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JESSICA VITALIS is a Columbia MBA-wielding author on a mission to write entertaining and thought-provoking literature. She founded Magic in the Middle, a series of free monthly recorded book talks, to help educators introduce young readers to new fantasy books. Her work has been translated into three languages, and she was recently named a 2021 Canada Council of the Arts Grant Recipient and featured on CBC's Here and Now and CTV's Your Morning. Her first two novels, The Wolf’s Curse and The Rabbit’s Gift, are out now with Greenwillow / HarperCollins. Coyote Queen publishes 10/10/23 and an unnamed standalone will follow in 2024.
In this hands-on writing workshop, participants look at what makes characters come alive in readers’ hearts and minds and learn how to develop memorable characters using the author’s secret technique to show and not tell.
Using the building blocks of story, we’ll work through a flexible pre-writing strategy that provides authors with a framework to draft a novel without bogging them down or making the drafting process feel too prescriptive.
This presentation includes the inspiration behind the author's work, a short reading, stories of tenacity and perseverance related to the author’s unusual childhood and her 14 year journey to publication, how to find story ideas, and a peek at the revision process (including the most important item in her writer’s toolbox!). Q&A included.
