Five things I learned at Clarion

In 1996, I attended the Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers’ Workshop. Clarion was established in 1968, and it’s an intensive training ground for aspiring writers of fantasy and science fiction. It lasts for six weeks, and I returned exhausted. Back then, it was held at Michigan State University, and now it’s at UC San Diego. The next session is June 23 to August 3, 2024.

What did I learn there? Here are five things:

1. How to critique and why. Finding ways to strengthen someone else’s work is a fast way to learn how to strengthen your own work. The technique I learned from Maureen F. McHugh is this: Summarize what the story is or does in a sentence or two; identify the successes of the work; indicate the weakest parts; and offer one or two ideas for the fastest and biggest improvements.

2. Every story gets only one miracle, and the first sentence should point to it.

3. The person (or thing) that hurts the most is usually the best perspective for a story.

4. Setting reflects character, and different characters will experience the same setting differently.

5. The first draft may have everything you need, but you might need to change it all. That is, the story might be there, but the telling doesn’t do it justice. What is the story trying to do? What are its successes? Weaknesses? What could improve it the most?