TRAVELWRITINGCLASS.COM
The Seattle-based school offers workshops in photography and travel writing, primarily in Italy. Co-founded in 2007 by Amanda Castleman and Marcus Donner, the company offers a 50% tuition discount to the winners of its essay competitions. Read reviews of TCW and its instructors here.

Offerings in 2010 include:
ROME, May 9-15 – Travel writing and photography, taught by Amanda and Lisa
SEATTLE, July 17-18 – Travel writing and photography, taught by Amanda and Marcus
VENICE, October 10-16 – Travel writing and true crime, taught by Amanda and Candace
ROME, October 17-23 – Travel writing and photography, taught by Amanda and Marcus

Read reviews of our instructors and programs here. Contact info@travelwritingclass.com

AMANDA CASTLEMAN (SEATTLE)
WRITING INSTRUCTOR & COFOUNDER
Italian-American Amanda Castleman spent eight years in Europe. She lived on a traditional narrowboat, moored on the Oxford Canal in England. She also endured two years swilling espresso in Italy, as a Visiting Writer at the American Academy in Rome, then ranged farther afield to Greece, Cyprus and Turkey. Seattle, her native city in the Pacific Northwest, is once again her home base.

A full-time freelancer and instructor, she has contributed to nearly 30 books, including Italy, A Love Story and Rome In Detail, as well as titles for Michelin, Frommer's, Time Out, Rough Guides, National Geographic, and the first travel writing collegiate textbook in the US. Other credits include MSNBC, the BBC, Salon, Wired, The Guardian, Italy Daily and The International Herald Tribune. She strings adventure stories for Sport Diver and won a 2007 Lowell Thomas award – travel writing's ersatz Pulitzer – for the same genre.

Amanda also teaches for Writers.com and the Richard Hugo House. Her online classes usually overflow, thanks to her humor, detailed line critiques, and blend of hack-reporter tricks with more literary, narrative devices. She has a grudge match against word repetition and the term "nestled." You have been warned....

A former wilderness guide, she enjoys active assignments from backpacking to seaweed foraging and wilderness kayak expeditions. An advanced diver, she's hit the water in Alaska, California, the Northwest, Malta, Honduras, Colombia, Guam, Yap and Palau. A member of the NUJ and SPJ, she holds a degree in Latin and speaks conversational Italian. Amanda someday hopes to live in the Eternal City again. And next time she'll buy a proper Vespa.

Her website is www.amandacastleman.com and she ego-casts further at http://roadremedies.blogspot.com. Follow her adventures on Twitter @amandacastleman.

LISA PAYNE (LONDON)
PHOTOGRAPHY INSTRUCTOR
London-based Lisa Payne is an award-winning reportage photographer (photojournalist). She specializes in capturing people in their environments, always with an eye for how humans have shaped the world around them. Her in-depth photo essays have covered embalmers, fat camp, playground games and the peasants of the Peruvian Andes, Lisa's projects have been published in a variety of leading magazines, including Marie Claire, the Observer, The Independent, and numerous travel and lifestyle titles.

An alumna of Plymouth College of Art and Design, she has won the Art Think prize, as well as acclaim from the Renaissance Awards, the Association of Photographers and Marie Claire's International Reportage competition. Additionally, she has been honored with Associate status from the British Institute of Professional Photography (BIPP).

Other clients include Marks & Spencer, Dorling Kindersley, British Heart Foundation, Insight Guides, NTL and Howies, plus long-running assignments for the NHS. She has shot for marketing campaigns for Abbott Mead Vickers, D'Arcy, Bamber Forsythe and Mac & Co. Lisa is currently working with Damien Hirst on his forthcoming book titled Pharmacist.

Also an avid advanced scuba diver, she has tackled underwater assignments from hydrotherapy to adult swim classes. Her website is www.lisa-payne.com.

