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live-laugh-lenney · 3 years

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The One Where YN Meets Will.

Hello, hi!

I’m Emily, I’ve had this blog for a few months now and I’m not sure what I want to do with it, apart from reblog gifs of Will and catch up on all things Youtube and the Eboys and the Sidemen and all that. Thought about giving writing a go, since I’ve done some before on another blog for another fandom, and this came from my brain as an attempt at writing for WillNE.

I am willing to take requests or write anything that anyone wants me to write about, if anyone would like one written for a specific idea.

Hope you like it. x

A consistent buzz came beside her.

Rumbling on top of her bedside table, her phone laid overturned and ringing with an incoming call from someone, charging on the thick Stephen King book that she was halfway through reading, ripples rolling over the surface of the water in the tall glass placed next to it, that she took to bed with her the previous night. She glanced at the salt lamp, small and jagged-looking and emitting a dull orange glow behind the sunlight that streamed through her windows, and gave herself a tut for leaving it on overnight; she couldn’t remember leaving it on although she couldn’t help but give a mental clap at how truthful the benefits of having a Himilayan salt lamp had been.

‘MUM’

The three letter word flashed at her in bold text, above a candid photo that someone had taken of her and her mum in a heart-to-heart chat in the middle of a family barbecue that had taken a turn once her father had found the alcohol stash in the garage and turned a casual family get-together into a night where everyone stumbled over the front doorstep on their way out. A heart-to-heart conversation that had them both smiling brightly at one another.

“Mum, hi.”

“Hi, darling.” Her voice sounded so soft, so sweet, inviting and warm and YN missed her more than anything; if she had anything to say about moving miles away, she would always give the advice of making sure distance was something you could handle. “You sound tired, did I wake you? I thought you’d be on your way to work by now.”

YN looked at the red numbers on the screen of her alarm clock, reading 7:45, and she had a tiny freak-out for a brief moment before she came to the realisation that it was her day off and she wasn’t due into work until after the weekend had finished.

“You did, yeah. I’m not due at work today though. They gave me the day off since my boss’ schedule is just meetings out of town today. He’s up North for conferences and such and it was late notice for me so he didn’t mind me not accompanying him. I wouldn’t have been able to do much anyway,” YN clarified and she used her free hand to push herself up from the mattress. Her hair was knotted and pillow-messed, sticking up in all directions and falling loose from the ponytail she’d thrown it up in before she fell asleep. Her t-shirt twisted around her middle which she adjusted with her fingers, bringing her knees to her chest and staring out the window as the sun continued its rise in the horizon. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, don’t fuss about me,” she heard her mother tut from down the line. But YN couldn’t help but fuss over the two of them; if she lived closer to them, she wouldn’t worry so much because they’d be just a short distance away if they needed her help. But she didn’t live close and she hadn’t done for almost two years; she lived almost 300 miles northeast of where she used to live with her parents and it wouldn’t take her more than twenty minutes to tend to their needs. “We’re both fine, stop worrying yourself, darling. Your dad’s been back doing his gardening so he’s out there already. Watering his flowers, spraying fertiliser, cleaning all the fox poo up. He’s been growing some veggies in the plot next to the greenhouse so you can take some back when you next come to visit.”

YN smiled to herself, bringing her shoulders to her jawline before dropping them and relaxing against her headboard. The back of her head resting against the plush velvet, coloured a clean white, and her toes curled into the sheet beneath her, her fist clutching the duvet as she brought it tighter to her body.

“You can always send me some in a box? Or you could come and visit and drop them off yourself? You know I’ve got the spare room in the new place if you want to come up for a weekend. It’s vacant, just full of my empty moving boxes and bags that I haven’t gotten rid of yet,” YN said, a yawn creeping up her throat that she hid with the palm of her hand, “I need dad’s handyman work to come and help put some shelves up. You’ve not seen it yet.”

“Your dad said it’s a lovely flat. Lovely view. Lovely building. But, you know what he’s like when it comes to describing things. Everything’s lovely,” her mother snorted and YN laughed softly; her father had always been vague and she’s pretty sure that she’d never heard him use any other word to describe something other than ‘lovely’. “We’ve been talking about paying you a visit.”

“Please do. It’s a little lonely here by myself. I’m yet to meet new friends or have a chat with the neighbours. Everyone’s either back in Cornwall or back in Hackney and both are a hefty distance away.”

YN had never considered herself as an introvert so to call herself lonely felt strange.

