You must use YOUR name on the checkout form, because your name is on the credit card you are using to make the purchase. However, you can put the gift recipient's name and email address in the spaces further down on the checkout form that ask for: "Name of Student, if Different from Person Paying" and "Email of Student, if Different from Person Paying." That way we will know who the gift certificate is for, for our records. But the automated purchase confirmation and receipt emails will go only to you, the purchaser.

We don't send printed or emailed gift certificates. You will need to present the gift to your recipient in the form of a card, note or verbal communication.

Gift recipients can then simply call the Writing Salon, give us their name (we keep a records of gift certificates that have been purchased), and tell us which workshop they want to take. If they want to take a longer class, they can simply pay the additional amount. Please remember, gift certificates are good for only one year from date of purchase.

"If ghosts and witches, lost loves and conflict were good enough for Homer, Shakespeare, and Dante," says Nick Mamatas, "they're good enough for me. A genre is like a toolbox—good writers go beyond formula and use the tools of their trade to build and make real what nobody else could imagine."

Whether you're ready to be the next Nora Roberts, or simply have a great idea for an urban fantasy series, we'll get your ideas into shape—eliminate the clichés, perfect the voice of your characters, and create gripping plots—with an eye toward submission and publication. In addition to workshopping of stories or novel chapters, we'll explore the current marketplace for both short fiction and novels, and practice skills that writers need regardless of genres in which they write.

"Genre doesn't mean generic," Nick says. "This is not a place to learn the secret handshake or a class where you'll learn the basic outline for a by-the-numbers story. Instead, we're writing to add to the great traditions of stories we already love."

Nick Mamatas is the author of three novels: Under My Roof (Counterpoint), Move Under Ground (Prime Books), and the forthcoming Sensation (PM Press). He's also published over sixty short stories in genre magazines, literary journals, and anthologies, some of which were recently collected in You Might Sleep... (Prime Books). His fiction has been nominated for both the Bram Stoker and International Horror Guild awards, and as editor of the online magazine Clarkesworld Nick has been nominated for the World Fantasy award and science fiction's Hugo award. He currently teaches online at Western Connecticut State University, edits science fiction and fantasy for VIZ Media, and is awaiting the release of his next anthology, Haunted Legends (Tor Books), co-edited with Ellen Datlow.

This workshop, designed for both beginning and experienced writers, will provide practice and guidance to illuminate and enrich creative projects exploring the events, people, places, and inner worlds of childhood.

“My goal is to help memoirists, fiction writers, and poets write faithfully and evocatively about the girls and boys that they — or their fictional characters — once were,” says instructor Kathleen McClung.When you come to this workshop, try to bring a sense of wonder and curiosity about the past. That, along with some readings, discussion, and writing exercises, will help light the way back to a time long ago.

Kathleen McClung has mentored hundreds of writers at Skyline College, the Writing Salon, and other colleges, and she has taught/advised student teachers in the credential program at Mills College. She has also edited books at small presses including UCSF Nursing Press, Food First Books, and Westview Press. Her memoir, fiction, and poetry have been published in Spirituality & Health, The Rambler, Hawaii Pacific Review, Poetry Northwest, Tiny Lights, Hot Flashes, off our backs and elsewhere, and her work has received awards from the Soul-Making Literary Competition, Memoirs Ink., San Francisco Bay Guardian, Writers Digest, the National Society of Arts & Letters, and the Academy of American Poets.

The best fiction is inhabited by distinctive and complex characters. These characters seem so real that readers see them, hear them speak, and feel compelled to keep reading. Good fiction also requires characters that develop and change over the course of a short story or a novel. But their changes must be convincing, otherwise the story just doesn’t work.

In this workshop we’ll learn techniques to create convincing and compelling characters. We’ll clarify what is meant by terms such as character development and character arc. We’ll also do exercises designed to help us go deeper into the process of creating fictional characters. And we’ll talk about how, as writers, we manage a cast of characters in our stories. We’ll also look at how character development is inextricably linked with structure and plot.

