From June 2004 ...

A Whole Week Devoted To Writing

Back L-R, Gray, OSC, Gregory Steele; Middle L-R, Oliver Dale, Hel Bell, Ada Brown, Cathy Perdue; Front, Dan Kalman Gray (back row left) spent an awesome week with fifteen other would-be fiction writers from around the country, under the close tutelage of famed science fiction and fantasy author Orson Scott Card (back row center). Held at Southern Virginia University in Buena Vista--at one end of US Highway 501 from Myrtle Beach ... another connection to the Grand Strand!--it was a fantastic experience and the first time Gray has immersed himself in the writing craft so deeply for so long.

The campers spent the first two days with about thirty other participants at Card's "Fiction Writing Workshop," learning the basics of idea generation, story construction, and point of view.

Back L-R, Dave Wolverton, Ed Schubert, David Barr Kirtley, Christian Seehausen; Middle L-R, Grant Morris, OSC, Miles Romney; Front L-R, Jackie Dormire, Faisal Jawdat, Allen Moore

By the second day they had generated five different story ideas apiece, and used the third day to write out the complete short story! Gray "finished" his at around one in the morning on day four, then got up early and spent another couple of hours on it before turning it in (which didn't help much). The remaining time was taken with reading everyone's stories and providing critiques. Now, if Gray can actually put into practice everything he learned ...

(Special thanks to camper Gregory Steele for the images on this page. Check out his web page, www.nexuscapacitor.com.)