She was always the friend who asked for the bill, she was the friend who made the complaint in a restaurant when a plate of food came back wrong, she was the friend who made advances on blokes in pubs and clubs because her friends were too shy to go and introduce themselves and she was the friend who always carried the responsibility of making polite conversation with people in pubs when they needed a table to perch themselves at. She was that friend. So making friends with strangers and starting conversations with her co-workers and approaching others who she found had kind features was never something she struggled with.

Moving to a new place and having to make new relationships and form new bonds, regardless of how far it was from the bonds and relationships you already had, she found it daunting to start fresh.

“What are you doing today?”

“I’m not sure. The weather is really nice and it looks warm out so I might go and explore Canary Wharf and see what’s around. I need to do some shopping, food and furniture, so I might do some of that,” YN rolled onto her side and let her cheek rest against the cold side of her mattress, the backs of her thighs exposed to the cool air of her bedroom as her t-shirt rose up her body; and she made a mental note to buy herself so proper pyjamas because knickers and an oversized t-shirt could cause more problems than expected. “We’ve got a lovely grass area outside the block of flats so I might sit out there, soak up the sunshine, read a book and eat some lunch. I don’t know. Might see how the day goes, I have a good feeling about it.”

“Go exploring. You can find some places to show us when we come to visit,” and YN smiled.

“I’ll do that. You’ll love it mum. This place is amazing. I feel so lucky to have been given something as beautiful as this. I had a crack den for my first flat so this feels like a dream,” she stared at her ceiling. There was no yellow tint from how the previous tenants smoked inside and there were no unusually coloured stains on the ceiling’s coving that caught the eye because of how a stain of that colour shouldn’t have been there, leaving the mystery of just how it got there… and YN didn’t need that kind of stress over something like that. “It doesn’t smell like pee, there’s no syringes outside and there’s no sign of vomit or shit stains on the floor because it’s all laminate.”

“You deserve it, darling. You really do.”

“It’s clean, mum. It came clean, it smells clean, it looks clean. Everything looks brand new and,” YN pauses for a moment, rolling onto her stomach and she sighs with content, “I love it.”

After hanging up, she contemplated getting up and getting dressed for the day.

It felt rather tempting to stay in her comfortable loungewear and enjoy the silence, the time to herself and the time off she had been after for so long, taking advantage of Deliveroo and ordering food for breakfast, lunch and dinner rather than cooking something homemade and having the leftovers the next day (or for when she woke up in the early hours with a hankering for something to nibble on, because she could, because she didn’t have an authority figure to tell her no).

By the time her phone call ended with her mother, it was a little over forty-five minutes later and her alarm clock showed a time that she didn’t want to see on her day off; 8:35am. She expected another hour or two added on to her usual sleep schedule, to make a difference to the usual 6am alarm call that had her detesting her job just a tiny bit, but it wasn’t frowned upon because she’d take any given opportunity to speak to her mother. The one person she called her best friend because she really was the only person, apart from her father, that she’d drop anything and everything important for. Her sleep didn’t matter when she got to her the voice of someone she missed so dearly.

Porridge and fruit, a colourful array of strawberries and blueberries and bananas and cranberries in her bowl, and a warm cup of tea had been her breakfast as she caught up with the lifestyle Youtube channel she had been in the loop with. A Youtube channel that she had been a big fan of from the moment she moved to London, one who she turned to in times of need, one that she stumbled across when googling aesthetically pleasing ways to decorate a flat because she really needed to do something about how her Hackney flat had looked before a lick of paint and a hanging plant, one that she continued to view and like and followed tips from, even when it came to her new flat.

“Don’t be afraid to like monochrome and definitely don’t be afraid to follow a colour scheme that might seem ‘out there’ and in your face. If you like lime green then go paint a portion of your wall that colour. If you like the brightest shade of pink then go mad and add some colour to your life. You can never feel more organised than when your surroundings follow a consistent pattern that brings immense amounts of joy when you enter.”

The young girl on her screen, with space-buns either side of her head and an outfit that definitely came from a trendy thrift store clothes rail, sat before a wall of a delicious shade of peach that YN thought looked lovely; not for herself, because she’d stuck with the whites and the greys and the blacks that her flat already consisted of, but perfect for the young twenty-something year old.

“There are loads of websites where you can buy hanging plants, or artificial hanging baskets, and hanging canvas prints and wall art. I’m always looking for new things to buy so I’ll link some of my favourite online stores for you to check out; hit my Instagram mentions up with photos of things you’ve brought, too. That’s what I love to see.”

