Tag: Grand Lake

Interviews, Uncategorized

Flash Fiction: The Crush that Blossomed into a Love Affair–an interview with Marcy Dilworth

Nancy Stohlman

Marcy

Kathy and I are thrilled that we will be working with Marcy Dilworth for the first time this August in the gorgeous Rocky Mountains of Grand Lake. Here Marcy and I chat about flash fiction, best writing advice, and even exchange some favorite quotes.

Nancy Stohlman: The biggest challenge most writers have is finding the time to write. How do you “retreat” in your day-to-day life in order to honor your creativity?

Marcy Dilworth: Argh. I’ve worked really hard to create time to write. And have succeeded. Except for the part about reflexively succumbing to distractions. Whether they’re of the social media variety, or the false necessity of ticking something off my endless list of to-dos (which we all have, whether they’re written or not!), or the household chore that shouts my name (also a false call – if I weren’t writing, I certainly wouldn’t be filling my free time with vacuuming), or fill-in-the-blank, I struggle with shutting them out. But I keep trying! The best motivation to block all that out is to remind myself how good it feels, how satisfying, to be immersed in writing something I value.

Tell us about your relationship with flash fiction?

My relationship with flash fiction? It started as a crush when I met FF in a wonderful class led by Caroline Bock. Over time, it’s blossomed into a love affair, albeit one where I still have much to learn about my partner.

I LOVE that description! What is the best piece of writing advice you ever received?

Read your writing out loud. Hearing your story amplifies rhythm, tone, awkward phrasing, even logical gaps. Sometimes it’s a happy surprise; nearly always, it reveals things that can be improved, tightened or eliminated.

That is one of my favorite pieces of advice as well! What piece of your own writing are you most proud of?  Where can we read it (if it’s available)?

I’ve published one creative non-fiction piece and the rest fiction. Because the CNF is about my mom, and it’s close to my heart, it’s the piece of which I’m proudest. I’m so grateful to Literary Mama for choosing this, Orange Communion.

Wow, this is gorgeous. And I also know you are also funny–I love the piece you shared with me from the “red sweater” Flashnano Prompt: North Pole Bombshell.  So, have you ever been to Colorado before? What are you most looking forward to?

I’ve been to Denver a couple times – decades ago for a business conference, and last summer for a day-long layover. I’m looking forward to experiencing the real Colorado, mountains, crisp air, sky clear and unencumbered by suburbia’s light pollution, quiet, green . . . I’ve been enjoying it in prospect ever since I signed up for the retreat!

Yes, Grand Lake and Shadowcliff are really the jewel of all that is “real Colorado. Respond to this quote about mountains: “He who climbs upon the highest mountains laughs at all tragedies, real or imaginary.” ― Friedrich Nietzsche

Nietzsche is not known for being comforting, but that’s how I read this. It’s a suitable companion to a quote I come across in my “Writing Ideas” document every week or two – “There are seven billion people on this Earth and I have the audacity to think I matter.” – George Watsky. These quotes prompt me to let go of the irritations, worries and in-the-moment problems that cloud my vision, and just get on with it – where ‘it’ is doing what good I can and leaving the rest.

I love that Watsky quote, thanks for sharing it (I love quotes if you can’t tell)! Finally–tell us something we don’t know about you?

I love basketball, played in high school, coached my son’s team for many years, and am a feverish fan of the University of Virginia Cavaliers. I’ve got the season tickets (in the nosebleeds) to prove it!

Anything else you want to add?

I smile dreamily every time I think about “High Altitude Inspiration in Grand Lake.” This is going to be great!

Me too! We are so excited to have you and work with you in person, Marcy! Thanks for taking the time to chat with me!

Marcy Dilworth has been writing short fiction and nonfiction forever, but only recently started inviting anyone to witness it. Her stories have been published in Blink-Ink’s 10th Anniversary edition, Literary Mama, Writer’s Resist and 72 Hours of Insanity: Anthology of the Games: Volume 7. She earned her English degree at the University of Virginia, and her sense of humor and wonder from her kids. She lives in her recently emptied nest with her husband and their precocious rescue pup, Kirby.

Marcy’s Twitter address: @MCDHoo41.

Uncategorized

Honoring the Voices in Our Heads: Retreat Participant Lisa Trigg Shares a Micro

Kathy Fish

Do you have a character, a story, a voice that won’t let you go? Likely this is for a reason! Lisa Trigg, who will be joining us in Yviers, France for our French Connection Retreat , shares with us just such a voice in her micro below:

Hazel Currie Asks Who is that Talking?

by Lisa Trigg

Here I am, falling in love with exactly the wrong woman wondering how I have let this happen. And the voice said, in parentheses (well, this is how it works. You don’t know.  You just don’t know what you want until you have it in your arms, smiling up at you, cracking jokes at your books, all those shoes in your basement, how often your watch tells you to breathe and drink water, and how much you talk to Alexa. You start remembering things you never thought of or dreamt about or read in any of your books. Suck it up).

