Winter registration starts soon! Registration opens for members on Dec. 5 and for the general public on Dec. 12.

Class Catalog

There’s a class for everyone.

Long-time writer or just getting started? Writing an epic poem or a short story? Whoever you are and wherever your passions lie—if you want to write, there’s a Hugo House class for you. Explore our catalog and find yours.

When we say we want our classes to be for everyone, we mean it.

Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, The Writing Life

You’ve Been Rejected, Now What?

Instructor: Natasha Moni. Learn from a former editor and author how to examine and respond to rejections and strategize for publication success.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Intermediate
Length: 1 session
Start: December 2, 2023 , 10:00am PT
Format: Online
Fiction, Nonfiction, Memoir, Short Story, Essay

Flash of Lightning: A Generative Flash Lab

Instructor: Ruth Joffre. This class will introduce students to flash fiction form, such as dribbles, drabbles, and hermit crab forms, and provide space to generate and share new work, with in-class writing prompts and exercises.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Introductory
Length: 2 sessions
Start: December 2, 2023 , 1:10pm PT
Format: Online
Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, The Writing Life, Writing for Performance

Expressive Writing for Creativity, Serenity, & Joy

Instructor: Kimberly Lee. In this workshop, we'll engage with structured journaling techniques to clarify and organize thoughts while inspiring ideas for writing projects and managing stress.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Introductory
Length: 1 session
Start: December 9, 2023 , 10:00am PT
Format: Online
Nonfiction, Memoir

Making Meaning in Memoir

Instructor: Kimberly Dark. This generative workshop will open a number of creative doorways to mine meaning from memories, connecting students' unique perspectives to culture, history, and zeitgeist.

Course Status: Full
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Level: Introductory
Length: 1 session
Start: December 9, 2023 , 1:10pm PT
Format: Online
Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Reading, Novel, Short Story, Essay

Layers of Landscape: Harnessing the Power of Place

Instructor: Joe Wilkins. From chain restaurants to cross-country travel, learn to harness the power of place, including its force on communities, in your writing.

Course Status: Full
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Level: Intermediate
Length: 1 session
Start: December 10, 2023 , 1:10pm PT
Format: Online
Nonfiction, Memoir, Essay

Writing about Other People

Instructor: Kristi Coulter. Learn to skillfully and ethically write about other people in this generative class with lectures, readings, and in-class practice and review.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Introductory, Intermediate
Length: 6 sessions
Start: January 16, 2024 , 5:00pm PT
Format: Online
Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Reading

Boundary Breaker: Writing with Tricksters

Instructor: Shankar Narayan. Explore the role of tricksters across mythologies, including South Asian and North American Indigenous traditions, in this part-analytic, part-generative course.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Open to all levels
Length: 6 sessions
Start: January 17, 2024 , 7:10pm PT
Format: Online
Nonfiction

Creative Nonfiction III

Instructor: Gail Folkins. Explore craft elements such as structure and narrative in this discussion and workshop based class. Each student will have up to two of their essays workshopped.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Advanced, Intermediate
Length: 10 sessions
Start: January 17, 2024 , 5:00pm PT
Format: Online
Nonfiction, Poetry, Memoir, Essay

Linger & Leap: Writing the Lyric Essay

Instructor: Alexandra Lytton Regalado. Explore the lyric essay across various forms, with class discussion and activities to generate new writing that is formulated and shaped like prose, but moves and sounds like poetry.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Introductory
Length: 4 sessions
Start: January 17, 2024 , 5:00pm PT
Format: Online
Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, The Writing Life, Writing for Performance

Writing for Procrastinators

Instructor: Beth Slattery. Establish a writing practice and break patterns of procrastination with weekly writing and reading assignments.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Open to all levels
Length: 8 sessions
Start: January 18, 2024 , 10:00am PT
Format: Online
Fiction, Nonfiction, Memoir, Novel, Short Story

Fantastic First Lines

Instructor: Susan Meyers. This weekend intensive for memoir or fiction students focuses on creating a compelling story start.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Introductory
Length: 1 session
Start: January 20, 2024 , 1:10pm PT
Format: Online
Fiction, Nonfiction

Writing about Pleasure

Instructor: Darina Sikmashvili. Explore and write about pleasure via generative exercises and reading discussions, with a focus on discovering the ways pleasure can be derived from craft elements such as setting, character, and sentence style.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Introductory
Length: 4 sessions
Start: January 20, 2024 , 10:00am PT
Format: Online
Nonfiction, Memoir, Essay