YN’s spoon clinked against the ceramic bowl in front of her as she pushed it away from her, reaching for her television remote and turning off her Youtube app, her television turning off completely and leaving a black screen behind. The flat falling silent. She looked around her, drumming her fingers against the tabletop, eyes squinting as the sunlight streamed through the wall-to-ceiling windows and made everything feel bright..

As much as she warmed to the idea of staying inside and ordering furniture and decor for her home, scrolling through online stores to buy something she thought she needed but really didn’t need, she had a good feeling about the upcoming day.

“Listen, love, I’m not sure if you could tell but I’m not exactly a people person. I don’t know you, don’t want to know you, have no plans to get to know you. You might live in the building but that doesn’t mean we need to be friendly.”

He spoke with such vigour in his voice that YN could only keep quiet so as to not entice a negative reaction out of him in such a confined space because confrontation was something she was never comfortable with. Sure, she’d endured confrontation before but that was from people she had been acquainted with, the ones she was friends with, people she saw on a daily basis and from people she worked with, from those who were supposed to confront her when something was wrong or hadn’t been down in a way it was supposed to be done; her boss, mainly. This man was a complete stranger, someone she didn’t know,someone she’d never seen before so instant regret filled her veins. She thought he looked friendly enough to start a quick conversation, to make the lift ride seem a little less boring, filling the empty space with general chit-chat.

Cowering away from him and almost closing in on herself, even though his attention stayed focused on the screen of his phone as he scrolled through a social media app, she thought he’d finished with her and she hadn’t expected him to perk up anymore.

“Not everyone likes to chat to strangers.”

“Well, I like chatting to strangers so don’t mind him,” a quirky Geordie accent perked up from behind her, her posture adjusting at the sudden appearance of someone behind her; she’s sure she didn’t see anyone else in the lift, apart from the towering bloke beside her, when she stepped into the lift but, then again, he was tucked away in the corner with a cap on his head and she had been looking at the floor as she entered because a mark on her white shoe had caught her attention. “Come chat to me, if you want. Promise I won’t bite your head off like matey-boy there.”

Her trainers squeaked on the floor as she spun around, eyes raking up and down his figure so she could get a good look at who the voice belonged to, almost staking him out in a way. He was a handsome chap, with brown hair sticking out from beneath a black cap upon his head that he’d pulled quite far down his forehead, a cheeky grin on his face that made the mood in the lift much brighter. There was a graphic print printed on the front of the black hoodie he had decided to throw on, the commonly-known Adidas stripes lining the length of his joggers, trainers on his feet with the laces loose and almost untying by themselves (clumsy, she assumed he was, because there’s no way he wouldn’t trip over them as soon as they loosened completely).

“I’m Will. Will Lenney.”

“I’m YN.”

“Do I get your surname? S’only fair since I told you mine.”

She laughed softly and replied with her surname, a look of appreciation on his features as he held his hand out for her to take, which she gladly shook with her own. Skin so soft, fingers so delicate, with a hold so strong that she couldn’t find herself letting go. She didn’t want to let go. This was the first contact she’d had with someone new, in a month of being new to the area, and it just so happened to be with someone she found rather attractive to the eye.

The bloke from before, who had tore down her attempts at being the friendly neighbour who he would, no doubt, see quite often, couldn’t help but let out the strongest sigh of annoyance. A sound that brought them back to reality, hands falling from their hold, dropping back down to their sides with a faint rosy-look on their cheeks that didn’t come from how warm it was. A sound that made the both of them turn their noses up, that made them their eyebrows scrunch on their browlines and made them want to really throw words at him until he gained some manners. Yet they ignored him because he wasn’t worth the time.

“You’re new here, aren’t you? I don’t think I’ve seen you around before,” he started, adjusting the backpack on his shoulder that had slipped with the movement of his arm falling down to his side. His fingertips and right down to the middle of his palm still felt heavy with the thought of her hand still in his. “I’d remember such a beautiful face.”

The heat already on her cheeks reached boiling and she knew her flushed look caught his attention. His smile turning into a grin which had her looking at her feet, shyly. A handsome lad with a sense of immense charm about him; she liked him and it wasn’t typical of her to form an attraction at such an early stage.

