Blog
Meet the Teaching Artist: Amy Cipolla Barnes on Writing the Heat, the Humidity, and the Heart of Southern Fiction
by Writing Workshops Staff
5 days ago
Amy Cipolla Barnes knows when a story is working because it keeps her up at night "like the air conditioning is broken during a Tennessee July."
It's a fitting image from a writer whose fiction and essays have appeared in McSweeney's, The Rumpus, SmokeLong Quarterly, and Southern Living, and whose three published collections, including Child Craft (Belle Point Press, 2023), have earned nominations for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net, inclusion in Best Microfiction 2025 and Best Small Fictions 2022, and four consecutive years on the Wigleaf Top50 longlist.
Now, in her upcoming 6-week asynchronous workshop The Literature of Heat: Writing Summer, the South, and Swelter at WritingWorkshops.com, the official education partner of Electric Literature, Barnes invites fiction and CNF writers at all levels to explore how acclaimed Southern authors conjure atmosphere, voice, and the weight of place without leaning on stereotype.
Through close readings of both canonical and emerging voices (Flannery O'Connor, Richard Wright, Sabrina Orah Mark, Shome Dasgupta, William Woolfitt), weekly generative prompts, and individualized feedback on two completed pieces, students will write four to six new pieces of flash fiction or short prose and leave with a curated reading list and a targeted list of publications suited to their new work.
If you've ever wanted to develop what Barnes calls a "literary accent" rooted in place and sensory detail, this is the class to take.
Here is our Meet the Teaching Artist Interview with Amy:
Writing Workshops: Hi, Amy. Please introduce yourself to our audience.
Amy Cipolla Barnes: I'm a writer, editor, and recent empty nester who lives in Tennessee with my husband and our giant rescue Labrador puppy. My short stories and essays have been published at a variety of places: Southern Living, McSweeney's, The Rumpus, SmokeLong Quarterly, and many other sites. I've also had three collections published by small presses, including the last one by a Southern publishing company, with the requisite amount of heat.
Writing Workshops: What made you want to teach this specific class? Is it something you are focusing on in your own writing practice?
Amy Cipolla Barnes: I saw a call for this course's title and knew I wanted to teach it. I've thought about the idea of how seasons feature in stories, especially in the warmer southern states. From scene-setting to character definition, the regional temperatures and behaviors have their own role in Southern literature. I grew up in the Midwest, but felt a pull toward the South's steamy temperatures. I love midwestern people, but hated the cold and dreary winter months. Do I complain about the summer heat in Tennessee?
"Take away qualifying adjectives from in front of 'writer.' If you write, you ARE a writer. Period. Full stop."
Writing Workshops: Give us a breakdown of how the course is going to go. What can the students expect? What is your favorite part about this class you've dreamed up?
Amy Cipolla Barnes: Each week, students will complete generative exercises, alongside representations of the course's subject: TV episodes, movies, poetry, novel excerpts, and short stories. They'll read/watch/discuss the provided materials. I want them to feel the heat a little in generating their own sometimes-steamy, but G-rated Southern tales.
Students can expect to read, discuss the posted materials, and offer feedback on the community's shared stories. I'll pop in for informal feedback every week and offer longer constructive feedback on two individual pieces for each attendee.
My favorite part of this course is introducing writers to new contemporary Southern writers and seeing their new stories come to life.
Writing Workshops: Who was your first literary crush?
Amy Cipolla Barnes: Laurie in Little Women, in part because I'm an Amy, too. I imagined a handsome, wealthy boy moving in next door to fall in love with me, instead of my sister. He would be dashing, educated, kind, and well-spoken. It was not meant to be, because I lived in a 1980s Kansas suburb, and there was no Theodore Lawrence living in my neighborhood.
Writing Workshops: What are you currently reading?
Amy Cipolla Barnes: The Retrieval System by Maxine Kumin. I had the last line of the titular poem stuck in my head since a college creative writing course. I rediscovered the poem and Kumin a few years ago. The rest of the poem is as memorable as the closing lines:
"The forecast is nothing but trouble. It will snow fiercely enough to fill all these empty graves."
Ready to channel the heat of the South into your fiction? Join Amy Cipolla Barnes for six weeks of close reading, generative prompts, and individualized feedback.
Enroll in Literature of Heat →Writing Workshops: How do you choose what you're working on? When do you know it is the next thing you want to write to THE END?
Amy Cipolla Barnes: There's often a bit of sweaty late-night writing like the heat of the South, that furious need to get words down, and a slow "beach chair in the sun" approach to editing, until the story burns out onto the page. I know it's the next thing I want to write to THE END, when it keeps me up at night like the air conditioning is broken during a Tennessee July.
Writing Workshops: Where do you find inspiration?
Amy Cipolla Barnes: I find inspiration in unexpected places: weird news stories, eavesdropping in restaurants and retail stores, my family, signs, abandoned malls and stores, thrift stores, cemeteries, wrong turns in new places, and random things my mom sends me without context.
Writing Workshops: What is the best piece of writing wisdom you've received that you can pass along to our readers?
Amy Cipolla Barnes: Take away qualifying adjectives from in front of "writer." If you write, you ARE a writer. Period. Full stop. There's no need to add "emerging" or "early." Until I stopped with the qualifiers, my confidence was affected. I thought those extra labels made me less of a writer, when I didn't need them at all.
"I know it's the next thing I want to write to THE END, when it keeps me up at night like the air conditioning is broken during a Tennessee July."
Writing Workshops: What is the worst piece of writing advice you've received?
Amy Cipolla Barnes: Write. Every. Day. I know I probably *should* write every day. When I do write every day for an extended amount of time, I naturally produce more drafts. I write more. However, it can be a damaging concept. If I'm not writing every day under the command, I feel like a failure, and when I feel like a writing failure, I write less. When I write less ...
Writing Workshops: What is your favorite book to recommend on the craft of writing? Why this book?
Amy Cipolla Barnes: Going Short: An Invitation to Flash Fiction by Nancy Stohlman. I love this craft book because it's practical and breaks down the writing of shorter flash pieces in an encouraging way.
Writing Workshops: Bonus question: What's your teaching vibe?
Amy Cipolla Barnes: My teaching vibe is positive. Encouraging. Practical. For this class, maybe a little sweaty, too. :)
Join Amy in The Literature of Heat
Positive, encouraging, practical, and a little sweaty: that's Amy Cipolla Barnes' approach to both the page and the workshop. In The Literature of Heat, you'll spend six weeks exploring how Southern writers from Flannery O'Connor to Sabrina Orah Mark use setting, voice, and sensory detail to conjure stories that feel specific and alive. You'll write four to six new pieces of flash fiction or short prose, receive feedback on two completed works, and leave with a reading list and a publication target list to carry your writing forward. Whether you're encountering Southern literature for the first time or deepening a practice rooted in place, Barnes brings two decades of teaching experience and an infectious belief that if you write, you are a writer. Come feel the heat.
Seats are open for Amy Cipolla Barnes' 6-week asynchronous Southern fiction workshop. Bring your stories and your sunscreen.
Save Your Seat in Literature of Heat →WritingWorkshops.com is an independent, artist-run creative writing school and the official education partner of Electric Literature. Since 2016, we've helped writers strengthen their voice, develop a greater understanding of craft, and forge a path to publication.
