Join us for a writing-based creative retreat, an opportunity to restore your writer-self as we enter a new calendar year. Rather than a typical writing course composed of lectures, exercises, and workshopping, our emphasis at Tanque Verde Ranch will be a simpler – and deeper – one: to use the act of writing to reconnect with our own minds and begin the new year with focus and intention.

We’ll spend our mornings in class, discussing elements of craft with the help of essays by Alexander Chee, Melissa Febos, Ross Gay, Carl Phillips, and Patricia Lockwood. Then we’ll carry our insights onto the page, using a new prompt each day to jump-start a piece of writing or go deeper into your existing work. There will be plenty of time, too, for rest, and for the activities that the ranch has to offer: hiking, bird-watching, spa treatments, and horseback riding, to name a few. Each evening, we’ll share a family-style meal.

This workshop is designed for writers of creative nonfiction and memoir, but all are welcome; you may write in any genre or format you choose. No particular experience is necessary. This workshop is for anyone seeking to know themselves better through writing, whether or not you call yourself a ‘writer.’