Teen Writers Workshop
Wes Martin, Grantee
This year’s Central Coast Writer’s Conference teen writing program focused on writing short fiction in the horror genre, and the title of the workshop was “Teen Writers Workshop: Writing Horror, Weird, & Dark Fantasy Short Fiction.” The workshop was held virtually on September 25th, 2021 from 9:00am-1:00pm and was led by speculative fiction writer Nancy R. Lambert after a keynote address by the bestselling writer Jonathan Maberry. We decided to focus on horror this year because horror stories are often a way to deal with and explore individual and social fears as well as various types of social injustice, and 2021 seemed like a good year for helping young people explore those concerns and use their creative voices with a purpose.
During the workshop, 25 attendees between the ages of 13-19 discussed topics like developing compelling characters, using story structure to control pacing, and establishing tone with setting, dialogue, and word choice. They participated in brainstorming sessions, writing sprints, and opportunities to share their works-in-progress. By the end of this interactive workshop, attendees had the start they needed to help them craft, revise, and complete a short story. Participants will be encouraged to enter the 2021 CCWC Teen Writing Contest titled, “Stories that Unsettle.” A panel of judges will select the final stories, and Nancy Lambert, the workshop leader, will select the winner. She has also volunteered to give feedback to the finalists, which will be of such great value to these young writers.
Because of the contribution from Do Good Grants, the winning story and finalists will be published together as a short story collection to honor the creative work of these teenagers. In addition, to help participants continue to strengthen their short story writing skills, they have each been given two short story anthologies: Don’t Turn Out the Lights (middle grade) and Monster Boys and Slasher Girls (young adult). Both of these collections include stories by renowned writers, and they provide great models for the workshop participants. Do Good Grants made it possible to provide the participants with these books.