What I want to know is.  Who is it that talks in parentheses?  Just who is it?

 

Lisa has a whole series of “Hazel Currie” stories and explains her inspiration for them:

“Hazel Currie started talking in my head when I was about 20 years old.  She tells me stories, points out things that I should pay attention to, remember. She reminds me of things that I have forgotten that might be important, useful, that I should write down. She reminds me if I already have notes on a subject.  She does not usually know where those notes are. She is persistent and does not shut up until I write down what she says and I have done so since the beginning.  It’s the only way I can get anything else done.  I’ve been evaluated, and no, I do not need medication. To learn to make use of what she tells me, I regularly attend master writing workshops with writers that I admire, do close readings, work with a private writing coach, read craft books, other stuff that I have forgotten.”

 

(Note: Our French Connection Retreat is sold out, but registrations are now open for our return to Grand Lake, Colorado in August for High Altitude Inspiration in the Great American West. We’d love for you to join us!)

Uncategorized

Know anyone who could use a half-price writers’ retreat? Special deal on Writing Wild in Costa Rica!

Kathy Fish

Limited-Time Opportunity for a Half-Price Flash Fiction Retreat in Costa Rica, March 2020!

With the purchase of one all-inclusive retreat package, get a 2nd one for half off!

Invite a friend to join you for our Writing Wild in Costa Rica Retreat March 21st-27th & gift them with the half-priced fee (as low as $725 all-inclusive) OR register together and split the savings! We can only extend this deep discount to the first TWO pairs of writers to register. If interested, act soon! 

Your all-inclusive fee includes:

  • Six nights accommodation 
  • Three Delicious, Ayurvedic Meals Per Day
  • ALL workshops + One on One Consultations
  • Airport Pick-Up & Drop-Off
  • Final Night Celebration & Salon Reading Under the Stars
Samadhi Suite

“This retreat EXCEEDED all my expectations. Gorgeous location, perfect weather, delicious food & friendly, accommodating staff. I’m a flash fiction writing newbie and learned so much from everyone. I will carry the knowledge and wonderful memories with me forever!” ~Lucy Merklee

More About Writing Wild in Costa Rica
All-Inclusive Fees & Accommodations
Register / Request More Information 

 

We’ve also just opened registration for our 3rd annual Colorado Retreat. Check it out: High Altitude Inspiration in the Great American West for August 19th-23rd! 

Writing Prompts & Craft Articles

“Flash Fiction as Language Art” by Anne E. Weisgerber

Kathy Fish

One of my favorite sentence and language level writers is our own Anne E. Weisgerber, whom we’re delighted will be joining us (again) in Colorado this August for our High Altitude Inspiration Retreat (Note: There is ONE remaining room available for this & still time to register!). Below is an excerpt from Anne’s essay, “Flash Fiction as Language Art” which ran in Smokelong Quarterly:

I only attest that the act of forming sentences and scenes, the punctuation, the pushed and brushed pigment of vowels and verbs and slow-motion ninja gerund phrases has become a vocation. Flash is an artist’s medium; writing it places one where people care about art.”

“I realized I could craft flash miniatures that added up to something bigger if I intended them to, like dabs in a Seurat painting. In this way, my reader at novel distance will see the rose window, hear the orchestra, experience the video wall of calibrated gifs but within scenes, each pane, each cellist, each meme stands alone. A reader might experience my novel as a flash choir, or pointillism, or whatever it winds up being. Flash forces writers to have the nerve to say: THESE WORDS ARE BEAUTIFUL. So I find myself now writing a huge novel in meditative, colorful spoonfuls. I must remember to look at images my words create, both at the linseed tip of my nose and at twenty skeptical paces. Up close, I worry: How can I honor this life with my writing? At practical, admission-paying distances, I fret: What’s in it for my reader?

You may read the whole terrific essay here at Smokelong Quarterly.

A.E. Weisgerber is from Orange, NJ and has recent/forthcoming work in 3:AM, Yemassee, DIAGRAM, Matchbook Lit, Gravel Mag, and The Alaska Star. She is a 2018 Chesapeake Writer, 2017 Frost Place Scholar, 2014 Reynolds Fellow, and Assistant Series Editor for the Wigleaf Top 50. She is writing her first novel. Follow @aeweisgerber or visit anneweisgerber.com 

NOTE: There is ONE room remaining (for one or two) and still time to join us for High Altitude Inspiration in Grand Lake in August. Join us!

