Lisa Alvarez’s poetry and prose has been published in Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review, Huizache, [PANK], Santa Monica Review, TAB Journal and most recently in So It Goes, the literary journal of the Kurt Vonnegut Museum and Library as well as anthologies including Sudden Fiction Latino: Short-Short Stories from the United States and Latin America (Norton). Along with Andrew Tonkovich, she co-edited Orange County: A Literary Field Guide (Heyday). She is the editor of the forthcoming Why to These Rocks: 50 Years of Poems from the Community of Writers (Heyday). Born in Los Angeles, she earned an MFA from UC Irvine and has taught for nearly 30 years as a professor of English at Irvine Valley College. She co-directs the Writers Workshops, and serves serves as Assistant Program Director at the Community of Writers.
2017 Writers Workshops Staff
Photo Credit: Jonathan Sprague
Natalie Baszile has a M.A. in Afro-American Studies from UCLA, and is a graduate of Warren Wilson College’s MFA Program for Writers. Queen Sugar was named one of the San Francisco Chronicles’ Best Books of 2014, and nominated for an NAACP Image Award. Natalie has had residencies at the Ragdale Foundation, Virginia Center for the Arts, Hedgebrook, and the Djerassi Resident Arts Program where she received the SFFILM and the Bonnie Rattner Fellowships. Her non-fiction work has appeared in Lenny Letter, The Bitter Southerner, O, The Oprah Magazine, The Rumpus.net and a number of anthologies. For two years, she was Writer in Residence at Saint Mary’s College where she taught a fiction workshop in the MFA Program. Natalie is a member of the San Francisco Writers’ Grotto and lives in the Bay Area. [F] www.nataliebaszile.com
Photo Credit: Trace Ramsey
Belle Boggs grew up in King William County, Virginia, and is a writer and teacher. Her first book, Mattaponi Queen, was published in June 2010 by Graywolf Press. Mattaponi Queen won the Bakeless Prize and the Library of Virginia Award, was short-listed for the 2010 Frank O’Connor Short Story Award, was one of Kirkus Review’s top fiction debuts for 2010, was long-listed for The Story Prize, and was a finalist for the Library of Virginia People’s Choice Award for fiction. Her fiction and nonfiction work have appeared in The Paris Review, Orion, Harper’s, Glimmer Train, Ecotone, the Sun, and the Oxford American, among other publications. Her first nonfiction book, The Art of Waiting: On Fertility, Medicine, and Motherhood, was published in September 2016 by Graywolf Press. Her first novel, The Ugly Bear List, is also forthcoming from Graywolf. Belle teaches in the MFA program at NC State University and lives in Chatham County, North Carolina, with her husband, daughter, and two cats. She was on staff for the Community of Writers in 2017.
Mark Childress is the author of seven novels, three books for children, and several screenplays. A native of Monroeville, Alabama, his novels include A World Made of Fire, V For Victor, Tender, Crazy in Alabama, Gone For Good, One Mississippi, and Georgia Bottoms. He lives in Hanoi, Vietnam. www.markchildress.com [F]
John Daniel’s books of prose, including Rogue River Journal and Looking After, have won three Oregon Book Awards for Literary Nonfiction and a Pacific Northwest Booksellers Award; and have been supported by fellowships from Literary Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts. A former Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University, Daniel has taught as a writer-in-residence at colleges and universities across the country. Gifted, his first novel, came out in Spring 2017 from Counterpoint. He lives with his wife, Marilyn Daniel, in the Coast Range foothills west of Eugene, Oregon. https://www.johndaniel-author.net/
Photo credit: Alexandra Shyshkina
Alex Espinoza was born in Tijuana, Mexico to parents from the state of Michoacán. He graduated from the University of California-Riverside, then went on to earn an MFA from UC-Irvine’s Program in Writing. His first novel, Still Water Saints, was published by Random House in 2007. His second novel, The Five Acts of Diego León, was published by Random House in March 2013. Alex’s work has appeared in several anthologies and journals including Alta, NPR, Virginia Quarterly Review, and in the 2022 Best American Mystery and Suspense Stories. His awards include a 2009 Margaret Bridgeman Fellowship in Fiction to the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, a 2014 Fellowship in Prose from the National Endowment for the Arts, a 2014 American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation for The Five Acts of Diego León, and a 2019 Fellowship to MacDowell. His latest is Cruising: An Intimate History of a Radical Pastime (Unnamed Press 2019). Alex teaches at UC-Riverside where he serves as the Tomás Rivera Endowed Chair of Creative Writing.
