Sharpen your pencils: I'm teaching two classes at Hugo House this fall. Member registration opens today and general registration opens August 22. Scholarships are available: apply here by August 25!

• Wall-to-Wall Writing Prompts will be a fun-for-everyone one-day writing bonanza. I'm bringing in all my favorite prompts. If you're eager to kick start some new writing, this one's for you. Come with some overheard lines of dialogue and leave with six story openings and a plan to finish at least one. Meets Saturday, September 30, 1-4 pm. Sliding scale pricing available for this class. Please call Hugo House at (206) 322-7030.
• Fiction I  is a six-week intro to fiction, with a special focus on character, plot, and landscape. We'll read short stories from James Joyce, Jamaica Kincaid, Flannery O'Connor, Sherman Alexie, and Louise Erdrich, among others. Writing prompts in and out of class will be geared toward writing a short story, though of course all the skills covered are applicable to novels. We'll also learn the basics of the workshop model. Meets Saturdays from October 14 to November 18, 1-3 pm.

Hope to see you then!

It's another sticky NY day and I'm miserably delighted with all the work I've got to do. Here are some updates (and shameless plugs):-I've added new stories to 55words.-I went to the launch party for Collectanea's summer launch party last night. Not as heaving a crowd as their debut, but a pleasant evening in from the mugginess, with some good stories to listen to. In case you missed it, my story "Bastille Day" is in their winter issue, with a podcast/radioplay version. I understand the summer issue will be up Monday.-I started reading Flannery O'Connor's collected works and am thoroughly enjoying it. This winter I gobbled up Raymond Carver's Cathedral and quasi-gobbled Angela Carter's Burning Your Boats. School is making the gobbling-thing rather difficult, but at least short stories can be read in a single train ride. That's a real lifesaver. As much as I enjoy reading about how to make grammar interesting (I do!), sometimes I go through fiction withdrawal.