“Yeah, I moved in about a month ago. Floor 10, right at the end of the corridor. A proper upgrade from where I used to be located but thanks to my work, they moved me from my previous office block to my current office block in Canary Wharf and said they’d move me closer if necessary,” she thought she was rambling and she expected a look of faint annoyance on his features that would silently tell her to shut up. She picked at the loose string hanging from the hem of her t-shirt and twirled it around her finger, looking up from her feet and seeing a look of intense concentration on his face, enticing her to carry on. “The move was necessary. Completely necessary. It wasn’t a nice place where I was before, it was the first thing I saw on the website and I was desperate for somewhere to live. If I stayed there, I would be half an hour away otherwise.”

Canary Wharf.

It was a complete upgrade from the streets of Hackney and the dingy flat she had become so accustomed to for a little less than a year; the smell of weed and tobacco would fill the corridors and hit her in the face when she left her front door, the lights were always dim and flickered and the lifts were rickety and untrustworthy, discarded bikes and scooters and old prams and baby-carriers littered the space between one end of the hallway to the other, suspicious figures dressed in black hoodies and grey joggers always greeted her with stone-cold faces and squared-up jaws. An attempt, she guessed, to look like they were the typical hardnuts of the complex and that they weren’t to be messed with, even if it was just a polite ‘excuse me’ to pass them by and to be out of their hair within a moment.

It wasn’t all bad, regardless. Her neighbours were sweethearts, they always said hello and invited her in for cups of tea and a slice of cake after she finished work, most people were kind and warm and had their own back stories as to why they chose such a place to live - she could only imagine that the building was a nice place to live, with residents who took care of themselves and the place they lived in, before London gangs took over and were on the high of increasing and before drug dealers became more frequent on the streets - and her life, thank god, was never bothered. No one intervened, no one found her life to be their business to spread and life felt normal; she had a home, somewhere to live, somewhere to sleep and eat and shower and feel warm and cosy in a bed. Even if it wasn’t as nice as she had wanted it to be, she had somewhere.

Her new flat was almost dream-like if you compared it to what she lived in before. It made her Hackney flat look like a pit; a drug-den, if you will. She could wake up to pure sunshine filtering through double-glazed windows and there was no chance that she would be rudely woken up in the middle of the night from the ghoulish moans of the wind getting trapped between cracked window panes or the drunken yells of people stumbling down the hallways back to their homes. She could walk to her new place of work rather than hop on public transport and she could take the time to explore a side of London she never had the chance to see. Her floor was laminated wood, heated when the nights were cold, and there were no stains of garishly and disgusting colours of god-knows-what from previous tenants who had lived there. The view was beautiful, she could see right to the end of the horizon, and the scenes she was greeted with on her arrival home were almost picturesque… except pictures could never do it justice.

She’d been there for a month.

A whole four weeks.

And she could already feel improvements in her lifestyle that weren’t so bold before. She woke up happier and didn’t feel the need to stay in bed for a lie-in, she felt happier during the day and had a bob in her step that brought light to her office block, she felt safe when she walked out the reception and into the open space by the entrance and didn’t feel like she would be jumped by hiding predators if she arrived home late at night. She was friendly with her neighbours, always popped round to give them any post that had been posted through her mailbox by accident or if deliveries were left with them when she’d been at work and always started a conversation with them when they stood waiting for the lift to arrive on their floor.

“Oh, nice. What is it-”

The ding of the lift stopped Will mid-sentence, silenced them and halted their conversation as the doors opened to reveal the reception floor, empty and desolate from people. It was mid-morning, almost lunchtime, so YN had assumed most were working or out in the streets of London to enjoy the sunshine; the latter being what she had planned to do.

The man from the lift, who had tucked himself in the corner and stuck earphones in to block out their conversation, made sure he was the first one out and disappeared before YN could give him a sarcastic goodbye, not that he would have heard her anyway so she settled with a wave, a really exaggerated and over-the-top wiggle of her fingers, and hoped he saw it in the reflection of the window as he left and disappeared into the mass of people walking by their block of apartments.

“You’re a right character, you,” Will admitted, nudging her with his elbow and smirking at her, “what is it you do, job-wise? That’s what I wanted to ask.”

“I’m a PA for a CEO at an advertising company. A personal assistant who runs and gets coffee for everyone, gets lunch during her lunch-break, who organises meetings and creates schedules and gets the big boss what he wants when he wants it,” she clarified, “it’s not exactly the best job and I wish I was doing something I wanted to do but it pays well. For now, it’s enough to get me by and keep this place.”