MARCUS R. DONNER (SEATTLE)
PHOTOGRAPHY INSTRUCTOR & COFOUNDER
On hiatus for the spring 2010 workshop, due to Vancouver Olympic commitments
As director of photography, this visual storyteller coached staff and defined the look of a daily metro newspaper for nine years. Other experience includes photojournalism, teaching workshops, cinematography on independent films, and picture editing for print and multimedia. His work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, HBO, Cinemax, The Christian Science Monitor, Microsoft, The MacArthur Foundation, The Sundance Channel, Reuters and the Associated Press.

He has volunteered for the past decade with the Society of Professional Journalists and is currently the editor of the 2007 edition of Access: A Guide to Open Government.

Marcus has run workshops for an NPR affiliate, the Society of Professional Journalists, and the Seattle International Film Festival's Screenwriters Salon, among others. Visual storytelling is his passion, but he is equally renowned for his ability to nutshell complex concepts and technology to a lay audience.

His website is www.marcusdonner.com; check out his bird blog at marcuspix.wordpress.com.

CANDACE DEMPSEY (SEATTLE)
TRAVEL/TRUE CRIME INSTRUCTOR
Slated to CO-teach an autumn 2010 workshop with Amanda in Venice
This Italian-American journalist just finished her controversial manuscript Murder in Italy: The Shocking Slaying of a British Student, the Accused American Girl, and an International Scandal (Penguin: Berkley Books, 2010). The true crime book grew out of Candace's blog, Italian Woman At The Table, which has attracted worldwide attention. Hosted by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, it's been featured on Newsweek.com. Martha Stewart Living Radio, CNN, Oggi, Corriere dell"Umbria and The Daily Beast. She has discussed the Kercher case on CNN, Italian TV, and KOMO 4 News in Seattle, her hometown.

Candace's adventure essays appear in Travelers’ Tales A Woman’s Passion For Travel, Solo: On Her Own Adventure (Seal Press), Gifts of the Wild (Seal Press) and other anthologies.  Her last staff job – before going freelance – was Editor and Producer of MSN Underwire.com. Newsweek called this women's web site "cheeky, nicely written, fun" and The New York Times saluted its"serious sisterhood." 

She's covered travel, women's issues, business and other topics for numerous magazines and newspapers, including The Chicago Tribune, The Boston Phoenix, Puget Sound Business Journal, Art & Antiques, Passionfruit and Adventure Journal.

Candace has a masters degree in narrative nonfiction from the University of Oregon. She passes some of those skills along, teaching Food Writing: The Secret Recipe for Success via Writers.com.

The middle child in a multicolore Italian-American family, Candace has three brothers and three sisters. She lives in Seattle with her husband and son. She likes to ski, kayak, mountain climb and hike. She is obsessed with all things Italian and often visits her Italian cousins in Calabria, Rome, and Bologna.

Her website is www.candacedempsey.com and she continues to blog on Italian Woman At The Table.

Past and upcoming work
by our instructors

• Art & Antiques
• Associated Press
• The Athens News
• The BBC
• Chicago Tribune
• The Christian Science Monitor
• Cinemax
• The Daily Mail
• Dorling Kindersley
• Eyewitness Guides
• Frommer's
• HBO
• The Guardian
• The Independent
• The International Herald Tribune
• Investors Business Daily
• Intelliguides
• Insight Guides
• Italy, A Love Story
• Italy Daily
• Los Angeles Times
• The MacArthur Foundation
• Marie Claire
• Michelin
• Microsoft
• MSN
• MSNBC.com
  
• MSN Daily Access
• National Geographic book series
• Outside
• The Observer
• Reuters
• Rome in Detail
• Rough Guides
• Salon
• Seattle-International Film Festival
• Sport Diver
• The Seattle Post-Intelligencer
• The Sundance Channel
• The Sunday Express
• Time Out
• Thomas Cook
• Travelers' Tales
• Travel Writing (textbook)
  
• Wired
• Wired News

William Storey's angel sculpture in the Catholic Cemetery, Rome, Italy.