Let's spend October writing scary stories together!
Join Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya for a month-long deep dive into writing freaky, fun and frightening flash fiction.
In this four-part course, we'll explore thematic multi-step generative prompts with tips and techniques for crafting super short horror with a big bite.
Every week, you'll write and revise a new piece of flash fiction, so that by the end of the month you have four finished horror stories!
Workshop Takeaways
In this generative self-paced course, students will develop a range of literary horror craft skills, including:
Building immersive horror worlds at a micro level
Playing with time to spooky effect
Developing timely eco-horror
Applying cinematic devices from horror films to literary craft
And more! This workshop is geared toward taking creative risks and writing bold, imaginative, scary flash that'll haunt readers. Join us if you dare!
This workshop begins on October 1, 2025. Paid subscribers will receive full access to this and all of our workshops for $10/mo
How It Works
Kayla will publish a new lesson every Wednesday in October. If you're subscribed, they'll be sent directly to your email. Our workshops are self-paced, so you can take them anytime that works for you.
In the comment section of each lesson, writers taking the workshop share responses to assigned exercises, swap feedback, and engage with each other. And Kayla will be on hand to answer questions and offer her thoughts on your writing.
At the end of the month, this workshop will be added to our collection, and a new instructor will take over to teach something else!
About The Instructor
Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya is a lesbian writer of essays, fiction, and pop culture criticism living in Orlando. Her queer horror novelette Helen House was named one of the Best LGBTQ Books of 2022 by NBC News. She is the managing editor of Autostraddle, an assistant fiction editor at Foglifter, and the former managing editor of TriQuarterly. Her short stories appear in McSweeney's Quarterly Concern, Catapult, The Offing, Joyland, The Rumpus, Cake Zine, and others. Some of her culture writing can be found in The Cut, The A.V. Club, Vulture, Refinery29, and Vice, and she previously worked as a restaurant reporter for Eater NY. She has held fellowships with Tin House and Lambda Literary. Find out more at her website.