By Bethany Peterson/nw news editor
Students can get advice on all genres of creative writing as well as learn how to break into the publishing world at the NW Campus SNaP Creative Writing Conference Feb. 27.
Workshops will be held from 8:30–11:30 a.m. with a question-and-answer time before the lunch and keynote speaker at 12:30 p.m. A book signing will be held after lunch.
NW English department members are involved in the conference, either teaching a workshop or facilitating one. Guest speakers include screenwriter Jon Keeyes, novelist Julie Kenner and 2005 Texas Poet Laureate Alan Birkelbach.
Kenner will talk during lunch about life as a full-time author.
“The highs and lows, and the process of getting a book from idea to the shelf,” she said.
She has written more than 30 books, including Carpe Demon: Adventures of a Demon-Hunting Soccer Mom.
Keeyes and Birkelbach will each conduct a workshop.
James Hunter, NW English instructor, will conduct the Writers’ Block and Description, a workshop to help writers get over that initial hump and then make their work engaging by good use of descriptions.
“Descriptions get a bad wrap,” Hunter said. “If you do it well, it becomes intimately tied to the action.”
He wants students to come out with some words on paper to start with and fearing writing a little less.
Students’ writing is sometimes flat and ineffective because the descriptions are flat, Hunter said.
Likewise, Alice Shen plans to have students write some in her workshop END OF PLAY … Now What? She will give a situation or a set of nouns, verbs and adjectives and ask students to create a play idea to share with the group.
She plans to teach how drama is different from fiction writing but also how to market for the theater.
Her first play Entitled won the SE Theatre Conference’s 2010 Charles M. Getchell New Play Award.
Several students have been active in offering ideas and doing some light work arranging the conference.
Student Connie Bensen created several graphic ideas for SNaP, including the chosen icon.
