Mondays, May 3 – 24 (4 weeks)
8 – 9:30 p.m. EST | Online via Google Meet  |  Register to receive link

There are decisions we make (about entry point, tone, point of view, conflict, stakes, and more) in our opening pages that set us up for stories that practically write themselves, or for ones that are bound to run quickly out of steam.

In this four-week class, we will examine and edit student work (on a volunteer basis) in class, helping bring the potential in each piece to the fore as early as possible. We will also study some masterful published first pages to see what works, and we’ll geek out about arc, momentum, and language, winding up with concrete takeaways, writing exercises, and strategies for revision.

This class is appropriate for anyone writing creative prose (fiction or nonfiction), and for students of all levels and backgrounds.

Rebecca Makkai’s latest novel, The Great Believers, was a finalist for both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award; it was the winner of the ALA Carnegie Medal, the Stonewall Book Award, the LA Times Book Prize, the Clark Fiction Prize, the Midwest Independent Booksellers Award, and the Chicago Review of Books Award; and it was one of the New York Times’ Ten Best Books of 2018. Her other books are the novels The Borrower and The Hundred-Year House, and the collection Music for Wartime — four stories from which appeared in The Best American Short Stories. Rebecca is on the MFA faculties of Sierra Nevada College and Northwestern University. She is Artistic Director of StoryStudio Chicago. Visit her at RebeccaMakkai.com or on twitter@rebeccamakkai.

Scholarships Available for MDC Students

Miami Book Fair is offering two (2) full-tuition scholarship for MDC students interested in attending the above-listed creative writing workshop. Applicants must be currently-enrolled, (full time or part time) degree-seeking Miami Dade College students with a demonstrated financial need.

To Apply for a Scholarship:

Scholarship application due 3 business days before workshop starts (Due Tuesday, April 27, 11:59 p.m. EST)

Please send an email to Marci Cancio-Bello, Miami Book Fair programs coordinator at mcanciob@mdc.edu before the start of the workshop you would like to attend. The message must include your contact information, the title of the workshop you’d like to take, a short statement of financial need, your MDC class schedule, and a writing sample. First-time writers who lack a writing sample should submit a statement explaining their interest in the workshop.