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Lit Fest 2025
Type: Nonfiction/Memoir clear filter
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Monday, June 9
 

9:00am MDT

Literary Lightning: Finding the Poetry in Your Prose (V)
Monday June 9, 2025 9:00am - 11:00am MDT
Zoom
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Are there are parts of your stories and essays that when you reread them, still hold true? Is there a line that you are still curious about? Perhaps your thinking on the subject has deepened or changed. How do you pull threads from previously written work and turn it into something else? What was once an essay or an article may hold the seeds of a flash essay, prose poem or song lyric. We’ll explore work that began in one form and transformed into other and talk about how to do that for a piece of our own.
Speakers
avatar for Ellen Blum Barish

Ellen Blum Barish

Instructor
Ellen Blum Barish is the author of the spiritual memoir Seven Springs: A Memoir and the essay collection Views from the Home Office Window: On Motherhood, Family and Life. Her work explores themes of identity, family, and spirituality. You can find her essays and prose poems in Brevity... Read More →
Monday June 9, 2025 9:00am - 11:00am MDT
Zoom
  Nonfiction/Memoir

1:30pm MDT

How to Create Unforgettable Characters
Monday June 9, 2025 1:30pm - 3:30pm MDT
Lighthouse
Register
In this seminar, we’ll work through the process of building a character (or characters) who can serve as a catalyst for a larger narrative, propelling the story forward. From navigating backstory to placing characters in scene, we’ll focus on getting protagonists and antagonists out of our heads and onto the page through a series of writing exercises, discussion of example texts, and optional sharing.
Speakers
avatar for Steve Almond

Steve Almond

Visiting Author
Steve Almond [www.stevealmondjoy.org] is the author of a dozen books, including the New York Times bestsellers Candyfreak and Against Football. His first novel, Which Brings Me to You (co-written with Julianna Baggott) was made into a major motion picture starring Lucy Hale. His second... Read More →
Monday June 9, 2025 1:30pm - 3:30pm MDT
Lighthouse 3870 York Street Denver, CO 80205
  Fiction   Nonfiction/Memoir

1:30pm MDT

The Laundry Line (V)
Monday June 9, 2025 1:30pm - 3:30pm MDT
Zoom
Register
The journalist Michael Pollan asserts that every piece of nonfiction needs a “laundry line”: a main conceptual through-line that is strong yet flexible enough to hold the various vignettes and reflections that make up the piece. The same is true for fiction: even with plot to guide us, fiction writers need to think about how to balance the narration of physical events with psychological ones, how to weave backstory with present action. This class will offer writers a new vocabulary for articulating and experimenting with structure through lecture, discussion, and a writing exercise.
Speakers
avatar for Natalie Hodges

Natalie Hodges

Instructor
Born and raised in Denver, Natalie Hodges has performed as a classical violinist throughout Colorado and in New York, Boston, Paris, and the Italian Piedmont, as well as at the Aspen Music Festival and the Stowe Tango Music Festival. Her first book, Uncommon Measure: A Journey Through... Read More →
Monday June 9, 2025 1:30pm - 3:30pm MDT
Zoom
  Fiction   Nonfiction/Memoir

1:30pm MDT

Borderless: Writing Against Containment
Monday June 9, 2025 1:30pm - 3:30pm MDT
Lighthouse
Register
The border is highly permeable for some and completely rigid for others, as the pandemic, various humanitarian crises, and recent elections in the West have underscored. The terror of the border remains relentless. In this generative seminar, we'll discuss and write in response to the work of (im)migrant writers who question the border and contend with its shifting, dislocating provocations. We’ll consider how and why certain bodies and literatures are (b)ordered through denial, displacement, dispossession, and detainment. And we’ll explore how we can write to confound the ideologies, policies, and practices that seek to contain us.
Speakers
avatar for Kanika Agrawal

Kanika Agrawal

Instructor
Kanika Agrawal is a queer Indian writer, editor, and educator. As a mad diasporic hybrid who developed over six countries on four continents, she works between and across languages, geographies, and disciplines. She received a BS in Biology and a BS in Writing from MIT. She then earned... Read More →
Monday June 9, 2025 1:30pm - 3:30pm MDT
Lighthouse 3870 York Street Denver, CO 80205
  Fiction   Nonfiction/Memoir   Poetry   Hybrid

1:30pm MDT

So You Want to Go Indie
Monday June 9, 2025 1:30pm - 3:30pm MDT
Lighthouse
Register
As the quality and readership of indie/self-published books increases, indie publishing—once considered a “less than” alternative to traditional publishing—is becoming a progressively popular choice for authors at all stages of their careers. What does it take to independently publish your book? In this seminar, we’ll explore what goes into the indie decision, the pros and cons of this publishing method, and the must-have attributes of a successful independently published book.
Speakers
CS
Monday June 9, 2025 1:30pm - 3:30pm MDT
Lighthouse 3870 York Street Denver, CO 80205
  Fiction   Nonfiction/Memoir   Poetry   Hybrid   Publishing/Career   YA/Children's

