Every Word Matters: Making Sentences That Scream

One Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. (this class is not currently scheduled)
$95 members/$110 others San Francisco

Avoiding boring writing isn’t enough. “My sentences almost always come out perfectly adequate,” Matt Stewart admits, “but that’s not enough to stand out from the flood of middling writing out there. Also, I don’t know about you, but I didn’t get into writing to write ‘okay’ sentences. Life is too short to write—or read—average work.”

Matt’s workshop will give you a jolt of language-centric adrenaline to help you craft electrifying prose and cut below-par copy, while avoiding the perils of overwriting. You’ll deconstruct work from prose masters and identify literary wordplay techniques to capture reader attention, all in service of driving your story and character development.

“Think of this session as the writing equivalent of a caged-match wrestling showdown,” Matt says, “with unimaginative text playing the role of the Andre the Giant bad guy. The enemy may be big and hairy, but with the right moves and a dedicated work ethic you’ll be able to pin down the problem for good.”

Come ready to write. You’ll tackle a series of writing exercises, get constructive feedback, and start honing strategies for turbocharging sentences in your own style.

Matt Stewart’s debut novel, The French Revolution, has been deemed “wildly imaginative,” “brilliant,” and “an excellent achievement,” and was named a Notable Debut by Poets & Writers. He’s mildly infamous for releasing the novel on Twitter first. His stories have been published in Instant City, The Millions, McSweeney’s, Opium Magazine and more, and he blogs for The Huffington Post and The Nervous Breakdown. Learn more at http://matt-stewart.com.