They started walking toward the automatic doors of the entrance, feeling the cool air of the shade on their exposed skin that definitely disappeared as soon as the sunshine hit them, coming to a stop just by a brick wall. Young children were running around with their parents walking behind, cyclists were dinging bells to pass through large groups and groups of university students were huddled on the grass, eating lunches they’d brought from restaurants on their way, backpacks discarded and being used as pillows as they laughed and joked. Tourists were taking photos and posing to show off where they’d been and what they got up to when it came to showing their friends back home and businessmen and businesswomen were almost speed-walking to get back to their offices in time with a styrofoam takeaway lunch in their hands.

“I’m not keeping you from anything, am I? Just tell me to piss off if I am.”

“No, no. Don’t be silly. I’m only popping round the corner to see my mate. He won’t mind if I’m late,” he said, perching down on the brick wall and patting the space beside him. The legs of his ankles rose up to show the white ankle socks he’d paired with his trainers., “What is it you want to do as a job? Just, the way you talk about your job now makes it sound like you don’t like it.”

“I do like it there. But I don’t want to be a personal assistant, running round London to get coffee and sandwiches, for the rest of my life. I’ve always dabbled in blogging, taking photos, talking about nonsense and stuff. Posting videos and vlogging, too. I’ve tried it out as something fun, documenting holidays and stuff, and I’d love to do something with that and take it further but... I don’t know,” she sat down beside him, sliding her bag off of her shoulder and setting it on her lap, arm looped underneath the handles to keep it from spilling the contents inside, “I don’t want to be a social influencer but someone who does what she wants to do and gets by by just being herself. No companies to promote her or anything. Nothing to boost her. All her,” she stared off into the distance, tapping the heel of her foot against the concrete. Will nodded. “What do you do?”

“I, uh,” he scoffed out a laugh and rubbed the nape of his neck. His hat fell from his head and he decided to swap the shade of the cap to the sunglasses he had hanging from the neck of his hoodie, “funnily enough, I post videos on Youtube. I’m a Youtuber.”

Her head whipped round and she gawked at him. Eyes wide, mouth agape and her hand found his forearm, squeezing it tightly with excitement.

“You’re not?”

“I am, yeah. I was in university, didn’t like what I was studying, and I was told that if I really felt strongly about this Youtube malarky then I should pursue it to its possible potential and see where I end up. My mum’s words, not mine,” he snorted. He felt her hand loosen around his forearm and he watched her face become rigid as she came to the realisation of what she’d done. He dismissed it because he didn’t want to embarrass her but, really, he didn’t mind and he found it endearing. “I’m not that big or popular or anything but I’ve got a couple million subscribe-”

“Not that big,” she mocked and rolled her eyes, “a couple million subscribers is huge. I’ll have to search you up. What’s your channel name?”

“WillNE. Like, Will then an N then an E. Like a-”

“Like a play on words with your surname,” she grinned as she proudly finished his sentence for him and he nodded, rather pleased with himself; and she had to give it to him, it was something special, unique and rather creative than some of the stand-out names she could think of from the platform. Some were really out there and had no relevance to who they were nor what they spoke about, some were vague and some were almost as bonkers as the people who came up with them. “That’s really cool. This is really cool. A famous Youtuber lives in my flat complex... I’m talking to a famous Youtuber right now... heck, I’ve managed to keep my cool around someone famous and I’m amazed I haven’t embarrassed myself. Wait till I tell my friends about this. They won’t believe me.”

“They’re not fangirls or anything, are they?”

“No, ha. If anyone’s the fangirl out of my friends then it’s me. I’ll find myself watching Youtube when I’ve got nothing else to do,” she admitted, “cooking dinner? I’ll stick someone on to watch. Can’t sleep? I’ll just binge watch someone until I’m tired. Day off and there’s nothing to do? I’ll find a channel and just let it go from there.”

“Maybe I’ll pop up on there one day. I’ll help cure your boredom,” Will grinned, “then you can say ‘hey, that’s one of my mates there on my telly, that is’.”

A comfortable silence swallowed the both of them as they sat and let the seconds tick by. The tweets of the birds came from above, distant chatter came from the students lounging on the grass behind, scuffs of soles signified people were walking and jogging nearby and despite the feeling of time coming to end between the two of them, neither of them wanted to leave the other, neither wanted to bring the conversation to an end and neither of them wanted to part ways.

“So, we’re mates, huh?”