www.alexespinoza.com
Photo: Tracy Hall
Janet Fitch’s new novel, The Revolution of Marina M. will be released in November, 2017. Her first novel, White Oleander, a #1 New York Times bestseller and Oprah’s Book Club selection, has been translated into 24 languages and was made into a feature film. Her second novel, Paint It Black, a national bestseller, was made into a 2017 feature film, written and directed by Amber Tamblyn. She attended the Fiction Workshop at the Community of Writers in the 1980s, the Poetry Workshop in 2017, and returns frequently to teach during the Writers Workshops at the Community of Writers. www.janetfitchwrites.com
Lynn Freed’s books include seven novels, a collection of stories, and two collections of essays. Her short fiction and essays have appeared in Harper’s, The New Yorker and The Atlantic Monthly, among numerous others. She is the recipient of the inaugural Katherine Anne Porter Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, two O. Henry Awards for fiction, and has received fellowships and grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and The Guggenheim Foundation, among others. She is Professor Emerita of English at the University of California, Davis, and lives in Northern California. [F] http://www.lynnfreed.com/
Photo Credit: Brett Hall Jones
Sands Hall is the author of the award-winning memoir Reclaiming My Decade Lost in Scientology (Counterpoint). Blackstone Audio produced the audio book, read by the author. Other books include the novel Catching Heaven (Ballantine), a Random House Reader’s Circle selection and Willa Award Finalist (Woman Writing the West); and a book of essays and exercises, Tools of the Writer’s Craft. Her stories and essays have appeared in such journals as Alta, New England Review, Iowa Review, and Los Angeles Review of Books. Professor Emeritus at Franklin & Marshall College, she lives in the foothills of California’s Sierra Nevada. [F/M] www.sandshall.com
Photo Credit: Tracy Hall
Paul Harding is the author of two novels, Enon and Tinkers, which won a Pulitzer Prize in fiction. He has taught at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and Harvard. He has received fellowships from the NEA, the Guggenheim Foundation, and the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown MA. [F] www.tinkerspulitzer.com/
Photo credit: Ekko von Schwichow
Rachel Howard is the author of a novel, The Risk of Us, and a memoir, The Lost Night. Her fiction, essays, and dance criticism have appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Review of Books, Waxwing, Zyzzyva, and elsewhere. The former interim director of Undergraduate Creative Writing at Warren Wilson College, she teaches frequently for Stanford Continuing Studies and at the San Francisco Writers’ Grotto. She lives in Nevada City, California. www.rachelhoward.com
Photo Credit: Emmet Cullen
Michael Jaime-Becerra is a writer from El Monte, California, a working-class suburb east of East Los Angeles. He is the author of This Time Tomorrow, a novel awarded an International Latino Book Award, and Every Night Is Ladies’ Night, a story collection that received the California Book Award for a First Work of Fiction. Recent essays of his have been featured in the Los Angeles Times, ZYZZYVA, and The Los Angeles Review of Books.
