NZSA Webworkshops – a series of webinars to enable ongoing professional development

Featuring writers and industry professionals offering virtual workshops on topics such as self-publishing, romance writing, poetry, structure, short stories, pitching, contract advice, dystopian writing and the business of writing.

All Webworkshops are hosted on Zoom. Zoom is free to download

Learn more about what to expect in a Webworkshop in this article from the NZ Author magazine – Spring 2020

Webworkshops – 2025 season

Cassie Hart – Stand in the place where you are

6pm to 8pm, Tues, 23 September

In the same way that our surroundings shape us, a good setting shapes a character as well. Come and learn what to put in, and what to leave out when creating vibrant and evocative locations for your stories. No matter the genre, shape, or age range. From the factual to the fantastical.

In this workshop, learn how to ground your character in whatever world or setting they inhabit, and how to bring that setting to life in a vibrant and evocative way.

Cassie Hart is a multi-award-winning Māori (Kāi Tahu, Makaawhio) speculative fiction writer who enjoys delving into human nature in all its beauty and disarray. In 2022 her tradtional debut, Butcherbird, won Best Novel for the Sir Julius Vogel awards, and in other years she has been an SJV winner in a range of categories, as well as a Hugo and Australian Shadow Awards finalist. In 2018 she was selected as one of six emerging Māori writers to participate in the Te Papa Tupu incubator programme, where she worked on Butcherbird, a supernatural suspense set under the watchful gaze of Mount Taranaki. Butcherbird released from Huia in August 2021. As well as self-publishing a range of novellas and novels, Cassie has co-edited three short story anthologies, worked as a freelance editor for almost a decade, and is always looking for new ways to collaborate with others.

NZSA members $35 Non-members $75

Register HERE

Please note that the Webworkshop is held on Zoom.
Bookings close 1pm, two business days prior to the workshop or when workshop reaches capacity.
If you are unable to make the live event, all attendees can access a recording of the Webworkshop to view for one month after it is aired live.

Past Webworkshops

Tracy Farr – Tell it Slant: Truth and lies, and using fact in fiction
Madison Hamill – Reconstructing Vividness: Working with lost memories in personal non-fiction
Melissa Addey – How to Make and Use Book Trailers
Elizabeth Heritage – Book campaign planning: media releases, pitching to journalists and more

“Can I just say that I am so enjoying these online classes – so much better than having to go out in the cold, wrestle for a park etc. Please keep providing these! I live part of the time on a farm and it is just so wonderful to be able to participate in these sorts of things when I am not in the city. Makes all the difference!”