“Yeah, I reckon so,” Will smiled. Eyes locking with hers for a brief second, long enough to catch the twinkle in her eye and the genuine smile that lifted up her lips, “you’re a good’un. I like you. I think we’ll get along really bloody well, me and you.”

(WILL’S TEXTS. YN’S TEXTS.)

Filming a video tomorrow. Fancy coming by?

Won’t I get in the way?

Bollocks will you. Come along. Please. You can see firsthand how to make a Youtube video since you said you’ve always thought about it.

Where?

Only at my place. A TWOTI.

This Week On The Internet… nice one. I’ll be there.

You’ve done your research on me!

Spent all day googling you. As soon as you walked away, I started my research and I cut my day short so I could come home and watch your videos. Just call me a superfan now.

Superfan, ha.

I’ll have to test you. Could get you in a video to see if you’re my biggest fan.

Try me. I’ll get full marks. Your subscribers will look like phonies compared to me, hahaha.

You might have to sit off camera, out of shot, tomorrow. If I don’t finish everything by the time you get here, that is. No distractions. No pulling faces behind the camera.

I’ll be on my best behaviour. I’ll fangirl at the door, drop my Twitter handle into conversation, ask for a signature and a photo and then I’ll be fine.

I’m not going to regret this, am I?

You won’t hear a peep out of me. Promise.

Come by after lunch then. We can get some takeaway for lunch or something, if you don’t eat before, and I’ll have some bits filmed by the time you get here so you won’t have to sit in silence for too long.

Make it 1pm and it’s a deal.

Why 1pm?

It’s Saturday tomorrow. I don’t get up before noon on the weekends. Not even for you, mister big-shot Youtuber. ;)

And here I was, thinking you would throw your routine away for your new best mate.

Nice try.. see you tomorrow, William.

Ohh, serious. Full name and all. I see how it is, YN.

Goodnight, you muppet.

See you tomorrow. x

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staceyresnikoff · 7 years

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“Writing in Paris” Resources for Writers (Boston Book Festival - BBF Unbound)

Voilà ! You’ve found the linkable resource list from the “Writing in Paris” BBF Unbound session at the 2017 Boston Book Festival. Explore your options to write in English in France:

Cambridge Writers’ Workshop Writing Retreats

https://cambridgewritersworkshop.org/summer-in-paris-writing-retreat-july-22-30-2015/

Based in Cambridge, CWW holds retreats in Paris and the French countryside, mixing classes, workshops, yoga, café writing, outings, and time with faculty. Artistic Director Diana Norma Szokolyai says the next Paris retreat will be July 25-30, 2018 with Rita Banerjee, Diana Norma, and two or three well-established authors as faculty. See the daily blog from the 2016 Barcelona and the South of France Retreat to get more background on their approach: https://cambridgewritersworkshop.org/2016/07/18/bienvenidos-a-barcelona-the-cww-barcelona-south-of-france-writing-retreat-day-1/ From the website: “The workshop is a forum for fostering communities of dedicated writers and encouraging creative expression in the literary arts.”

L’ATELIER

http://www.latelierwriters.org/

Founded by three Emerson College MFA graduates, Laura McCune-Poplin, Michelle Bailat-Jones, and Sara Johnson Allen, L’ATELIER was designed to be an instructive and supportive writing community coming together for one week in the French countryside. The third annual retreat took place in early June 2017 at a former winemaking estate. From the website: “The space provides privacy for writing and also comfortable common areas with verandas, centuries-old stone staircases, gardens, hidden libraries, and a reserved meeting space for L'ATELIER craft sessions, meals, editing consultations, and seminars.” See the blog to understand the introspective and inspirational flavor of this annual retreat: http://www.latelierwriters.org/blog/

WICE Paris

https://www.wice-paris.org/

From the WICE website: “WICE is one of the oldest Anglophone organizations in Paris. For more than 35 years, this non-profit association has been offering cultural and educational programs to the international and expat community in Paris. Day-to-day operations are supported by a dedicated group of volunteers, diverse in age and nationality.” WICE creative writing courses are offered year-round: www.wice-paris.org/creative-writing-literature with regular faculty including David Barnes (of SpokenWord) and Gretel Furner. Occasional CNF/memoir teacher Lise Funderburg http://www.lisefunderburg.com/ is highly recommended.

