This craft talk and generative workshop examines how absence, memory, and longing operate in fiction through the twin lenses of haunting and nostalgia. Through close readings of writers such as Carmen Maria Machado, Angela Carter, and Helen Oyeyemi, alongside ideas from thinkers like Mark Fisher and Svetlana Boym, participants will explore how these forces reshape narrative perception and atmosphere. Handouts with selected excerpts will be provided, and short generative writing exercises will allow participants to immediately apply these concepts and build new material on the page. By the end of the session, participants will leave with a deeper understanding of how haunting and nostalgia function as structural tools in storytelling, as well as new pages generated during the workshop.
About Atina Hartunian
Atina Hartunian, a first-generation Armenian-American writer, earned her MFA from Pacific University in 2023. She received a Teaching Fellowship from Anaphora Arts (2024), a Pacific University MFA Merit Scholarship (2021), and residencies from Cambridge Writers’ Workshop and, most recently, from Rockvale Writers’ Colony.
She has led generative workshops using sensory-driven prompts and craft-based constraints, and has delivered craft talks exploring facets of the horror genre. Currently, she’s developing a four-part lecture series on horror. Atina Hartunian writes and lives in Los Angeles.
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