Announcing the launch of Craft School!

Hello in these difficult times, Circe’s Circle. We have a major announcement to make that we hope will serve as a much-needed bit of community-centered, creative, and fun news to many of you, as opposed to that other kind of news with which we are all so currently deluged: hard news, the compulsion to constantly check the news to see “what else” has happened, the difficulty of processing how out of control things have gotten. Just about a year ago, in an effort to support the creative community, Circe offered a 6-week course for writers struggling to find meaning in these times, and more than 50 writers signed up. Now, we are happy to announce that we have taken this call for larger, community-centered courses very seriously and decided to collaborate with one of our absolute favorite community-builders, Jeannine Oullette of Writing in the Dark, to offer an ongoing, immersive and connected community of language lovers who are hungry for both serious craft learning and a sense of having a creative home.

It is with our great pleasure that CIRCE CONSULTING and WRITING IN THE DARK present “CRAFT SCHOOL,” a vibrant new community for writers. This creative collaboration between Jeannine Ouellette, Emily Rapp Black, and Gina Frangello—three established writers with extensive teaching experience—is for prose writers of all levels who want to deepen and accelerate their craft through dedicated effort with close reading of acclaimed published work, an array of live (virtual) cross-disciplinary instruction, visiting writers and editors, generative writing rooms, publishing talks, small work groups, and more. Through our close reading and study of craft, we will identify specific elements of craft to apply in our own work within a cohesive, supportive cohort of writers doing the same. CRAFT SCHOOL is a place to practice attention, curiosity, playfulness, and surprise as a portal to profound revelations and transformations in our writing and our lives. With live Zooms monthly (all sessions recorded), and weekly posts on Mighty Networks, CRAFT SCHOOL offers robust and continual support for discussion, extended close readings, sharing work-in-progress with peers, and more. We are wildly excited to see what will emerge in this intentional, self-paced, slow-writing program for dedicated, community-focused, and joyful language-doers. We know the power of story changes lives and can’t wait to share this deeply important and impactful work with you.

Craft School will involve monthly community-wide Zooms that highlight craft lectures and close readings, as well as other face-to-face Zoom meetings such as small group work, paired accountability buddies, and group writing rooms and prompts. We will also have a thriving and active online community on the Mighty Network platform to keep us connected between our Zooms. Some of the visiting writers, editors, agents, visual artists and others we already have slotted to visit Craft School include Natashia Deon, Martha Bayne, Rob Roberge, Bret Anthony Johnston, Stephen Graham Jones, Molly McCully Brown, Edgar Gomez, Amanda Eyre Ward, Matthew Zapruder, Carrie Scanga, Alison McGhee, Julie Schumacher, Tia Levings, Athena Dixon, and Charles Baxter.

We are so over the moon excited and want to tell you EVERYTHING about Craft School, but we’re also so in love with the new Craft School website that we want to refer you over to it for all the intel you could possibly need! First, though, one more important announcement!

If you join the waitlist of Craft School, you’ll receive an email for our early registration, allowing you a 10% discount. So, make sure you keep this WAIT LIST LINK handy!

We are just bubbling over with excitement at this new offering that will allow us to keep the communities we build going all year long, with potential for renewal over multiple years, and the formation of an ongoing container for language makers, learners, and seekers. We hope to see you at Craft School!

With much love and solidarity—

Gina, Emily, and Heather