Online Readings
Chanel Brenner, writer, grief-writing guide, mother, and author of Smile or Else, will read from her award-winning poetry collection and discuss with her editor, Tom Lombardo, founding editor of Web M.D., how writing helped her through the pain of losing her six-year-old son and how she continues that journey by helping others navigate their grief.
Thursday, October 30, 7 PM Eastern, 4PM Pacific on ZOOM
Online Workshops
Thursday, January 1, 2-4:00 pm Eastern (online)
Are you wanting to write every day in 2026? Author Shuly Xóchitl Cawood used to say writers didn’t need to write every day—and she still believes that—but in 2021 she decided to write a poem every day for one month. It didn’t matter how long or how short, how great or how terrible. All that mattered was that she wrote one. After that month ended, she was hooked, and not a day has gone by since then that she has not written something. In this workshop, Shuly will share a few of her tricks to ensure that, even if she has only a few minutes to spare, she gets something on the page. You’ll have the chance to try some of her methods in class with writing sprints geared toward prose and poetry, so come ready to write. This class will be recorded for anyone who registers and cannot attend. Cost $50. Registration is required.
Sunday, January 4, 5-6 p.m. Eastern (Free online)
Are you considering submitting a flash essay to Prime Number Magazine? In this one-hour (free) discussion, Shuly Xóchitl Cawood (our flash creative nonfiction editor) will read and talk about some of her essay selections from 2025, highlighting what worked well in these essays and why she picked them. Feel free to bring any questions you have. Cost: FREE. Registration is required.
Thursday, January 15, 2-4:00 p.m. Eastern (online)
In this online class, we’ll talk about what flash nonfiction is, how it works, and why it works. Together we’ll mine some powerful flash essays for effective techniques you can use in your own writing. You’ll also have time in class to try your hand at starting your own draft of a flash nonfiction piece. Facilitated by Shuly Xóchitl Cawood, author of the prize-winning flash essay collection, What the Fortune Teller Would Have Said. This class will be recorded for anyone who registers and cannot attend. Cost: $50. Registration is required.
Let’s Write Together! with Shuly Xóchitl Cawood
Your Tuesday Lunchtime Workshop! (one hour, online, $10)
Noon to 1PM Eastern Time on ZOOM
Having a hard time finding inspiration and motivation to write? We’ll talk about a piece of writing, Shuly will give you a prompt, and then you will WRITE.
Workshops are on most Tuesdays from Noon to 1PM Eastern Time
“Shuly's ingenious prompts in her Tuesday workshops have led me into many important scenes in my novel and expanded my understanding of craft and creativity. This online community of writers is just wonderful.” —Erika Higgins Ross, winner of a 2023 Key West Literary Seminar Emerging Writers Award
"I love the poems and the prompts. I always come out of the class with a draft I want to continue to develop." —L.V.
"These workshops have been excellent, and they are exactly what I need in the middle of my busy work day." —J.B.
"Tuesday is magic, I always get something out of it. I end up with a workable poem almost every time or the start or an idea for a flash." —P.G.
“The uniqueness of Shuly’s selections has been as useful as the prompts themselves to expand my ideas of what craft and form can do. She has shaken out the starts of so many pieces, even when I thought I was in a writing rut. Not to mention she’s a wonderful person and talented writer and teacher. 10/10, highly recommend.” —E.M.
About Shuly Xóchitl Cawood
Shuly Xóchitl Cawood is the author of Something So Good It Can Never Be Enough (Press 53) and A Small Thing to Want: Stories (Press 53) and four other books: What the Fortune Teller Would Have Said: Flash Essays, winner of the 2022 Iron Horse Literary Review Prose Chapbook Competition; Trouble Can Be So Beautiful at the Beginning (Mercer University Press), winner of the 2019 Adrienne Bond Award for Poetry; 52 Things I Wish I Could Have Told Myself When I Was 17 (Cimarron Books, 2018); and The Going and Goodbye: A Memoir (Platypus Press, 2017). Shuly earned her MFA from Queens University of Charlotte, and her writing has been published in The New York Times, Brevity, The Sun, and others. Shuly also leads writing workshops through Press 53’s High Road Fest Online, including the popular Let’s Write Together!, a one-hour lunchtime workshop at Noon Eastern on Tuesdays. Learn more at shulycawood.com