14 Comments

I'm so excited to get started with this workshop! As a fun gift to my subscribers, I plan to write a Winter Solstice/Christmas ghost story each year (a la Dickens). My biggest challenge? How to build fear into the story. This workshop definitely came at the right time, and with the right teacher. As a lesbian with a love of all queer lit, having Kayla teach is hitting all the YES buttons for me!

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YAY! i'm so glad this course is perfectly timed for you. we'll definitely be touching on different tactics for building out fear over the coming weaks

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13 hrs agoLiked by Kayla Kumari, Shelby Stretton

This is great! I can't wait for the rest of the course!

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20 hrs agoLiked by Kayla Kumari, Shelby Stretton

A great read!

After literal years of wondering what to write and that doubt becoming a handy excuse to not write, I recently found my way here to start writing horror concepts, flash fiction and poetry all around the beauty in the surreal. so great timing! Looking forward to reading along, thankyou!

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23 hrs agoLiked by Kayla Kumari, Shelby Stretton

You had me at horror! And then again at lesbian!

So, already a convert, although I've watched and read a lot of horror but only recently started writing it. I've JUST started a flash fiction series where I challenge myself to write a horror flash fiction inspired by a rock song every week - just to see if I can. So this is timely. Very excited to dive in!

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pulling inspiration from rock songs is SO cool! one of the things we'll be playing with is the idea of "disruption" and disrupting your own writing process with little challenges — trying to write fiction inspired by rock songs sounds like a great tool for that!

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Oct 8Liked by Shelby Stretton

After reading this intro lesson, I realize a story in need of revision has wanted to be horror all along. I’ve never tried horror. Can’t wait to get started. Thank you!

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oh that's so cool! while i think all the lessons could help you out with your specific existing project, I think you'll really get a LOT out of the revision lesson I have planned for the end of the course!

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Oct 7Liked by Kayla Kumari, Shelby Stretton

I'm writing a horror novel right now so this came at the perfect time! Excited!

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Oct 7Liked by Kayla Kumari, Shelby Stretton

This is really helpful, thank you!

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hi all! thanks for joining! happy to answer any questions or even just chat. i know there isn't a formal writing prompt for this lesson, but if you're wanting to do some writing, I'd love you to consider the question of why you write horror or, if you're new to it, why you want to write horror. no need to share your answers, but you can if you like!

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Already off to such a helpful start! Thanks so much for doing this, I've been looking forward to it since it's announcement. One thing I'm struggling with as a newer writer is identifying tropes and themes, and would love to get your advice on that. Is this something you'll be covering in later lessons?

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we'll definitely be touching on both the concept of themes and of tropes. and one thing I'm going to encourage during the drafting stage is to actually embrace and maybe even lean into tropes, even if you think they're "overdone" or "on-the-nose." i think they can be useful in the initial drafting stage, and there are ways to make them your own later on

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This will be perfect for me! I'm actually very interested in learning how to identify and use tropes in my writing, as I think it would be extremely helpful for creating identifiable characters and helping me build characters who feel distinctly different.

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