Designed for writers of all levels, this workshop will leave you inspired and excited about your fiction, and with some concrete tools to help you to improve your work

Elaine Beale's most recent novel, Another Life Altogether, has so far received positive reviews from the Boston Globe, Lambda Literary, and Publishers Weekly, and was featured in Oprah Magazine as one of the ten must-read books of March 2010. Elaine has taught creative writing for more than a decade and is also teaching our Berkeley Novel Writing class, as well as occasional short workshops on plot development and mystery writing.

" The first ten, twenty or hundred times writing and revising the poem are a discovery process. What more is there underneath the poem? What leaps can you make? What gems can you uncover?

"A poem is a nest built out of the twigs and ribbons of ordinary words. Poets are like magpies — stealing images, details, scraps of dialogue, and the flotsam and jetsam of everyday life to construct their nests, nests that enable consciousness to fly."

In this class, you will spend some time giving and receiving feedback, says Alison, but the main focus will be on in-class writing exercises and discussions to help you generate more and better material. You will focus on process over product, on going deeper rather than rushing to find closure.

Alison Luterman's first book of poems, The Largest Possible Life, was published by Cleveland State University Press. Her second book See How We Almost Fly won the Pearl Poetry Prize in 2008 and is now available from Pearl Editions. Two of her poems appear on The Library of Congress website as part of the Poetry 180 project that former poet laureate Billy Collins initiated. One of her poems was featured for several years on BART in the mid-90's and another poem, "I Confess" was on view for commuters in Portland's public transit system. She has had poems published in many magazines and anthologies, including The Sun, Poetry East, Oberon, Kalliope, The Brooklyn Review, Salt River Review and others. She has taught poetry to thousands of children through California Poets in the schools, and to adults at Esalen Institute, Omega Institute, the Santa Barbara Writer's Conference, and The Mendocino Coast Writer's Conference.

What special something must be drawn out in order to make it meaningful to people other than you? "Each story is unique and has its own special needs," says Jamey Genna. "Writing a story outline or first draft can be a fulfilling experience, but once you've gotten that far, you've got to start digging deeper and ask yourself, Have I truly tapped into the heart of my story?"

In this class you'll dig deeper and get closer to finding the heart of your stories. "Writing isn’t about feeling intimidated by or superior to your classmates," says Jamey. "It’s about jumping in, getting ideas and words onto the page, and then discussing those words with other like-minded souls. In this hands-on workshop, we’ll start by reading handouts that focus on one element of craft each week. Then we’ll dive in and do writing exercises related to those handouts. Everyone will bring in at least one story or story excerpt for group feedback and discussion."

Jamey Genna received her masters in writing from the USF, where she is also a major projects advisor. Her short fiction has been in many literary magazines including Storyglossia, Cutthroat, Dislocate, Shade, Pinyon, and Georgetown Review. Her short story “Stories I heard when I went home for my grandmother’s funeral” was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Her collection of fiction Nobody Has to Die for It to Tell You Something was both a finalist for the Ontario Prize and a semifinalist for the Iowa Prize. Her collection of short-short fiction I’ll Tell You That Story in a Minute was a finalist for the 2007 Elixir Press Chapbook Awards.

This overview class will give you a taste of food writing in all its variations: magazine and newspaper features, literary memoir, blogging, recipes and reviews. You’ll also learn which ingredients constitute an irresistible cookbook proposal.

Instructor Dianne Jacob will lead you through exercises designed to bring your simmering creativity and style to a boil, focusing on the senses, memory, and place.

Dianne Jacob is the author of Will Write for Food: The Complete Guide to Writing Cookbooks, Restaurant Reviews, Articles, Memoir, Fiction, and More, used as a textbook at the Culinary Institute of America; and Grilled Pizzas & Piadinas, co-authored with chef Craig Priebe. She has been published in Writer’s Digest, Salon, Sunset, Gastronomica, The San Francisco Chronicle and elsewhere, and has won two national awards as a top editor of magazines and interactive books. Dianne also judges the international cookbook awards of the James Beard Society and the International Association of Culinary Professionals, and was a finalist for the Bert Green Award for Food Journalism. She blogs about food writing at Will Write for Food.

