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Focus on the Short Story

MARK SPENCER

Focus on the Short Story

MARK SPENCER | JOHN DECHANCIE

$449.99

08/28/2025 - 12/04/2025
 

Enroll Now

Newly revised for 2025!

 

This online course is for anyone writing any kind of short fiction. You will draft and complete two stories. There are no restrictions on topics or genre.  All aspects of writing engaging short stories are covered—plot, character, setting, theme, style. A tremendous part of learning how to become a good short story writer is becoming an exemplary reader, so at the core of the course is the analysis of a classic work of short fiction, along with creative exercises involving instruction in the close reading of contemporary works.

Whether you consider yourself a dedicated short story writer or a future novelist cutting your teeth on short works in the tradition of Stephen King, Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Anthony Doerr, Alice Munro, Barbara Kingsolver, and Jayne Anne Phillips, this class should serve you well. A chief lesson you will learn is that a successful work of fiction—whether short or long—is primarily created by the meticulous selection of small, sensuous details.

The lectures provide guidance and encouragement. The feedback on your submissions is constructive and honest. The required readings and resources are built into the course with links. No need to buy textbooks—everything is provided via the links.

$449.99

08/28/2025 - 12/04/2025
 

Enroll Now

Newly revised for 2025!

This online course is for anyone writing any kind of short fiction. You will draft and complete two stories. There are no restrictions on topics or genre.  All aspects of writing engaging short stories are covered—plot, character, setting, theme, style. A tremendous part of learning how to become a good short story writer is becoming an exemplary reader, so at the core of the course is the analysis of a classic work of short fiction, along with creative exercises involving instruction in the close reading of contemporary works.

Whether you consider yourself a dedicated short story writer or a future novelist cutting your teeth on short works in the tradition of Stephen King, Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Anthony Doerr, Alice Munro, Barbara Kingsolver, and Jayne Anne Phillips, this class should serve you well. A chief lesson you will learn is that a successful work of fiction—whether short or long—is primarily created by the meticulous selection of small, sensuous details.

The lectures provide guidance and encouragement. The feedback on your submissions is constructive and honest. The required readings and resources are built into the course with links. No need to buy textbooks—everything is provided via the links.

Course Details

Course outline

Each session is two weeks long and includes required reading, a written lecture, a creative exercise, and a writing assignment to turn in for feedback from your instructor..

Meet the instructor

Mark Spencer

Mark Spencer is the author of the novels An Untimely Frost, Ghost Walking, The Masked Demon, The Weary Motel (Omaha Prize for the Novel, Faulkner Award for the Novel), and Love and Reruns in Adams County; the best-selling nonfiction novel A Haunted Love Story: the Ghosts of the Allen House; as well as the short-story collections Wedlock, Spying on Lovers (Bradshaw Book Award), and Trespassers.

His short stories and articles have appeared in a wide variety of national and international magazines. He has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize eight times and has received four Special Mentions in Pushcart Prize: Best of the Small Presses. He also won the St. Andrews Press Short Fiction Prize. Trespassers, Mark’s most recent short-story collection, was a finalist in four national book competitions: the Serena McDonald Kennedy Award, the G.S. Sharat Chandra Prize for Short Fiction, the A.E. Coppard Long Fiction Prize, and the Quarterly West Novella Competition.

After earning his B.A. in English Literature at the University of Cincinnati, Mark earned his M.F.A. in Creative Writing at Bowling Green State University and did Ph.D. work at Oklahoma State University.

Mark is a professor of English and Creative Writing in the MFA program and Associate Vice Chancellor in Academic Affairs at the University of Arkansas at Monticello. Several times, Mark has been named to Who’s Who Among America’s Teachers.