Pre-Quill Conference - League of Utah Writers

I had so much fun at my first Pre-Quill conference this year! It was wonderful to see friends from Superstars and I'm grateful to my friend Wendy for re-introducing me to many of them. There were some great classes and I loved how small they were.

My favorite two were on writing creative non-fiction given by McKel Jensen and one on writing BIPOC with sensitivity by J.T. Moore.

Writing creative non-fiction is not something I've ever thought of doing in long form, but I loved this class anyway. There were so many things that were applicable through all types of writing - understanding and keeping your contract with the reader, using sensory details to put readers in the moment, and starting in a moment of tension.

But I loved the conversations we had as a class about choosing a vehicle to tell your story in creative non-fiction and how to play with time and anecdotes to really drive home the message you want to tell. Structure is something that fascinates me the most in writing, and the ways you can play with it in creative nonfiction are really neat. McKel also had a nifty formula that is similar to the scene/sequel plotting pattern but for creative non-fiction: Scene, Summary, Musing.

The class taught by J.T. Moore was really unique, and I loved how most of what she shared was immediately actionable. First were two resources that I was already familiar with but are always worth citing: Writing with Color and Writing the Other.

She encouraged the class to write diverse stories, to tell the stories of the people who are normally left out. But "you don't solve a world with no diversity by dropping in a character from and underrepresented group." To make sure you aren't just adding one of these token characters to check a box, she offered a great litmus test -- if you have a minority character in your story, we shouldn't recognize that character by their diversity aspect. For example: we should recognize the black character when they enter a scene because of their limp, their favorite hat, or their relationship to the other characters. Not by their skin color.

Moore encouraged us to analyze our own media consumption with critical questions like "who dies first and who survives?" or "What are the roles of the minority characters?" as a way to practice so we can analyze our own work.

It was a great conference overall! I'm sad that I probably won't be able to attend Quills this year, but I hope to see everyone again at Storymakers!