
  •  
    11:00 AM
  • End
    July 18, 2025
  •  
    3:00 PM
  • Location
    WriterHouse

  Register

  Description:

  For Rising 6th to Rising 8th Grade Students

  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 selections 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 James 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.

  
  

  
  

  Show details
• Write On! Summer Camp for High School Writers

  • Start
    July 21, 2025
  •  
    11:00 AM
  • End
    July 25, 2025
  •  
    3:00 PM
  • Location
    WriterHouse

  Register

  Description:

  For Rising 9th to Rising 12th Grade Students

  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. 

  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.

  
  

  
  

  
  

  Show details