King’s Writing Workshops

Making your writing dreams a reality!

King’s offers six new writing workshops online this October and November

SPECIAL PRICING: Members of the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia as well as King’s students, faculty, staff, parents and alumni get $50 off the price of each workshop!

Whether you’re working on a novel, a memoir, or journalistic piece, or are just developing your writing skills, the King’s Writing Workshops can help you become the author you want to be. Our non-credit 4- and 8-week workshops are open to everyone, everywhere, whether you’re still at the idea phase or already have words down on the page!

Registration is now closed.

Four-week workshop on Zoom – $299+HST

Researching Your Book

Eight-week workshops on Zoom – $549+HST

Finish Your Novel 

Organizational Storytelling

Creating Compelling Scenes

The Art of the Essay

King’s has a limited number of bursaries available for students requiring financial assistance. Bursaries applications are now closed.

Researching Your Book (4 weeks): Tuesdays, 6:30 – 9 p.m. ADT, beginning September 24 on Zoom

Instructor: Lezlie Lowe

Course description: All books require research. Whether fiction or nonfiction; experimental or explanatory; memoir, historical fiction, or sci-fi — research lends manuscripts authorial power, scenic strength and a narrative foundation. Researching Your Book is a four-week virtual workshop for fiction and nonfiction book writers at all stages of their practice who want to solidify their research paths and forge onto unknown trails. Workshop participants will look at the merits of primary and secondary documents and gain useful tools for accessing those resources. Participants will also consider the deep value of researching ephemera and connecting with human sources, as well as the importance of being in the places they are writing about … even if those places don’t actually exist.

Lezlie Lowe teaches in the School of Journalism, Writing & Publishing at the University of King’s College, the Dalhousie University Creative Writing program and in the King’s Master of Fine Arts in Creative Nonfiction program. Her first book, No Place To Go: How Public Toilets Fail Our Private Needs, was listed as a top-25 pick by CBC Books and The Toronto Star, and one of the top 100 books of the year by the Globe and Mail. The Volunteers: How Halifax Women Won the Second World War was released in 2022.

Finish Your Novel (8 weeks): Wednesdays, 6:30 – 9 p.m. ADT, beginning October 2 on Zoom

Instructor: francesca ekwuyasi

Course description: During this eight-week course, students will be encouraged to outline a complete draft of their novel, with a focus on the following components:

• Clear plot direction & review of story structure and character arcs
• Theme, mood and setting
• Setting attainable goals, deadlines and developing a writing plan

The course will include in-class workshopping and some light reading from the book Meander, Spiral, Explode by Jane Alison for guidance and exploration of potential novel structures. The primary aim of the course is to cultivate goal-oriented writing practice and create the foundations of a first draft.

francesca ekwuyasi is a learner, artist and storyteller born in Lagos, Nigeria. She was awarded the Writers Trust Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBTQ2S+ Emerging Writers in 2022 for her debut novel Butter Honey Pig Bread (Arsenal Pulp Press, 2020). Butter Honey Pig Bread was also shortlisted for a Lambda Literary Award, the Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction, the Amazon Canada First Novel Award and longlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and the Dublin Literary Award. Butter Honey Pig Bread placed second on CBC’s Canada Reads. Canada’s Annual Battle of the Books, where it was selected as one of five contenders in 2021 for “the one book that all of Canada should read.”

francesca’s writing has appeared in the Malahat Review, Transition Magazine, Room Magazine, Brittle Paper, the Ex-Puritan, C-Magazine, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, Canadian Art, Chatelaine and elsewhere. Her short story Ọrun is Heaven was longlisted for the 2019 Journey Prize.

She co-authored Curious Sounds: A Dialogue in Three Movements (Arsenal Pulp Press, 2023), a multi-genre collaborative book with Roger Mooking.