“Many poets and memoirists attempt to write about the hardest aspects of our own lives,” says Ruth L. Schwartz. “Yet we face many technical, emotional and even spiritual challenges in doing so.”

This class is open to writers working in all genres, and offers a variety of resources, approaches and techniques to help you rise to those challenges. We’ll read and discuss published examples; we’ll do a range of writing exercises; we’ll explore the use of visualization, humor, the variety of forms available to us, and much more. In the process, we’ll find ways to both honor our own stories, and do justice to the enormous, messy, magnificent complexity of the truth. Ultimately, we’ll expand the range of (e)motion available to us, as writers and as human beings.

Due to the sensitivity of the subject matter, discussion of participants’ own writing will be carefully structured and completely optional.

Ruth L. Schwartz is the author of four award-winning books of poems, including Edgewater, a 2001 National Poetry Series winner selected by Jane Hirshfield. Her memoir, Death in Reverse, documents the year following her donation of a kidney to her former partner. Her poems and essays have appeared frequently in The Sun (sometimes under a pseudonym, at the editors’ request), and she has received numerous literary fellowships, honors and prizes. Ruth is currently a Distinguished Visiting Writer in the low-residency M.F.A. program at Ashland University and also teaches privately. In addition, she is a practicing hypnotherapist and shaman who honors and wrestles with pain, beauty and truth in all their disguises.

Or maybe you need a boost to your creativity that will help your words flow.

“We live such busy lives,” says instructor Elaine Beale. “Demands come at us from all directions. It can be very challenging to make the time to write. Besides, writing creatively requires a level of inner stillness and disconnection from the busyness that surrounds us. Sometimes we simply need to take a day to reconnect with our creative selves.

“This workshop will be chock-full of discussions and exercises designed to jump-start participants’ writing and reignite their imaginations. It will be a supportive and inspiring place where creative sparks will fly and you’ll get lots down on the page.”

Elaine will also provide advice and materials designed to help participants maintain a writing practice after the workshop is over. “Ideally,” she says, “I want everyone to leave with a renewed commitment to their creative selves, as well as concrete techniques that will help them convert that commitment to actual writing.”

Elaine Beale's most recent novel, Another Life Altogether, has so far received positive reviews from the Boston Globe, Lambda Literary, and Publishers Weekly, and was featured in Oprah Magazine as one of the ten must-read books of March 2010. Elaine has taught creative writing for more than a decade and is also teaching our Berkeley Novel Writing class, as well as occasional short workshops on plot development and mystery writing.

And one of the fundamental ingredients to strong writing is the art of paying close attention — to details, to rhythm and sound, to language, to characters.

Good writing, no matter what genre, helps us to see the world anew, to take pleasure in the smallest things. A travel essay brings us the smells of a Guatemalan village at dawn, the rhythmic sounds of tortillas being flattened in the hands of a village woman. A poem can show us an ordinary table as 'a fabulous ship /bearing bunches of fruit ("Ode to a Table" —Pablo Neruda).'”

"In this class you'll experiment with writing fiction, creative nonfiction and poetry," says Aurora. "You'll live for nine weeks as writers – paying attention to the world around you and translating your experience into language, tasting life twice, or even three times! Our classroom will be a creativity laboratory. We will do writing exercises, read aloud, look at art, listen to music, study maps and old photographs, tell jokes and make up fables. I'll give you exercises and assignments that will help you build vivid worlds and emotionally gripping stories. Our readings and conversations will teach you more about craft. And the practice of paying close attention will teach you to savor the details of your every day lives."

Students need not have any prior experience with creative writing. This class is about discovering your innate creativity!

Aurora Brackett loves to teach as much as she loves to write. She has an MFA in Creative Writing from San Francisco State University and has taught there, at Johns Hopkins University and at College of Alameda. Her stories and poems has been published or are forthcoming in Cosmopsis Quarterly, Alimentum Journal, Tinfish, The Portland Review and Fourteen Hills. She has been awarded residencies at the Vermont Studio Center and Hedgebrook.

It’s the equivalent of, say, an aspiring carpenter who has committed to building a beautiful house, yet doesn’t know how to hammer in a nail or saw a piece of wood.”