Photo Credit: EVJ
Louis B. Jones is the author of the novels Ordinary Money (Viking); Particles and Luck and California’s Over (Pantheon); Radiance, and Innocence (Counterpoint). His short fiction and essays have appeared in ZYZZYVA, The Threepenny Review, Open City, The Sun, Santa Monica Review, the Pushcart Prize, and The Best of Pushcart anthology. He co-directs the Writers Workshops at the Community of Writers. [F] www.louisbjones.com
Photo Credit: Brett Hall Jones
Dylan Landis is the author of a novel in stories, Normal People Don’t Live Like This, and a novel, Rainey Royal, a New York Times Editors Choice. Her books are linked, both set in 1970s New York, and a chapter in Rainey Royal appeared in the O. Henry Prize Stories. Before Dylan started writing fiction at age 40 she covered interior design for magazines, writing six books on decorating along the way–so the subject of place and setting is dear to her. https://www.dylanlandis.com/ [F]
Photo Credit: Dean Baquet
Krys Lee is the author of the story collection Drifting House and the novel How I Became a North Korean, and the translator of two books by Young-ha Kim. She is the recipient of the Rome Prize in Literature and the Story Prize Spotlight Award, the Honor Title in Adult Fiction Literature from the Asian/Pacific American Libraries Association, a Granta New Voices pick, and was a finalist for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize and the BBC International Story Prize. She teaches creative writing at Yonsei University, Underwood International College. www.kryslee.com
Photo Credit: Matt Douma
Photo Credit: David Walter Banks
Christopher Monger is a writer/director in film and television who has directed eight feature films and written over thirty screenplays. He was born in Wales but has lived in Los Angeles since the mid 80’s. He is best known for his film The Englishman Who Went Up A Hill But Came Down a Mountain and his screenplay for the Emmy Award-winning HBO film, Temple Grandin, which was also nominated for an Academy Award. For writing and directing, his many awards include, the Christopher Award for the film Seeing Red and the Hollywood Film Festival Award for the Girl From Rio. Currently, here is writing a miniseries for HBO and a feature film for Amazon Films.
He will teach the special Adaptation Class this summer on Film and TV Adaptation, (five 90-minute afternoon sessions). The class will be a practical approach to adapting a novel into a screenplay or miniseries. There will be an overview of the fundamentals of screenwriting as well as an analysis of the specific skills for a successful adaptation. We will explore the crucial differences between the mediums, their respective strengths and weaknesses, and examine a handful of adaptations, comparing and contrasting the films with the original material. Indicate your interest in the application form. $250 fee.
Photo credit: Betsy Zajko
Martin J. Smith is an award-winning journalist and author of five suspense novels, including the Edgar Award-nominated Straw Men and the thriller Combustion; and five nonfiction books, including The Wild Duck Chase, the essay collection Mr. Las Vegas Has a Bad Knee, and the forthcoming Going to Trinidad: A Doctor, a Colorado Town, and Stories from an Unlikely Gender Crossroads (Bower House, April 2021). A participant at the Community of Writers in 1992, Smith has been returning as a faculty member since 2002. https://martinjsmith.com/
Photo credit: Brett Hall Photography
Gregory Spatz’s most recent books are What Could Be Saved (connected novellas and stories), Inukshuk (novel), and Half as Happy (short stories). His fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, The New England Review, The Southern Review, Kenyon Review, Santa Monica Review, Zyzzyva, and many other publications. He is the recipient of an NEA Fellowship and a Washington State Book Award. He teaches in the MFA program at Eastern Washington University and is also serves as program director. =[F] www.gregoryspatz.com
Photo Credit: Julia Graff
Andrew Tonkovich edits the West Coast literary magazine Santa Monica Review, and well as the new online literary arts quarterly Citric Acid. His fiction, essays, and reviews have appeared in the Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Review of Books, OC Weekly, Ecotone, Fautline, Juked, ZYZZYVA and Best American Nonrequired Reading. With Lisa Alvarez he edited Orange County: A Literary Field Guide, and is the author of the fiction collections The Dairy of Anne Frank and More Wish Fulfillment in the Noughties and Keeping Tahoe Blue and Other Provocations. He is the founding editor of the Community of Writers’ online journal The OG Quarterly.
Photo Credit: Brett Hall Jones
Josh Weil is the author of the novel The Great Glass Sea, the novella collection The New Valley, and story collection The Age of Perpetual Light. A Fulbright Fellow and National Book Foundation 5-under-35 honoree, he has been awarded The American Academy of Arts and Letters’ First Fiction Prize, the Dayton Literary Peace Prize, the GrubStreet National Book Prize, the Library of Virginia Literary Award, the California Book Award, and a Pushcart. A writing teacher for over a decade, he has most recently taught in the MFA program at U.C. Irvine and at the Bread Loaf Writers Conference. www.joshweil.com
Photo credit: Brett Hall Photography
