Hi-Way Haven: A Place for Writers

A writer will do well to train her ear to hear the silence between words, to know that what goes unsaid can be far more revealing than anything that can be said. —Vera Caccioppoli

Vera Caccioppoli has written and published fiction, poetry, screenplays, newspaper and magazine articles, and personal essays since she was fourteen and received her first handwritten rejection letter from Michael Curtis, the fiction editor of The Atlantic Monthly. (It would be many years later, when playing poker with Mr. Curtis, that Vera would remind the editor of his rejection letter to her, quoting it verbatim from memory.)

A native of Cliffside Park, New Jersey, Vera earned her MFA in Creative Writing from the George Mason University writing program, where she was awarded a full fellowship and taught creative writing, literature, and composition for many years.

Her writing has earned the prestigious PEN/Faulkner Award. Her short stories have been published in many literary journals, and her non-fiction has been featured in the Washington Post, Shape magazine, and has been broadcast on National Public Radio. Vera has recently optioned two screenplays to Hollywood and won numerous screenwriting awards at film festivals around the country, including a double win at the 2007 Houston International Film Festival for her screenplays Hi-Way Haven (drama) and Perfect Couple (romantic comedy).

In addition to her writing career, Vera is highly successful private writing coach with an international clientele of novelists and screenwriters.

Vera has been profiled and interviewed by local and national publications, including The San Diego Union-Tribune (Project Offers Haven for Writers). She lives in Encinitas, California.

Project Offers Haven for Writers
by Lillian Cox
February 16, 2006
ENCINITAS – Dyslexia prevented Vera Caccioppoli from learning how to read until she was 9. But it didn't deter her from pursuing a writing career.

Today, Caccioppoli excels in various writing markets. Her screenplays have won honors at the Sundance, Austin and the WorldFest-Houston International film festivals. She is the recipient of the Dan Rudy and PEN Syndicated fiction awards. Her articles have been published in The Washington Post, as well as Self and Shape magazines.

Caccioppoli is founder of the Hi-Way Haven in Leucadia, where she mentors other writers by providing manuscript and screenplay analysis and coaching. On Wednesday nights, Caccioppoli hosts what she says is the only drop-in screenwriting class in San Diego County.

“Since I began, seven or eight people who hadn't written before have finished novels and screenplays,” she said. “That really means something to me.”
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From: WORD|san diego, October 2004.
Word Around TownTalking about found art, how about found places and created spaces? Vera Caccioppoli was driving along Pacific Coast Highway 101 in Encinitas when she saw what used to be a surfers' motel built around 1940. She pulled over. There was a for rent sign on the door. She went inside. "It was like walking into my own screenplay, called Hi-Way Haven," Caccioppoli says. That screenplay is one of two Caccioppoli has sold and optioned. So what do you do with an MFA in fiction writing, 10 years experience teaching writing in universities, and after publishing short stories, poems, feature stories in magazines and a popular newspaper column? You pull over when you see a 1940s surf motel, rent the place, and call it Hi-Way Haven. Then you open your heart, and your door, to the world. "The Haven is a place for writers," Caccioppoli explains. "As opposed to cyberspace. We offer on-site resources, networking, writing workshops, open readings, book discussions." The Haven also has a reader's and writer's boutique. "There's a lot of fun stuff," Caccioppoli says. "Unusual writing journals, pens, new and used books, literary cards, software, and a few out there surprises. Our favorite surprise: the super-sized painting of a beaming Papa Hemingway on the back wall.