Writing Readers (ages 11-18)

Join us for a summer series of writing workshops for teens led by author Nikoletta Gjoni. Delve into an aspect of creative writing at each session and take your stories to the next level!  Optional: Before each session, read the recommended book for inspiration and insight.  Portions of teen writing may also be submitted to Urbana's Teen Zine for future publication. Each attendee will receive a writer's notebook and pencil, while supplies last. Recommended books available for purchase at the Curious Iguana bookstore at a 20% discount for Writing Readers participants. Attendance at each session is optional but highly encouraged. 

JUNE 17:

Through a Colorful Lens: The Puzzle Pieces that Make up a Story

A novel--or short story--is really a sum of all its parts. Can you identify what they are? In this exercise, we're going to look at the first pages of The Hunger Games and The Giver and color code the following: the action, the dialogue, the internal thoughts, the description, and the emotion. How do all these individual elements contribute to the larger story? How do they build on each other so that each piece plays an integral part in the storytelling process? And then we'll compare the two titles and see how they're similar and how they're different. Do the authors' styles, tones, and approach to telling a story differ based on how they incorporate these various elements? For the last stretch of the session, we'll begin building our own stories using our color coding method. How many of them can you incorporate in one scene? We'll find out! Recommended reading: The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins and The Giver by Lois Lowry

JULY 22:

Written in the Cards

The cards of a tarot deck are filled with symbolism, imagery, prophecies, and mystery. How do you read what's printed on them? In this workshop, we'll pass around the Joie de Vivre tarot deck and create our own flash fiction stories of 1000 words or less based on the art of the card you select. How does the imagery speak to you? Who is the character staring back and what's their story? You decide. Recommended reading: The Gilded Ones by Namina Forna

AUGUST 5:

Metaphor Dice

What creativity will be unlocked when you roll the metaphor dice? This writing tool will help you overcome writer's block and think outside the box with how we consider seemingly random words thrown together. Four red, four white, and four blue, for a total of 12 dice. Roll at least one of each color, arrange them in order—red, white, and blue—and read the resulting metaphor aloud, supplying whatever smaller linking or auxiliary words you want. Then start writing! We'll roll several times to get numerous creative combinations and let our imaginations run wild. What kind of story can you come up with? Recommended reading: When the Bones Sing by Ginny Myers Sain

About the Workshop Presenter:

Nikoletta Gjoni is a writer living outside of Washington, D.C. Much of her work delves into myth and folklore, historical fiction, and family lore and dynamics. Her work has been published in Atticus Review, Emerson Review, Alan Squire Publishing,The Ex-Puritan, and Cleaver Magazine, among others. Her story, “The Obscure Historical Sorrows of Canines,” was shortlisted for The Masters Review’s 2025 Best Emerging Writers anthology. Her work has appeared in the 2023 Rising Stars London Independent Story Prize anthology and has been previously nominated for the PEN/Robert J. Dau prize, Best of the Net, and Best Microfiction. She was a 2024 scholarship recipient for the Salty Quill Writers Retreat in Maine where she worked on her first novel. When not working as a project manager for a marketing agency, she is an editor of manuscripts for Writer’s Digest. View all of Gjoni's publications at www.ngjoni.com.