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Manners (not to be confused with politeness) are how a person conducts him or herself in the presence of others. Unique bad manners—whether inadvertent or intentional—are a great way to characterize the people who populate your stories, and add delicious tension to your prose. In this 2-hour class, we’ll look at examples from Claire Keegan, Robert Penn Warren, Sylvia Plath and others, and do lots of writing using manners to develop new characters or deepen characters you’ve already created. Come prepared to write! After class, any participants interested can convene across the street at Leo’s House of Thirst to demonstrate good manners and get to know each other (food and drink cost not included).

Heather Newton’s novel The Puppeteer's Daughters (Turner Publishing 2022) won the NC Indie Author Project book award for adult fiction, was a finalist for the Forword INDIES Book of the Year Award and was optioned for television. Her short story collection McMullen Circle (Regal House 2022), was a finalist for both the Thomas Wolfe Memorial Literary Award and the W.S. Porter Prize. Her novel Under the Mercy Trees (HarperCollins 2011) won the Thomas Wolfe Memorial Literary Award, was chosen by the Women’s National Book Association as a Great Group Reads Selection and named an “Okra Pick” by the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance. Her Substack is Cheerful Tearful: A Memoir in Toys. A practicing attorney, she teaches creative writing for the Charlotte Center for Literary Arts, the UNC Asheville Great Smokies Writing Program, and is co-founder and Program Manager for the Flatiron Writers Room writers’ center in Asheville. www.heathernewton.net