Enchanting. Mysterious. Hidden. The Factory Hotel was the perfect location for a Crime Writing Workshop led by New York Times bestselling author Cynthia Weiner, who lives in Beacon, from the Beacon Lit Fest as the festival organizers build up to their main event this June (early bird tickets on sale now) with learning opportunities and a dance party orbiting the calendar.

A writing table at the Crime Writing Workshop from the Beacon Lit Fest at the Factory Hotel.

The setting was dark. The mood was light as writers, aspiring writers, budding writers and retired writers sat in velour chairs and couches around mirrored tables with their pens and computers, ready to listen to Cynthia lead them down pathways on how to set the scene for the perfect murder. Or missing person. Stories that would grip the reader and reveal more behind motive and who did it.

The attendees were given orange journals and a pens to write in for 10-minute writing exercises that were to happen periodically throughout the workshop. Cynthia provided us with several tightly written description of solved and unsolved mysteries that we could choose from to start writing about - or pick our own. Wheels started turning for several writers in the room who indeed had a mental file folder of ideas and unfinished stories in their heads.

Hannah of the Beacon Lit Fest Team with the author Cynthia Weiner.

Next, Cynthia encouraged us to ask ourselves and answer in our new journals (or type into computers) why we would be choosing the story we landed on. This part was personal. It was the “why” behind why we latched on to an idea or concept or situation or character. Several people in the room identified with “The Missing Man” story about a 31-year-old Poughkeepsie man who went missing one night after receiving a text at 11:30pm. He told his parents he was going to shoot pool, and never returned.

This struck a chord with male and female parents of adult children in the room who could not, or did not want to fathom living with the existence or non-existence of a child who went missing; not knowing if they died or not. This led to the next writing exercise of which character voice we would tell the story in. The victim? A witness? A neutral narrator? A mother? The framed murderer?

Ideas began unfolding as pens were scribbling and fingers flying across keyboards for those who brought computers. Memories of past writing assignments or unfinished memoirs were stirred, and the writers in the room were lit.

Behind The Black Gate Of The Factory Hotel

View of the fluttering white paper tunnel from the black gate of The Factory Hotel.

As for the scene of the event room at The Factory Hotel, located next door to and behind The Dutchess Hotel & Day Spa hotel (same owners), it was surprising to say the least, if you have never been behind the black gate at the end of the fluttering white paper tunnel.

Electric clothes hung on laundry lines under pink lights above private bungalows that would make for the perfect getaway for a writer looking for solitude to get into rhythm for writing these crime stories. Suddenly we weren’t in Beacon anymore. Maybe we were in the bright architectural tropics of Charleston, SC, but colder.

Beacon Lit Fest. Don’t miss future opportunities from them. Follow Beacon Lit’s Instagram, sign up for their newsletter, and donate at any time for them to keep producing these opportunities. Follow A Little Beacon Blog’s Calendar of Things To Do, and Adult Classes Guide, as we post events from Beacon Lit. Sign up for ALBB’s free newsletter to be alerted to these and other news and events (and some unsolved and new real-life mysteries!)