Upcoming Workshop: Social-Emotional Writing in Fantastic Literature

Addressing the Monster in the Room: Social-Emotional Writing in Fantastic Literature

Dates/Times: Sept. 21 and 28 at 7:30 to 9:00 pm ET (two sessions)
Cost: $60 US
Delivery: Online with sessions recorded for later viewing

Ursula Le Guin writes in Cheek by Jowl, “What fantasy often does that the realistic novel generally cannot do is include the nonhuman as essential.”

Monsters of all sorts live in our dreams, embodying our deepest emotions. They are guides to our truth and, as such, they play a huge role in social-emotional development. While realistic fiction centers the intricacies of humans, fantastic fiction is the imagination on fire, exploring shadow versions of our world and breathing life into our inner monsters. Stories about monsters – whether they appear in a game of Dungeons and Dragons, in a poem, or in a work of fiction are essential, especially in our post-pandemic times. They help readers and listeners better understand how to manage emotions, develop healthy identities, feel empathy, and show support for others.

This two-session workshop will ask four key craft questions to help you incorporate the monstrous into your writing. What is your protagonist’s relationship to the monstrous? What are your monster’s physical, emotional, and/or magical character traits? What metaphors or image systems define your monster and why? Does your monster live alongside our real world or has the protagonist crossed into the monster’s world? Our goal is to deepen your work’s social-emotional themes, offering you and your reader an opportunity to better understand the heart, mind, and spirit.

This Workshop Is For You If

• You are drafting or revising a picture book or novel with a monstrous theme and/or character.
• You are seeking to deepen your monstrous character(s) (widely defined as invented creatures of any kind).
• You’d like to explore how monsters in fiction support social-emotional learning and themes.