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Home / Desert Nights, Rising Stars Writers Conference / Schedule / 2019 / Conference Schedule Saturday, February 23, 2019 / Writing Joy with Annie Vitalsey

Conference Schedule 2019

Conference Schedule 2019

Saturday, February 23, 2019, 4:15 p.m. - 5:15 p.m.

Is Happiness Interesting?: The Craft of Writing Joy with Annie Vitalsey

Date(s): Saturday, February 23, 2019, 4:15 p.m. - 5:15 p.m.
Location: Tooker, Old Main (view map)
Type(s): Craft Talk, Presentation
Genre and Form(s): Creative Nonfiction, Fiction, Mixed Genre, Short Stories
Tags: Happiness, Joy, Character, Narrative

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Meet our Faculty

About the Session

Why is it so hard to write about happiness? Are happy characters boring? Where is the conflict in joy? In this session we’ll explore the pitfalls of writing joyful stories and characters, and discuss why as writers we often shy away from writing the happy. With an eye toward the craft of character development and narrative structure, as well as lenses from ancient and modern philosophy, we’ll dissect diverse examples of “happy” stories and figure out what makes them work.

Meet the Presenter(s)

Photograph of Annie Vitalsey


Annie Vitalsey

Annie Vitalsey is a third-year MFA candidate in fiction at Arizona State University. Her stories have appeared in Pacifica Literary Review, Bennington Review, Spilled Milk Magazine, Menacing Hedge, Bird’s Thumb, Watershed Review, and elsewhere. Originally from North Carolina, Vitalsey now lives in Mesa, Arizona and is working on her first novel.


Learn more about Annie Vitalsey