Presentations include:
How to Interview your Characters: Learn who your Characters are with Q&A – to find out more about their behaviors, idiosyncrasies, intentions, and desires, and thus write stronger scenes. This is a fun session in which participants will work with partners or in small groups on several exercises. Presented by Linda Angér – WORKSHOP
Creating an Emotional Roller Coaster for your Readers through your Hero’s Journey: Successful stories, regardless of their length or media, give their readers an emotional roller coast ride as the protagonist cycles between failure and success in order to achieve an impossible goal. Constructing an emotional coaster is one of many techniques that writers use to connect audiences to characters. Recently, Lightwave, an advanced biometric company, measured the emotional response of an audience as they watched THE REVENANT. The movie is a riveting example of how the filmmakers created a startling emotional coaster experience for the audience through the life of the main character. In this presentation, we will reveal those techniques, as well as how they apply to novels. Presented by Dr. Stanley Williams – LECTURE
How Supporting Characters and their Subplots Support the Hero’s Primary Journey: Learn how to construct the subplots of your supporting characters to reinforce the themes of the hero’s journey – All stories, regardless of the number of characters or subplots are about one thing. Yet, to your audience, they seem to be about different things allowing you to engage a wide variety of readers and demographics. For example, how does the honest eccentric gold prospector’s subplot support the protagonist who is a crooked Washington political? In fact, how do all 12 of your main characters thematically converge on that one controlling idea that drives your writing and novel forward? We’ll explain how to do that in this session. Presented by Dr. Stanley Williams – LECTURE
How to Create Characters who will come Alive in your Novel: Using the Science of Western Face Reading to Craft your Character’s Look – Creating characters is arguably the single-most important part of novel writing; why is this so important? It can make the difference in writing a book that resonates with the audience, which will result in sales, or not. A novel is not visual like a movie. In film, all of the sensory work is done by a camera and a microphone. You have neither of those things in a novel. As a writer, words are all you have. It is important to use those words to help the reader have a very “real” feeling for your character. The science of Western Face reading has been scientifically validated to 92% accuracy. It can help you create a vibrant mental image of your character, one that people can’t wait to spend an evening with – or, in some cases, a whole weekend. Presented by Lin Klaassen -LECTURE
Character’s Body Language: Showing Emotion and Feeling by Writing Non-verbal Communication – What is Body Language? The non-verbal, temporary posture, expression, gesture, and movements a person makes. Body Language is an outward reflection of a person’s emotional condition and it is the most honest form of expression. As a writer you need to show characters’ emotions and feelings without telling. After all how many times can you use the words gaze, glance, and look, just to name a few?
- Use body language to add depth to dialogue
- Use it because more than 50% of human communication is non-verbal
- Use it to show how your character’s emotions affect his or her actions
- Use it to help show, rather than tell, your reader everything
Learn techniques to show a character’s emotion through the creative use of words to describe their body language. Presented by Lin Klaassen – LECTURE
The Art of Dialogue: Crafting Believable Dialog and Giving your Characters Voice – We all know that words matter. Even moreso when they’re out of the mouths of our beloved characters. From center stage to supporting, characters must not only be impeccable with their words – they must be believable and unique enough to give them dimensionality, charisma and style. Tips and techniques for writing believable dialogue inspired by a melange of journalism, poetry, and bad email etiquette. Presented by Lynne Golodner – LECTURE
A Family of Characters: Crafting characters who are related to one another in the story may pose unusual challenges. Three Michigan authors will share their experiences with creating characters who are related – parents, children, siblings – to discuss how a family of characters drive the action, with ups and downs, to tell the story. Presented by Lisa Lenzo, Lolita Hernandez, and L.E. Kimball – PANEL DISCUSSION
We encourage all attendees to bring a fully charged laptop or tablet. Although not necessary, a computer will enhance the experience with a hands-on feel. Use the hashtag: #RochesterWriters before, during and after the event in your posts, likes, and tweets.
Fresh hot coffee and tea available throughout the day. Light breakfast snacks and a full lunch included with registration. Please contact us if you have special dietary concerns.
Attendees will be able to choose one presentation per session time at the conference. Schedule could change without notice – Rochester Writers reserves the right to add, subtract, or substitute any of the presentations and speakers. Thank you.
Rochester Writers 