Interviews

Life, Chaos, & the Sublime: An Interview with Barbara Greenstein

Kathy Fish

Nancy and I are delighted that Barbara Greenstein will be joining us in August for High Altitude Inspiration Retreat in Grand Lake (Note: There is ONE room still available for one or two to share and we’d love for you to join us!).

  • Hi and welcome to our blog, Barbara! Regarding the upcoming gathering in Grand Lake, what are you most looking forward to?

I’m new to Flash Fiction – I’ve haven’t intentionally written in the genre.  But I’ve been writing small pieces for years, and I’m excited to be part of a gathering at 8000 feet all about words and stories and creativity.  Sounds like heaven to me. 

  • What are the themes or topics or images that seem to recur in your writing, i.e., what are your writerly obsessions?

My writing often deals with family, with illness, with trees and landscape, and with human interaction. I believe Grace Paley’s observation that a good story is found at the intersection of two stories.  I’m often looking for the intersection of the transgressive and the sublime.  I want to know what brings you to your knees.  One of my family members has had a serious chronic illness for over 25 years.  While I can’t change it, I can describe it, and be a witness. When my world becomes fraught, I try to take a step back and deal with the chaos in a writerly way. 

  • Wow, yes, I love that from Grace Paley (one of my favorite writers) and I love what you say here about “the intersection of the transgressive and the sublime.” It makes me eager to get to know you and your writing more! Now…Solitude vs. Community: what is your own perfect balance of these two when it comes to your writing life?

One week before the Twin Towers fell I had the great good fortune to join a weekly writing workshop.  Since then I’ve been meeting with the same teacher (Irene Borger) and largely the same people. We’ll listen to poetry, or sentences, or a particular approach, write for 45 minutes or so, and then read our work aloud. Speaking and hearing my own words, and getting immediate feedback always changes how I perceive what I’ve written. I’ve learned that I can be funny – because people laugh.  And of course we know each other so well by now, the group is infused with trust and love.  So I’ve benefitted greatly from having a writing community.  I’ve done a poorer job at creating my own space to write.  I’m hoping that the Flash workshop will open some floodgates, or at least doors. 

  • Oh, I know it will, Barbara! And you’re very lucky to have a regular writing group like that. Is there an author you’d love to meet someday? And why?

Barry Lopez.  Arctic Dreams changed the way I saw the world.  His latest book, Horizon, is stacked near my bed but as yet unread.  I love the way Lopez combines a deep look at the natural world with history and anthropology and biology and art and personal reflection. He draws threads from many disciplines to weave the world into something glittering and whole, all done in lyrical language.  I’d also place Robert McFarlane and Peter Mathiessen in this group.  And Rebecca Solnit, as a wide-ranging public intellectual, writing about landscape and art and humanity.  Any of them, give me any of them to meet, to listen to.   

  • Oh yes. I’m imagining a very large table with food and drink and favorite authors gathered. Heaven! Barbara, is there something about you that you’d like to share? 

I love baseball.  And so far it’s been a good year to watch the Dodgers, though I worry about their relief pitching.

This last spring I took two classes at UCLA on writers in early modern Italy.  In one class we read Dante, Boccachio, Machiavelli, and about Michaelangelo, Rafael, Leonardo, Galileo.  The second class was on women’s voices from that same period.  Reading primary sources (in English translation) of women from the 1400s – 1600s is an education in female intellect and oppression and how far we have, and haven’t come in half a millennium.  

  • What’s the best piece of writing advice you’ve received?

At the Port Townsend Writer’s Conference, 2004, from the poet Olga Broumas, at a craft lecture. “Rinse your words.  Hold up the page and let the words and the syllables you don’t need fall off the page.”  

Wow, I love that advice. Seems especially apt for flash fiction. Thanks so much for your time, Barbara! See you soon in Grand Lake!

Barbara’s Bio: A degree in Anthropology.  Grad school:  Paleolithic archaeology, then primate behavior.  Six months in Puerto Rico watching rhesus monkeys.  Drop out with Imposter Syndrome.  Law school.  Work at the Santa Monica Rent Control Board, at Legal Aid, in the City Attorney’s Office.  Poverty law, landlord tenant, employment law.  Every case a story.  Join a writer’s workshop. Married with children.  A boy and a girl, now 35 and 33.  A husband with multiple sclerosis.  Retire after 30 years.  Two dogs, a fluffy white Marilyn Monroe of dogs, and a crazy Pekingese who talks to me.  A stint at the Getty Villa, immersed in myths and spells and ancient lore.  A house with a secret garden:  A tough job, watching the light, but somebody has to do it. 

Note: There is ONE remaining room available for our Grand Lake Retreat (for one or two to share). Consider joining us! We’d love to have you!