Paris Writers Workshop (run by WICE)

http://www.wiceblog.org/2016/03/paris-writers-workshop-2016.html

Every other year, WICE holds its Paris Writers Workshop, which includes workshopping, manuscript consultations, panels, and sightseeing. There is no 2018 website yet, but see the link above and the write-up in Poets & Writers: https://www.pw.org/content/paris_writers_workshop

about 2016. More information from Dmitri at WICE: “I was on the organizing committee in 2016, and am head of the committee for PWW 2018. This is a week-long workshop typically in late June or early July. We run seminars in novel, short story, creative nonfiction and poetry. We've had some distinguished faculty, including Phillip Lopate, Lan Samantha Chang (who runs the Iowa Writing Workshop), and Ayana Mathis (author of The Twelve Tribes of Hattie).”

Paris Writing Workshop at the Paris American Academy

http://pariswritingworkshop.com

This is an intensive month-long workshop held each July in the Latin Quarter on the historic Rue Saint Jacques, close to Luxembourg Gardens. The program combines fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry through craft classes and workshops, as well as special sessions in screenwriting, travel writing, and reading one’s work to an audience. Rolf Potts runs the program. His 2018 co-instructors are: Major Jackson, Dinah Lenney, and Robin Wasserman. There can be guest lectures and soirées. Writers in the Fellows Program focus on specific writing projects while also leading peer workshops and literary walking tours. Applications and acceptances are rolling.

Paris Writers Retreat

http://www.pariswritersretreat.com/

Wendy Goldman Rohm of Rohm Literary created this twice-yearly program with best-selling authors and literary agents to empower writers in both writing and publishing. The next retreat is May 28 - June 1, 2018. From the website: “Story and manuscript development come alive at this acclaimed, professional workshop for authors of fiction and nonfiction. We hold the Paris Writers Retreat twice a year at our private loft in the heart of Paris, in May and September. Develop your book, fine tune your manuscript, and perfect your writing in progress. Writers of all levels attend to generate new material, develop ideas, or shape their stories.” The schedule is posted here: http://www.pariswritersretreat.com/schedule.html

Left Bank Writers Retreat

http://www.leftbankwritersworkshop.com/

This one-week program, June 10-15, 2018, offers daily morning workshops and afternoon literary-minded outings. Founder Darla Worden aims to steep participants in the methods and influences of iconic expat writers. Quote from Darla on the website: “I want to offer this experience to other writers who would like to write in the morning and see the sights of Paris in the afternoon — using their Parisian experiences as writing prompts in their work. We will explore Paris’s Left Bank where iconic writers like Hemingway, Joyce, and Fitzgerald lived and worked, as well as the great museums, parks and restaurants that inspired them.” (Details on 2017: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2017/01/prweb13985873.htm )

American University of Paris (AUP)

https://www.aup.edu/academics/summer/creative-arts/creative-writing-institute

https://www.aup.edu/academics/summer/creative-arts

The AUP hosts both a Summer Creative Writing Institute and summer classes in Creative Arts, including Writing. Coursework is transferrable for credit at U.S. universities. Founded 55 years ago, the AUP describes itself as an “American-style university education” set in Paris. It’s located on the Left Bank in the 7th arrondissement along with icons such as the Eiffel Tower and Musée D’Orsay.

Shakespeare & Company

https://shakespeareandcompany.com/

This bookstore/café/literary mecca close to Notre-Dame cathedral delivers the pulse of what’s happening in the Anglophone writing/reading community in Paris. Shakespeare & Company provides its library room free-of-charge to several writing programs and teachers (upcoming events listed here: https://shakespeareandcompany.com/51/shakespeare-and-company/389/workshops ) and hosts not-to-be-missed, high-profile author readings. One of its most prestigious partners is the NYU low-residency MFA Writers Workshop in Paris (see next blurb). If you’re lucky, you might become a Tumbleweed, which is a guest of the bookstore, encouraged to write and read, and given a spot to sleep, in exchange for volunteer work at the shop: https://shakespeareandcompany.com/35/history/38/about-tumbleweeds

NYU MFA Writers Workshop in Paris

http://as.nyu.edu/cwp/low-residency-mfa.html

Whether you are ready to pursue a rigorous MFA in creative writing or not, the presence of this NYU graduate program is a boon to English-speaking writers and readers in Paris. It hosts twice-yearly residencies with stellar faculty during January and July — faculty who often do public readings and discussions — providing a tremendous surge of energy for students of other Paris writing programs running concurrently. NYU MFA students meet in Paris for five intensive ten-day residences over two years and then work remotely under close faculty mentor supervision. Check out a sample calendar of the residency period: https://as.nyu.edu/content/dam/nyu-as/cwp/documents/Low-ResidencyMFAJuly2015Calendar.pdf

