Sharon Oard Warner

Sharon Oard Warner

Upcoming Opportunities

7th Annu­al Taos Writ­ers Conference

Fri­day, July 7 to
Sun­day, July 9, 2023
at SOMOS, Taos, New Mexico

Lim­it­ed-seat­ing live ses­sions as well as online via Zoom.

A full week­end of work­shops on fic­tion, cre­ative non­fic­tion, mem­oir, poet­ry, short sto­ries and more!

Ear­ly-bird reg­is­tra­tion by 6/23/23.

Con­firmed Fac­ul­ty include:

Keynote Speaker/Instructor
Tom­my Orange

Aaron Abey­ta
EJ Levy
Lin­da Michel-Cas­sidy
Amy Beed­er
Sawnie Mor­ris
Bren­da Beard­s­ley
Min­rose Gwin
Sharon Oard Warn­er
Lau­ren Camp
Ariel Gore
Jamie Figueroa
Susan Mihal­ic
Alle­gra Hus­ton
Con­nie Josefs
Veron­i­ca Golos
Sean Mur­phy
Vale­ria Mar­tinez
Lean­na Torres

Iowa Sum­mer Writ­ing Fes­ti­val
Ses­sion: Why Make a Scene?
Pre­sen­ter: Sharon Oard Warn­er
Ses­sion, Sun­day, July 16 to Fri­day, July 21; all day

Lat­er, we’ll sort out the specifics. For now, let’s say the novel­la is an extend­ed work of fic­tion: long enough for the read­er to get lost in but short enough to be con­sumed in a sin­gle sit­ting.  It doesn’t take up much space. Stow it in your purse or slip it in your back pock­et. Read it as you wait in line for cof­fee. Novel­las used to be con­sid­ered awkward—too long to fit com­fort­ably in the pages of most lit­er­ary mag­a­zines and too short to be pub­lished alone. But, in our cur­rent cul­ture, the novel­la is, as Debra Sparks has said, “Goldilocks form, not too much this and not too much that but just right.” read more

Iowa Sum­mer Writ­ing Fes­ti­val
Ses­sion: The Novel­la Work­shop
Pre­sen­ter: Sharon Oard Warn­er
Week­end Ses­sion, July 22 to 23; all day

Cre­at­ing a pub­lic dis­play of emo­tion is one way to describe “mak­ing a scene.” We’ve all been there, usu­al­ly as onlook­ers, occa­sion­al­ly as par­tic­i­pants. Most often, pub­lic spec­ta­cles are spon­ta­neous, but scenes on paper are any­thing but. Par­tic­u­lar­ly in the ear­ly stages of the writ­ing process, scenes require con­sid­er­able plan­ning and fore­thought. In The Scene Book: A Primer for the Fic­tion Writer, author San­dra Scofield defines scenes as “those pas­sages in nar­ra­tive when we slow down and focus on an event in the sto­ry so that we are ‘in the moment’ with char­ac­ters in action.” If the scene is com­pelling enough, the read­er becomes a bystander of sorts, and char­ac­ters come to life. Any­one who writes short sto­ries, novel­las, nov­els, mem­oirs, screen­plays or dra­mat­ic plays must be pro­fi­cient at cre­at­ing com­pelling scenes. Think about it: All the sig­nif­i­cant moments in any nar­ra­tive get con­veyed through scene. Scenes are the build­ing blocks of nar­ra­tive, regard­less of the form that nar­ra­tive takes. read more

Iowa Summer Writing Festival

Iowa Sum­mer Writ­ing Festival

Fri­day, July 7 to
Fri­day, July 28, 2023
Magid Cen­ter for Writ­ing
24 Phillips Hall
Iowa City, Iowa 52242

Novella Workshop
Uni­ver­si­ty of Iowa Sum­mer Novel­la Work­shop 2021