Organizational Storytelling (8 weeks): Wednesdays, 6:30 – 9 p.m. ADT, beginning October 2 on Zoom

Instructor: Alison DeLory

Course description: Drawing from both journalistic stylings and creative nonfiction techniques, you’ll learn how to tell stories about or inspired by your organization that help audiences understand and value its mission. Through the strategic writing paradigm of PAM (purpose/audience/medium), you’ll learn how to focus and structure your content. Assignments will challenge you to incorporate elements like description and figurative language, voice, tone, point of view, setting, dialogue, subject, structure (linear or non-linear) and narrative arcs into longer pieces like backgrounders, blogs or profiles. You’ll also practice writing clear, tight copy for platforms that favour succinct writing like newsletters, websites and social media platforms. Discussion will include techniques for research, interviewing, drafting and rewriting.

Alison DeLory is a Halifax-based writer, editor, instructor and communications professional with over 25 years’ experience. She’s authored three books, taught writing and public relations at the post-secondary level, written for local and national newspapers and magazines, served as editor-in-chief of two alumni magazines and is a member of the writers’ council at the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia. Currently, her day job is Director of Advancement Communications at Dalhousie.

Creating Compelling Scenes (8 weeks): Tuesdays, 6:30 – 9 p.m. ADT, beginning October 1 on Zoom

Instructor: Wanda Taylor

Course description: Think about the last book you read that was so good, you forgot you were reading, and you found yourself lost in the storytelling. What was it about that story that drew you in? Answers may range from great characters to an intriguing plot. An answer sometimes overlooked – but so vital to great storytelling – is scene building. This workshop will examine the elements of scene structure and how to use scenes as a way to pull readers into the story.

Wanda Taylor is an award-winning writer, filmmaker, screenwriter and college professor. As an author of fiction and nonfiction, Wanda writes across both children’s and adult markets. Her middle grade novel, The Grover School Pledge, was the 2023 recipient of the Northern Lights Middle Grade Book of the Year Award and is nominated for the Hackmatack Book Award. Wanda has produced a variety of content as a former CBC producer, news journalist and documentary filmmaker. Her work has also screened at festivals across the globe, on television and on streaming platforms. As a freelance journalist, her features, essays and poems appear in publications across Canada, the US and the UK; including the Globe and Mail, Quill & Quire, and Atlantic Books Today. As a former Acquisitions Editor, Wanda acquired and championed titles from seasoned and emerging writers. She continues to support the work of Canadian writers as a freelance editor and as mentor for various organizations; including The Writer’s Union of Canada. Besides teaching a journalism course at King’s College, Wanda also serves as a Fiction Mentor for King’s MFA Writing and Publishing Program. She also teaches courses in screenwriting, journalism and documentary filmmaking in Toronto.

The Art of the Essay (8 weeks): Thursdays, 6:30 – 9 p.m. ADT, beginning October 3 on Zoom

Instructor: Adrienne Gruber

Course description: Creative non-fiction and personal essay are powerhouses in the storytelling genre – they merge real life with literary technique, including dialogue, scene building and narrative. This course will assist you in finding your voice as a non-fiction writer and locating the heart of your story, as well as finding creative ways to tell these stories. In addition to traditional essay forms, we will explore unconventional literary non-fiction styles by playing with structure and trying out a variety of forms like the braided essay, the Abecedarian, the Hermit Crab and more. This 8-week non-credit course will include assigned essay readings each week, as well as generative writing exercises and opportunities for sharing work and receiving feedback.

Adrienne Gruber is an award-winning writer originally from Saskatoon. She is the author of five chapbooks, three books of poetry, including Q & A, Buoyancy Control, and This is the Nightmare, and the creative nonfiction collection, Monsters, Martyrs, and Marionettes: Essays on Motherhood. She won the 2015 Antigonish Review’s Great Blue Heron poetry contest, SubTerrain’s 2017 Lush Triumphant poetry contest, placed third in Event’s 2020 creative non-fiction contest, and was the winner of SubTerrain’s 2023 creative non-fiction contest. Both her poetry and non-fiction has been longlisted for the CBC Books awards. In 2012, Mimic was awarded the bp Nichol Chapbook Award. Adrienne lives with her partner and their three daughters on Nex̱wlélex̱m (Bowen Island), B.C., the traditional territory of the Coast Salish peoples.