Paris Lit Up

http://parislitup.com/

An independent, non-profit community arts organization, Paris Lit Up organizes a series of writing workshops, including the Paris Writers’ Group meetup hosted by Helen Cusack O’Keeffe (https://www.meetup.com/pariswriters/members/9573183/ ) and an application-based mini-residency (http://parislitup.com/writing-workshops/plu-mini-writing-residency/ ). PLU is also known for its Thursday open mic nights with featured writers at Culture Rapide bar in the 20th arrondissement of Paris (http://parislitup.com/paris-lit-up-open-mic/ ) and Paris Lit Up Magazine.

Ivy Writers Paris

http://ivywritersparis.blogspot.com/

Ivy Writers Paris was founded by American writers Michelle Noteboom and Jennifer K. Dick. They offer bilingual poetry readings and literary lectures on the Left Bank. From the website: “Before the reading starts, we gather for a drink and chat with new friends and old alongside invited authors. After the reading, books can be purchased and signed and then everyone who wants to comes along for dinner. The reading is thus sandwiched between social space, allowing listeners to really get to know guest authors. Ivy gives you the opportunity to talk to the writers you love and to their publishers, as well as other authors, translators and aficionados of poetry in attendance.”

SpokenWord Paris

https://spokenwordparis.org/author/db1066/

Directed by David Barnes, SpokenWord Paris hosts events for Anglophone writers. The Writers’ Group, organized and run by Bruce Sherfield, is its Sunday evening writing workshop, open to all, held at Shakespeare & Company. From the website: a “very down-to-earth, unpretentious feedback workshop running on a drop-in basis almost every weekend since February 2005.” (https://spokenwordparis.org/the-other-writers-group/ ). SpokenWord Paris also hosts a Monday night open mic in the 11th arrondissement at Au Chat Noir https://spokenwordparis.org/practical-info/ and publishes the literary magazine The Bastille.

La Muse

http://lamuseretreat.com/

La Muse is just one of several pure retreats available to writers in the French countryside (just Google “French writing retreat” and you’ll find them). This one is in Labastide-Esparbairenque in the Occitanie region in southern France. It is run by writers Kelly Eielson and John Fanning, who left careers in publishing in NYC 15 years ago to found their enclave. In addition to a quiet room, here’s what guests can expect: http://lamuseretreat.com/retreats/what-we-do-each-retreat/.

The Write Bank Children’s Book Workshop

http://www.maxineroseschur.com/about-the-write-bank.html http://www.maxineroseschur.com/WriteBankFlyer.pdf

Maxine Rose Schur will host an intimate autumn 2018 writing course on children’s book writing for four to six participants, set in a rented Right Bank apartment. From the website: “Appropriate for both beginning and intermediate writers, The Write Bank Children’s Book workshop is a combination of lecture, discussion, readings, in-depth critiques and hands-on exercises. The focus is deeply personal: on your specific work and your current writing goal.”

Erin Byrne

http://www.e-byrne.com/workshop.html

Travelers’ Tales author and Solas Awards-winner, Erin Byrne, plans to resume her eclectic writing workshop in April 2018 at Shakespeare & Company. From the website: “Our writing can be brightened with techniques, styles, and flourishes of other genres. During this two-session workshop, taught by author Erin Byrne, we will dip our pens into fiction, nonfiction, travel, memoir, film, poetry, and journalism to add vivid hues to our writing styles.”

A few à la carte links:

https://www.meetup.com/topics/writing-workshops/fr/paris/

This list on Meetup.com features many writers and artists organizing their own Anglophone writing groups, literary communities, and readings in Paris.

http://parisreadingsmonthlylisting.blogspot.fr/

A blog sharing writing and literary events by month, posted by Jennifer K. Dick of Ivy Writers.

https://www.ceastudyabroad.com/#go-with-cea

About CEA from the website: “Since 1997, CEA has maintained one simple philosophy: To provide high-quality international academic programs and services.”

This petite guide was created for the “Writing in Paris” BBF Unbound session at the Boston Book Festival, October 28, 2017, with panelists Marcia DeSanctis, Lauren Grodstein, and Stacey Resnikoff, and moderator Kelly MacFarland. Set at the French Cultural Center of Boston, it’s one of four events co-presented by the BBF, FCC, and Consulate General of France in Boston. For any future “Writing in Paris” updates, follow @staceyresnikoff on Twitter.

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