Injuries in Fiction and Writing About Other Medical Topics --

2/20, 1 PM PST, be there!

Cassie again, with a fun (depending on your definition of fun!) opportunity :D.

I love to do education, I love being a nurse, and I love being a writer — and this is where those things all get to intersect!

I’m doing a Webinar with Dream Foundry about Injuries in Fiction and Writing About Other Medical Topics on 2/20 at 1 PM PST!

As an author, I get that sometimes you need to concuss/stab/shoot/burn someone — but as a reader and a medical professional, I like it when things feel as true as possible, you know?

This is a talk I developed out of the need for that.

I’ve done workshops at genre writing conventions where people brought their character’s health problems to me and we talked things through, making it as believable as possible (and only as was needed, because as a fellow writer I know you shouldn’t slow down an action scene if the injury’s not the point of it, you know?) Burns in medieval times, where would a liquid alien hide inside a human body, arrows — through lungs, or knees? Etc.

And after doing all of those I realized it would really help writers to have a framework for thinking about the body holistically.

I sat down and created this lecture, to empower writers to work backwards (and forwards!) from any type of injury, by having a solid knowledge of airway, breathing, and circulation, based on understanding why those elements are important for human life, from a micro to a macro level — and all the fun/horrible ways you can disrupt them.

I gave this talk last year for Clarion West (a prestigious genre writing workshop) as part of their seminar series. People loved it, so here I am giving it again for Dream Foundry.

(Dream Foundry is an organization that helps newer writers find and form community for support, and I believe in their mission strongly, which is why I’m giving this talk for free although I do believe they’re accepting donations.)

It’ll be me talking for the first half, explaining How To Think About Injuries As A Writer and then the last half will be open mic so people can ask any questions they might have about things they’re working on.

Even if you’re not a writer, if you find Weird Medical Shit entertaining, this will be the talk for you.

So come hang out and let me empower you to do bad things to your characters in the future! :D

— Cassie