Tuesday, April 14th, 2026

Live Seminar via Zoom from 8:00 PM – 10:00 PM ET

🌍 Class Times by Time Zone: Los Angeles (PT): 5:00 PM – 7:00 PM / Chicago (CT): 7:00 PM – 9:00 PM / New York (ET): 8:00 PM – 10:00 PM

Any questions about this class? Use the Chat Button to talk with us. 

Instructor Alex Temblador is the award-winning author of a writing craft book, Writing An Identity Not Your Own, and two magical realism novels, Half Outlaw and Secrets of the Casa Rosada. In addition to receiving her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Central Oklahoma, Alex's creative work has been published in literary outlets like PALABRITAS, D Magazine, and Colorado Review, as well as two anthologies—Living Beyond Borders: Growing Up Mexican in America and Speculative Fiction for Dreamers: A Latinx Anthology. Alex has taught creative writing seminars, workshops, and classes with WritingWorkshops.com, the Women's Fiction Writers Association, the Writer's League of Texas, StoryStudio Chicago, WorldShift: The Speculative Fiction Writer's Summit, Texas Book Festival, Macmillan Publishers, Abydos Learning Conference, and more. When she's not writing her next book, Alex is working as an award-winning journalist, traveling, gardening, or exploring her home base of Dallas with friends.

Meet the Teaching Artist

Build Authentic Worlds: Alex Temblador on Speculative Fiction Craft

Who is this class for?

This speculative fiction writing workshop is for writers interested in crafting science fiction, fantasy, romantasy, or dystopian short stories and novels. Whether you're a beginner just discovering the genre or an intermediate writer looking to deepen your craft, this seminar welcomes all levels—including advanced writers exploring speculative fiction for the first time.

What to expect:

Do you dream of alternate worlds where beings of lore exist, or falling through a portal into another reality full of magic and wonder? Or perhaps shooting into the future, in a time where technology has evolved beyond our imagination? You're a speculative fiction writer at heart.

Award-winning speculative fiction author Alex Temblador invites you to join her for this online writing class designed to help writers learn how to build futuristic and fantastical worlds from scratch and how to integrate authentic characters—who have been impacted by that world's culture, history, and societies—into the world in a realistic way.

Alex will discuss everything from writing believable magical and technological systems, crafting characters (be they human or not) in a responsible and intersectional way, grounding the fantastical in emotional truth, how to prevent mirroring without intention, and avoiding harmful tropes while honoring genre conventions. Through exercises, writers will get a better handle on their speculative story and have their own assumptions of the genre challenged, leaving the class with determination to take their novel or short story to new heights.

What are the writing goals?

In this course, students will learn more about the speculative fiction genre, specifically how to world-build with intention and authenticity. You'll leave with a better understanding of how our own reality impacts the building of fantastical and futuristic worlds and characters, as well as the importance of building complex characters, emotional storytelling, and utilizing tropes in positive ways.

COURSE OUTLINE

This is a single-session seminar covering world-building, character development, and authentic storytelling techniques for speculative fiction writers.

COURSE TAKEAWAYS:

• How to craft authentic speculative fiction characters
• How to build believable fantastical and/or futuristic worlds that characters are fully immersed in
• Learn to avoid harmful tropes while honoring genre conventions
• Techniques for grounding fantastical elements in emotional truth
• Strategies for writing intersectional characters responsibly

What writers are saying about Alex Temblador:

"Alex's friendly personality helped relax her class. Her exercises led to insightful writing." — Former Student

"I took the Magical Realism class with Alex Temblador. It was a great class, and so much fun! Alex is a very good instructor. Her writing exercises were stimulating and got the whole class talking." — Former Student

"Alex is positive, engaging, and encouraging. Terrific at listening to participants and pulling out/distilling/reinforcing salient points from their questions/comments." — Former Student

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