In this class, you’ll develop concrete skills and narrative techniques through fun writing exercises designed to help you master your craft. At the end of five weeks, you’ll have a better grip on how to use these techniques (for developing character, setting and plot) as tools for building your story. The class will also analyze other narrative genres, from movie scenes to comic books, to analyze storytelling skills you can apply to your fiction writing.

NOTE: We used to always tell people to take this class BEFORE taking the 9-week Fiction Workshop. However, we’ve discovered that some people have actually found it just as valuable to take the 9-week Fiction Workshop first, and this one second! In fact, Junse has had quite a few MFA creative writing graduates who take this “intro” class — and, of course, they’ve already taken tons of other fiction writing classes! So it’s really up to you. We don’t have any strict “rules” about it.

Junse Kim, like many Writing Salon students, didn’t begin to pursue a writing life until well after graduating from college. Before ever taking a writing class, he worked as a concert promoter, Peace Corps volunteer, managerial consultant, scriptwriter, nonprofit fundraiser, and “full-time” temp. He has since received a Pushcart Prize (for his short story Yangban), a Faulkner Award, and the Philip Roth Residence in Creative Writing at Bucknell University. His fiction and creative nonfiction have been published in the Ontario Review, ZYZZYVA, and Cimarron Review, as well as two anthologies: Pushcart Prize XXVII and Echoes Upon Echoes: New Korean American Writing.

"But how do you make a character sympathetic? How do you establish a compelling desire? How do you structure rising tension so that the Hollywood Reader keeps turning the page? That's the art and the craft of screenwriting."

In this class, every aspect of writing your screenplay will be explored in the following five stages:

Story Concept; Characters; Plot Structure; Individual Scenes; Writing Visually. "As in my nine-week class," says Terrel, "my approach is to teach by personal example, to provide a professional insider's look at the screenwriting process. By studying scripts of well known movies and referencing my own work, I'll take you through the process of choosing and writing a viable story premise, and then how to work that premise into a feature length screenplay." Writing assignments (for those who want to do them) will encourge students to develop an idea, or to hone an already written screenplay into a more polished spec script.

Terrel Seltzer is a self-taught screenwriter. She learned the craft by watching and outlining literally hundreds of movies. Her career started in the Bay Area, working with SF director Wayne Wang, for whom she wrote the screenplays for the independent films Chan is Missing and Dim Sum. Her two produced Hollywood screenplays are How I Got into College (with Lara Flynn Boyle and Anthony Edwards) and One Fine Day (with Michelle Pfeiffer and George Cloony). Currently she has two scripts in active development, one with Reese Witherspoon attached to star and the other with Uma Thurman.

Mah Jongg, an ancient Chinese game also known as the "game of sparrows" has come to Berkeley. In this class you'll hear all about the game's fascinating history as you learn (by hands-on doing) the basics of how to play.

Taught by Toby Alice Salk, a 25-year Mah Jongg aficionado, the class will include a Mah Jongg card (for American Mah Jongg) and rule book (both from the National Mah Jongg League). Toby will also bring a bevy of show and tell items, including some spectacular Mah Jongg sets in bone, bamboo and bakelite.

"I've been listening to the tiles of Mah Jongg" all my life," Toby says. [The game is played with dice, racks, and 144 domino-like tiles.] "You could say it's in my blood. I'm just following in the footsteps of my grandmother, mother, and aunts." She has taught Mah Jongg to scores of lucky students in Marin, the East Bay and San Francisco.

NOTE: No, this isn't a writing class, but Toby has a special relationship with the Writing Salon so...think of it as a delightful departure from our norm — a way to take a little break from the realm of writing. Let your current writing project sit, get some distance from it, and return with with a more objective eye that will lead to a better revision.

maybe you shy away from talking about it with your co-workers, neighbors or brother-in-law (you know the way he rolls his eyes and calls you a dreamer). So come to this workshop instead, where you’ll meet other people who are doing what you’re doing, or want to do. “We’ll talk about your idea, how to make sure it has enough weight to carry a novel,” say Karen Bjorneby. “We’ll talk about your character and make sure she’s so compelling we all can’t wait to find out what she’ll do next. . . what changes is she going to go through along the way? We’ll talk about plot; how are you going to make enough things happen? Or how are you going to keep from being melodramatic? We’ll talk about structure—how do you organize this huge thing and not get overwhelmed?