1:30pm MDT

Symbolism and Metaphor: They Aren’t Just For Fiction (V)
Monday June 9, 2025 1:30pm - 3:30pm MDT
Zoom
Register
Humans are symbolic beings. We create symbols, we use them, we misuse them. In this class, we’ll first take a deep dive into the symbolic and the metaphorical in our everyday lives. We’ll analyze several examples of literary nonfiction that use the same devices fiction writers employ to layer meaning. We’ll talk about ways nonfiction writers can both deepen and complicate their own narratives and, in the process, understand the universalities embedded in our experiences.
Speakers
AS
Monday June 9, 2025 1:30pm - 3:30pm MDT
Zoom
  Nonfiction/Memoir

1:30pm MDT

Tragedy Plus Time: Writing Traumedy
Monday June 9, 2025 1:30pm - 3:30pm MDT
Lighthouse
Register
Tragedy plus time equals comedy, and in this seminar, we'll do that math and make readers laugh while PUNCHING THEM IN THE HEART.
People listen to a joke when they ignore a sob story or a rant, and humor can get your point and feelings across in more palatable and profound ways. To repurpose tragedy, we’ll read other sad-funny writers to steal their tricks, and we’ll cover every known device to turn a diary entry into publishable writing. Because if you can’t say something straight (if it’s too saccharine, confessional, or harrowing), then say it slant. Prerequisite: being in therapy.
Speakers
avatar for Elissa Bassist

Elissa Bassist

Instructor
Elissa Bassist is the editor of the “Funny Women” column on The Rumpus and author of the tragicomic memoir Hysterical, a semifinalist for The Thurber Prize for American Humor. As a founding contributor to The Rumpus, she’s written cultural and personal criticism since the website... Read More →
Monday June 9, 2025 1:30pm - 3:30pm MDT
Lighthouse 3870 York Street Denver, CO 80205
  Nonfiction/Memoir

1:30pm MDT

My Own Alphabet
Monday June 9, 2025 1:30pm - 3:30pm MDT
Lighthouse
Register
Using letters from the alphabet, participating writers will utilize free-association and automatic writing to generate ideas and call upon their memories to begin drafting and crafting their own lyric essays. This class will primarily be a generative space. The title of the workshop pays homage to Bobbie Louise Hawkins who published a collection of stories, essays, and memoirs of the same name with Coffee House Press in 1989 (there is no need to read this book).
Speakers
avatar for Sarah Elizabeth Schantz

Sarah Elizabeth Schantz

Instructor
Sarah Elizabeth Schantz is primarily a fiction writer living on the outskirts of Boulder, Colorado in a Victorian-era farmhouse where her family is surrounded by open sky and century-old cottonwoods. She literally grew up in a bookstore with parents who worshipped all things literature... Read More →
Monday June 9, 2025 1:30pm - 3:30pm MDT
Lighthouse 3870 York Street Denver, CO 80205
  Nonfiction/Memoir   Hybrid

4:00pm MDT

Building the Writer's Notebook
Monday June 9, 2025 4:00pm - 6:00pm MDT
Lighthouse
Register
Have you ever stared at a blank page and had no idea how to fill it? In this class, we'll learn how keeping a vibrant writer's notebook can provide us with material to use, whether we're trying to craft a compelling personal essay, fill a novel with vivid characters and settings, or capture the perfect image for a poem. We'll examine the notebook practices of some of the greats, including Joan Didion, Mark Twain, and Charles R. Johnson, and embark on our own journals. Bring in a fresh notebook, and we'll set it up to capture the inspiration, observations, and ideas that will fuel your next literary work.
Speakers
avatar for Jenny Shank

Jenny Shank

Instructor
Jenny Shank's short story collection, Mixed Company, won the George Garrett Fiction Prize and is a finalist for the Colorado Book Award (General Fiction). Jenny Shank's novel, The Ringer, won the High Plains Book Award in fiction, was a finalist for the Mountains & Plains Independent... Read More →
Monday June 9, 2025 4:00pm - 6:00pm MDT
Lighthouse 3870 York Street Denver, CO 80205
  Fiction   Nonfiction/Memoir   Hybrid

