July 16-18, 2026
Registration Coming Soon.
This 3-day gathering in beautiful Winona Lake, Indiana, features workshops, readings, lectures, cultural events, a banquet, and keynote speaker Karen Swallow Prior.
Our conference welcomes emerging writers of all walks: from college students and graduate students to teachers and other adults seeking to improve and publish their writing. Drawn together by our unique perspective as believers, WCWC focuses on excellence, beauty, and craft.
Held on Grace College campus beside picturesque Winona Lake, WCWC draws on the area’s rich Christian heritage as a revival site for evangelists such as Billy Sunday and Billy Graham, as well as its legacy of celebrated authors including James Whitcomb Riley, Theodore Dreiser, and Ambrose Bierce. Today, Winona Lake boasts plenty of inspiration including over 10 miles of off-road trails, fishing, kayaking, a swimming beach, a farmer’s market, artisan shops and boutiques, fine dining, and more.
Thanks to a generous gift, we are offering a reduced registration of just $425 for our second year of the conference (registration includes most meals). We have a few need-based full scholarships available and discounts for Grace College faculty and students. To inquire about a need-based full scholarship, email wcwc@grace.edu.
WCWC is committed to providing a world-class conference experience at an affordable price. When registering for the conference, you will select one of our six workshop tracks: Poetry, Fiction, Generating Sonnets, Nonfiction/Memoir, Writing for Young Adults, and Writing for Children. (Seats for each track are strictly limited, ensuring a more personal experience.) During the conference, you will also receive a 15-minute manuscript consultation with one of our faculty or guest writers. Most meals (including our keynote banquet featuring Karen Swallow Prior) are included in the registration fee, as are activities such as a nature walk and tour of the Billy Sunday Home.
Grace College is located in Winona Lake, IN, just south of Warsaw, IN, and about 2h 30min southeast of Chicago, IL, 1h west of Fort Wayne, IN, and 2h 30 min from Indianapolis. You’ll find a campus map and directions here. The Winona Lake/Warsaw, IN area offers a wide variety of accommodations from major chain hotels to Airbnb’s; here are some recommendations. WCWC also offers attendees an economical option to stay in on-campus accommodations; more information is available through the registration site.
Conference dates: July 16-18, 2026. Check back soon for a more detailed schedule.
Questions? Email us at wcwc@grace.edu
Dr. Rich is Chair of the Department of Humanities and Professor of English at Grace College. She is also the Director of the English & Journalism Program and the Director of the Office of Faith, Learning, & Scholarship. She currently serves as executive treasurer for the Indiana Council of Teachers of English. Rich specializes in early 20th century British & Irish literature and food studies. Her most recent publication is “’A Little Startling’: Subversive Consumption in the Late Novels of Molly Keane” in The Edinburgh Companion to Irish Modernism.
Dr. Poch is Professor of English and Creative Writing at Grace College. He is the author of eight collections of poems, including the forthcoming Dark Cathedral (Slant Books, 2025). His poems have been published in Paris Review, Poetry, Five Points, The TLS, and many other magazines. His first book of criticism, God’s Poems: The Beauty of Poetry and the Christian Imagination, was published by St. Augustine’s Press in 2022. He was a Fulbright Core Scholar at the University of Barcelona in 2014. He is currently the series editor for the Vassar Miller Poetry Prize.
Keynote Speaker
Bio: Karen Swallow Prior, Ph.D. is the 2025-26 Karlson Scholar at Bethel Seminary. She is a popular writer and speaker, a contributing writer for The Dispatch, and a columnist for Religion News Service. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Atlantic, Vox, The Washington Post, Christianity Today, and many other places. Her most recent book is You Have a Calling: Finding Your Vocation in the True, Good, and Beautiful (Brazos 2025).
Poetry Faculty
David is the author of (winner of the Miller Williams Prize), andNewly Not Eternal. He is co-editor of Playing with Fire: Christian Poets Reflect on Faith and Practice(forthcoming from Baylor). David’s recent poems can be found in Agni, The Believer, The Georgia Review, The Gettysburg Review, The Southern Review, Virginia Quarterly Review, and elsewhere. Editor of 32 Poems, he teaches creative writing as an associate professor at Washington & Jefferson College.
Children’s Lit Workshop Faculty
Shannon Anderson is a TEDx speaker, certified brain coach, and award-winning children’s book author who has spent over 26 years inspiring young minds as an elementary school teacher and professor. Named one of the Top 10 Teachers who inspired the Today Show, Shannon brings high energy, heart, and humor to every stage she steps on. A lifelong educator and storyteller, Shannon has published numerous children’s books, one of which was featured on Ryan Reynolds’ show, Bedtime Stories with Ryan, where he read her book, I LOVE Strawberries! To kids around the world. Today, Shannon writes and speaks full-time, traveling across the country to deliver dynamic author visits, keynotes, and workshops.
Fiction Faculty
Sally Thomas is the author of two poetry collections, Motherland and the forthcoming Among the Living, as well as a novel, Works of Mercy, and a short-story collection, The Blackbird and Other Stories. She is co-editor of the Paraclete Press anthology, Christian Poetry in America Since 1940, which received Christianity Today’s 2023 Book Award in Culture and the Arts. Her poetry, fiction, essays and reviews have appeared in First Things, National Review, the New Yorker, Plough Quarterly, Public Discourse, Religion and Liberty, and other journals.
Nonfiction/Memoir Faculty
Shemaiah Gonzalez’s work has appeared in America Magazine, Image Journal’s Good Letters, Ekstasis, The Curator, and Loyola Press, among others. Her book Undaunted Joy: The Revolutionary Act of Cultivating Delight will be published with Zondervan April 2025. A Los Angeles native, she now lives in Seattle with her husband, whom she has known since she was 14 years old, and their two teen sons.
Young Adult Faculty
Gary Schmidt is the bestselling author of numerous children’s and young adult novels including Okay for Now (National Book Award finalist and Children’s Choice Award), Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy (Newbery Honor and Printz Honor Book), and The Wednesday Wars (Newbery Honor Book). Gary previously taught literature and creative writing at Calvin University; he currently serves on the faculty for Scriptoria Workshop.
Guest Writer — Poetry
Professor Emerita of English and Creative Writing at the Lock Haven campus of Commonwealth University, 2023 Monson Arts Fellow, a poetry editor of Presence, and radio host of WPSU-FM’’s Poetry Moment, Marjorie Maddox has published seventeen collections of poetry, including Transplant, Transport, Transubstantiation (Yellowglen Prize, one of three finalists Brittingham and Felix Pollak Prizes; re-release Wipf & Stock 2018, 2020 Philip H. McMath Post-Publication Book Award); and True, False, None of the Above (Poiema Poetry Series and Illumination Book Award Medalist).
Guest Writer – Fiction
David Marsh is the author of the award winning novels The Confessions of Adam and Waterborne: Chronicle of the Clan of Noah. He has taught at Grace College and facilitates the Westside Writers’ Workshop in Avon, IN. Dave holds a B.S. in Communications from Grace College and an MFA in Creative Writing from Butler University. Dave facilitates the Westside Writers Workshop and every other Wednesday he posts a column on the craft of fiction called “Revel and Rant” at www.davidjmarsh.com.
Guest Writer – Young Adult
Claire Swinarski is the Edgar Award-nominated author of multiple books for both kids and adults. Her children’s novel What Happened to Rachel Riley? was an ALA Notable Children’s Book, a YALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults winner, and one of New York Public Library’s Best Books of the Year. She lives in small town Wisconsin with her husband and three kids, where she writes books and wrangles bread dough.