“We’ll share tips on the process, on getting the pages written, on keeping going, on when to go back and revise and when to keep moving ahead. And of course we’ll be talking about the nuts and bolts of craft—making your scenes work and your voice sing.”

With the help of various writing exercises, class members will work on developing written plot summaries, making sure there’s enough action and enough character development. “Our goal is to get you so close to your main character you’ll know all his secrets, hopes, fears, dreams…better than his own therapist would!” says Karen “We’ll also do writing exercises to help you connect with your setting. And we’ll share what you’ve written, so that you’ll get feedback on your craft, your style, and on that special quality you bring to your writing that makes it uniquely yours.”

Karen Bjorneby started writing by participating in workshops just like this one. She is the author of Hurricane Season: Stories from the Eye of the Storm, which received a Foreword Honorable Mention as best independent/university press short story collection of the year at Book Expo America. She has received a Pushcart Special Mention, two other Pushcart nominations, a National Magazine Award nomination, and she was named a Tennessee Williams Scholar at the Sewanee Writers’ Conference. Her fiction and poetry have appeared in nearly two dozen publications including The Threepenny Review, The North American Review, New Letters, StoryQuarterly, Confrontation, The New Orleans Review, The Nebraska Review, and The Sun. She is currently at work on her own novel and is “very familiar with the pitfalls along the way, having fallen into several of them myself.”

For the first four weeks, instructor Alison Luterman will lead carefully crafted writing exercises designed to elicit the undertones and overtones that give events resonance and elevate anecdotes into the realm of art. The latter weeks will be dedicated to refining and then workshopping the pieces you have begun, bringing them to the next level of craft.

"Every one of us is neck-deep in the middle of our own long and winding stories, stories that, when shared, can help us bridge the gap between ourselves and the rest of the world," says Alison. "What's wonderful about finding and honing these stories - about being a writer, in fact, is that...it redeems everything, even the moment of burning shame when you flunked the driving test three times, even the fact that you could never decide what you wanted to be when you grew up. It reminds you that once you were twenty and limber and unafraid to sleep in the cornfield when hitchhiking across France. And, like the smell of fresh coffee or a first kiss, it heightens the senses. We'll workshop your essays or memoir excerpts from the standpoint of craft, voice, and structure, using the techniques of fiction writing, playwriting, and even poetry to enliven your writing."

Alison Luterman has been shamelessly telling tales from her own life ever since she could grip a sweaty pencil. She has published essays in The Sun, Radiance, Response, The East Bay Express, and The Boston Phoenix. Her book of poems, The Largest Possible Life, won The Cleveland State University Poetry Prize, and a recent poem, "The Quilts from Gee's Bend, Alabama," won the latest Writer's Digest poetry award. Her play, Saying Kaddish with My Sister will be produced in January of '08 by the Jewish Ensemble Theatre of Michigan. She has taught poetry to thousands of school children through California Poets in the schools, and is an adjunct creative writing instructor at New College. She also performs improvisational dance, singing, storytelling and poetry through the Wing It! performance ensemble. She has given workshops and readings around the country.

"In this class, we’ll look at some good examples of the genre," says Alison Luterman. "We’ll play improvisation games to limber up our imaginations, we’ll do writing exercises to help us create characters and situations, and we’ll each write a ten-minute play. We’ll also share our material in dramatic readings."

Come prepared to laugh, risk, play, explore, and refine your understanding of this versatile form.

Alison Luterman has written Saying Kaddish With My Sister, a full-length play which had staged readings and productions in San Francisco, Seattle, New York City, and West Bloomington, Michigan. She has also written several one-act plays: Oasis, which was produced by No Nude Men Theatre Company, See How We Almost Fly, a choreopoem produced by Mendana Dance Theatre Company, Glitter and Spew, and Hot Water which will be produced by Actual Content Theatre Company in New York. She is currently working on another full-length play and a series of ten-minute plays.