4:00pm MDT

Channeling Palimpsest in Your Writing
Monday June 9, 2025 4:00pm - 6:00pm MDT
Lighthouse
Register
Drawing inspiration from the idea of a palimpsest—medieval manuscripts on papyrus or parchment whose text was scraped or washed off, and then written over—the workshop will consider what is erased from the past versus what remains and how that shows up in our lives and our writing. We’ll try techniques that sample the writing of others, such as erasure or the cento, and also write from prompts that consider what parts of ourselves have been erased and written over, or how scraps of the past are embedded in the places and objects that surround us.
Speakers
MM

Malinda Miller

Instructor
Monday June 9, 2025 4:00pm - 6:00pm MDT
Lighthouse 3870 York Street Denver, CO 80205
  Fiction   Nonfiction/Memoir   Poetry   Hybrid

4:00pm MDT

The Big Voice: How to Amplify Your Narratives
Monday June 9, 2025 4:00pm - 6:00pm MDT
Lighthouse
Register
In this seminar, we'll contemplate what Chuck Palahniuk refers to as the big voice and little voice; we'll look at the different strategies writers have used to amplify the little voices they have to use in both fiction and creative nonfiction. We'll learn how to create tension via the back-and-forth “dialogue” a big and little voice can evoke while paying attention to the ways the big voice can be utilized to make a character’s motivations more believable. Finally, the big voice can serve as a loophole to get around the limitations of first-person or close-third points-of-view for revealing big picture information the reader needs to know.
Speakers
avatar for Sarah Elizabeth Schantz

Sarah Elizabeth Schantz

Instructor
Sarah Elizabeth Schantz is primarily a fiction writer living on the outskirts of Boulder, Colorado in a Victorian-era farmhouse where her family is surrounded by open sky and century-old cottonwoods. She literally grew up in a bookstore with parents who worshipped all things literature... Read More →
Monday June 9, 2025 4:00pm - 6:00pm MDT
Lighthouse 3870 York Street Denver, CO 80205
  Fiction   Nonfiction/Memoir   Hybrid   YA/Children's

4:00pm MDT

Writing the Self: Considerations of Character, Perspective, and Scene (V)
Monday June 9, 2025 4:00pm - 6:00pm MDT
Zoom
Register
In order for your memoir to work, you need to be a character with flaws, with conflict, with desires—in short, with very human traits. This workshop explores how to explore and write your “Self” on the page in a way that allows the reader to know you, to like you, and go along for the ride.
Speakers
avatar for Karen Auvinen

Karen Auvinen

Instructor
Karen Auvinen (she/her/hers) is poet, mountain woman, life-long westerner, writer, and the author of the memoir Rough Beauty: Forty Seasons of Mountain Living, a finalist for the 2019 Colorado Book Award. Her body of work traverses the intersection of landscape and place, examining... Read More →
Monday June 9, 2025 4:00pm - 6:00pm MDT
Zoom
  Nonfiction/Memoir

4:30pm MDT

First Draft Live: The Debut Journey
Monday June 9, 2025 4:30pm - 6:00pm MDT
Lighthouse
Register
Join Mitzi Rapkin for a live episode of her popular First Draft podcast. This one will feature a conversation between debut authors Nini Berndt and Evanthia Bromiley and as they discuss their publication journeys, their book launch learning curve, their inspiration and challenges, and more. Mitzi's First Draft: A Dialogue on Writing, a literary podcast now in its 11th year of production, has more than 450 interviews in the archive.
Speakers
MI
Monday June 9, 2025 4:30pm - 6:00pm MDT
Lighthouse 3870 York Street Denver, CO 80205
  Fiction   Nonfiction/Memoir

7:00pm MDT

Visiting Authors Reading: Mat Johnson, Alex Marzano-Lesnevitch, and Elizabeth McCracken
Monday June 9, 2025 7:00pm - 8:00pm MDT
Lighthouse
Register
Hear your favorite visiting author perform their recent works. Shop at the Lit Fest pop-up bookstore operated by The Bookies and get your book signed afterward.
Speakers
MI
Monday June 9, 2025 7:00pm - 8:00pm MDT
Lighthouse 3870 York Street Denver, CO 80205
  Fiction   Nonfiction/Memoir   Hybrid   Poetry

7:00pm MDT

Visiting Authors Reading: Visiting Authors Reading: Mat Johnson, Alex Marzano-Lesnevitch, and Elizabeth McCracken (Livestream)
Monday June 9, 2025 7:00pm - 8:00pm MDT
Zoom
Register
Hear your favorite visiting author perform their recent works. Shop at the Lit Fest pop-up bookstore operated by The Bookies and get your book signed afterward.
Speakers
MI
Monday June 9, 2025 7:00pm - 8:00pm MDT
Zoom
  Fiction   Nonfiction/Memoir   Hybrid   Poetry
 
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