First Draft: A Literary Social with Dawn Davies

A guided writing prompt with a twist.

Because writing is thirsty work.

Have a drink. Write a story. Have another drink. Write a better story.

Miami Book Fair presents First Draft, a series of informal writing events that turn happy hours into great stories.

You’re inspired. But you’re also thirsty. Bring your own drink and log in for a First Draft event and a guided writing prompt. Share your writing. You never know what you might knock out as you knock one back!

Theme: The Writer as Bandit

Every artist is a thief. And any piece of writing is an invitation to scavenge another writer’s craft for techniques you can apply to your own work. By practicing thoughtful emulation, we can learn to look for the invitations a writer is giving you to borrow from them.

Instructor: Dawn Davies

Dawn Davies is the author of Mothers of Sparta: A Memoir in Pieces published by Flatiron Books in 2018. Mothers of Sparta won the Florida Book Award Gold Medal for General Nonfiction and the GLCA Award for Creative Nonfiction. Her essays, short stories and poems have been Pushcart Special Mentions and Best American Essays notables. Her work can be found in McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern, The Alaska Quarterly, The Missouri Review, Poetry Northwest, Narrative, Fourth Genre and in other journals and anthologies. She currently mentors creative writers and teaches self-paced and instructor-led workshops and writing classes at whistletreewriters.com. You can find out more about her at dawndaviesbooks.com.