Eureka! Exploring Exploding Structure in Writing

Structure is often seen as an imposed limitation on a writer’s creativity. In this workshop we’ll explore ways that structure can ignite your creativity—even when you end up breaking all the rules! We’ll experiment with three types of structures, engaging with them and then pushing past their boundaries. Writers of all genres and at all levels are welcome. Bring an open mind and playful spirit!

This workshop is free but we request you RSVP so that we are better able to prepare for the event and for refreshments to be served during the event.

Workshop leaders:
Carolyn Grace, author of Grenadine and Other Love Affairs (to be released April 29, 2023)
Carolyn Grace began writing poetry as a child, and has been completely in love with language ever since. Grace graduated from Berea College with an undergraduate degree in English composition and a minor in music performance. She went on to complete her MFA in creative writing through the Bluegrass Writers Studio at Eastern Kentucky University. Grace lives in Northern Virginia with her husband, Grant, and their dog, Fitzwilliam, who appears to be aware that he is named after literary royalty and acts accordingly.

Libby Falk Jones is the author of Yakety Yak (Don’t Talk Back) and For Your Good Health, Drink Flowers. Jones’s poems have been published in more than 25 journals and anthologies. Jones is Professor of English, Emerita – Berea College, Berea, KY, and Co-Director, Coming of Age Project (writing by women over 60). She lives and works in Berea, Kentucky.

James Alan Riley, author of Broken Frequencies, is currently working on his second book of poems, Uncertain Mythologies (forthcoming 2024).
Riley is the recipient of Recipient of the 2020 Thomas and Lillie D. Chaffin Award for Appalachian Writers, a Kentucky Arts Council Grant, a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, two Al Smith Fellowships from the Kentucky Arts Council, and an Individual Artist’s Fellowship from the Ohio Arts Council. His work has appeared in The Louisville Review, Kentucky Monthly, The Journal of Kentucky Studies, Appalachian Heritage, The Connecticut Review, The Greensboro Review, West Branch, and a number of other literary magazines over the years. Riley received a PhD in Modern British and American Literature from Ohio University in Athens and a Masters in English from the University of Arkansas. He is a retired Professor of English at the University of Pikeville in Pikeville, Kentucky, where he began teaching 1987, serving higher education in Eastern Kentucky.

About SHADELANDHOUSE MODERN PRESS
Shadelandhouse Modern Press, LLC is a Lexington, Kentucky-based, women-owned and family-operated independent traditional book publisher of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. We are committed to the advancement of established and emerging writers, excellence in publishing, and the production of high quality, entertaining, and artistic books. We believe that adults and children should have access to authentic and relevant stories that reflect diverse backgrounds, interests, and cultures, and that literature is vital to our humanity, our culture, and the arts. We are committed to the publication of authentic, artistic, and compelling books for adults and young readers and to the discovery of outstanding new voices and the advancement of writers at all stages of their careers.

Our authors and titles continue to be recognized on a state, regional, and national level and have received several awards and recognitions, including being 2023 Pen America Pen/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay (Small Acreages by Georgia Green Stamper), the 22nd Thurber Prize for American Humor (A History of Saints by Julyan Davis), the Thomas and Lillie D. Chaffin Award for Appalachian Writers (Morehead State University) (Broken Frequencies by James Riley), North American Academy of Spanish Language Children and Young Adult Award Premio Campoy-Ada (Under the Ocelot Sun by Jeremy Paden, illustrated by Annelisa Hermosilla), Foreword Indies Books of the Year Awards (Foreword Reviews), IPPY Awards (Independent Publisher Book Award), Benjamin Franklin Award (Independent Book Publishers ), and the International Book Awards. Our titles have also received notable and starred reviews from trade reviewers, including a prestigious Kirkus starred review and a Kirkus Reviews listing as Best Indies Indie Book of August 2022 Booklist for the novel Shadows Hold Their Breath.

We are a member of the Independent Book Publishers Association, an associate member of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators, an associate member of the American Library Association, and a sustainer member of the Academy of American Poets. Our founder/publisher Virginia H. Underwood (Berea College 1973, University of Kentucky College of Law 1983) has more than forty years of combined experience as an educator, lawyer, higher education administrator, and publisher. For more information about our current titles and authors, visit our website smpbooks.com and follow us on Facebook (@shadelandhouse), Instagram (@shadelandhouse_modern_press), and Twitter (@smp_books).