Odyssey class time is split between workshopping sessions and lectures.  An advanced, comprehensive curriculum covers the elements of fiction writing in depth. Students learn the tools and techniques necessary to strengthen their writing.  
The workshop runs from June 8th to July 17th, 2009.  Class meets for four hours in the morning, five days a ( Read more... )

Tracking my million words of crap.
grahamfielding  added his own crap lineup over on his blog, so I thought I'd see where I was at:

One completed novel     92,560 (plus AT LEAST 10,000 handwritten stuff I tossed)

3 partial novels 42,750; 37376; 4000

19 Short stories currently on my computer at an average of 5000 each = 95000

screenplays 12413; 7762; 6000
( Read more... )

I am way late to the dairy with this one, but the Odyssey Class of '08 page is up. We are darling, and I'm still stunned by the brilliance of our class quote, chosen via a last minute mutiny.
Speaking of which, applications for Odyssey are due by April 8th. If you've been considering attending a writing workshop, definitely look into Odyssey. I had ( Read more... )

I managed to drag my arse to the P.O. on Tuesday and mail a story out for the WotF contest at what was pretty much the last minute. This was the alien story I wrote at Odyssey, which Sara King actually prodded me to write because she claimed it was easier to get noticed in WotF with science fiction rather than fantasy. We shall see now, shan't we?

First--how can there be SO MANY people in this city? At 2 in the afternoon, I had assumed the bus and grocery store would be mostly empty. Nope, not in San Francisco. At least, not in the summer ( Read more... )

 I have figured out what I want to be when I grow up: Nancy Kress.

I semi-succeeded. Oh, there are still holes to plug, of course, but some people even liked it. I wrote a story with no blood and very little death! Who knew.

Today we talked about more of the details and mechanics of writing--the things that are hard to do on purpose. Things like putting the most important information in a sentance at the very ( Read more... )

 I decided that many of my favorite stories are those sweet, simple kind of stories that just get you in the gut. You finish it and go, "Oh. How lovely." But I never write those stories. I write about blood and death and betrayal--all awesome in their own way. But it seemed like a good time, being at Odyssey, to take a shot at one ( Read more... )

So that story I was rewriting for Nancy Kress? I have no idea if I actually made it any better. But I sure added a thousand words. I hard-core added them.
Why yes I do have a tag for "i suck at rewriting." How nice of you to ask.

I am supposed to be rewriting a story for Nancy Kress RIGHT NOW. And I couldn't bear it if I disappointed her. Yet here I am, distracted by LJ. Curses ( Read more... )