Write Your Story: Writing to Heal

Instructor: Ingrid Ricks. Learn how to identify, structure, and develop your personal narrative, with writing assignments and individual coaching sessions with the instructor.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Introductory, Intermediate
Length: 5 sessions
Start: January 20, 2024 , 10:00am PT
Format: Online
Nonfiction, Memoir, Essay

Our First Gods: Writing Our Parents

Instructor: Joe Wilkins. In this generative workshop participants will think, discuss, and write about a parental figure in the hopes that all will leave with the beginnings of a personal essay.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Intermediate, Introductory
Length: 1 session
Start: January 20, 2024 , 1:10pm PT
Format: Online
Fiction, Nonfiction

16-Week: Contextualizing the Family Story

Instructor: Jaimie Li. This class will connect our intimate experiences to a broader social history, using a combination of research and in-class writing assignments, towards producing individual stories that reflect a greater sense of where we come from and who we are.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Open to all levels
Length: 16 sessions
Start: January 23, 2024 , 7:10pm PT
Format: In Person
Nonfiction, Memoir, Essay

Creative Nonfiction II

Instructor: Meghan Lamb. Investigate nonfiction strategies and narrative structures—including lists, profiles, braids, and epistolaries—exploring what it means to "exaggerate" without "lying."

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Intermediate
Length: 8 sessions
Start: January 23, 2024 , 5:00pm PT
Format: Online
Fiction, Nonfiction

20-Week: Fiction/Nonfiction Daytime Workshop

Instructor: Peter Mountford. This daytime workshop offers regular deadlines, accountability, strong community, and high-quality feedback and peer review.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Open to all levels
Length: 20 sessions
Start: January 24, 2024 , 10:00am PT
Format: Online
Nonfiction, Essay

Writing about Past Travels

Instructor: Monika Sengul-Jones. Visit your inward passages by writing a travel essay about past travels. Pack your memories, memorabilia, journal entries, library cards, and beloved dreams.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Open to all levels
Length: 6 sessions
Start: January 24, 2024 , 7:10pm PT
Format: Online
Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Essay

Trees & Us

Instructor: Claudia Castro Luna. This generative class explores how trees have inspired human consciences, bodies, structures, imaginations, and work. Engage with a variety of texts—letters, essays, music, poetry, to examine our relationships to the tree societies around us.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Open to all levels
Length: 7 sessions
Start: January 25, 2024 , 5:00pm PT
Format: In Person
Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry

Breaking Up Time & Space

Instructor: Cedar Sigo. This workshop will investigate various ways of capturing and recording details of the everyday, exploring questions of craft and creativity around voice, tone, inflection, time and chronology, rehearsal versus practice, and more.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Open to all levels
Length: 1 session
Start: January 26, 2024 , 11:00am PT
Format: In Person
Nonfiction, Essay

The Artful Essayist

Instructor: Christine Hemp. Cultivate your voice, tune in to the "ear" of language, and find a shape for your unique essay in this workshop for the novice and advanced writer alike.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Open to all levels
Length: 2 sessions
Start: January 26, 2024 , 10:00am PT
Format: Online
Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Essay

Accompanying Crisis

Instructor: Susan Briante. Through readings and exercises, participants will consider the ethics of writing out of and through crisis, taking inspiration from writers confronting violence and climate change, as well as historic and contemporary oppressions, and more.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Introductory, Intermediate
Length: 2 sessions
Start: January 27, 2024 , 10:00am PT
Format: Online
Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Essay

Bake a Zine

Instructor: Kate Lebo. How can a recipe tell a story? This generative class will mash up family recipe-writing traditions with poetry, flash fiction, and the personal essay to see what emerges on the other side.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Open to all levels
Length: 1 session
Start: January 27, 2024 , 10:00am PT
Format: In Person
Nonfiction, Essay

Humor & Persuasion: The Comic Personal Essay

Instructor: Courtenay Hameister. Explore the art of the comic personal essay with close readings, subject matter guidance, humorous writing exercises, peer feedback, and a few laughs.

Course Status: Seats left
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Level: Intermediate
Length: 2 sessions
Start: January 27, 2024 , 1:10pm PT
Format: Online