About the 2017 Calendar
May 19: (Workshop May 18-21: Defining Your Voice with Sharyn November.) Patti will be featured speaker Friday morning of this weekend workshop on finding your voice with longtime Penguin editor November. At The Barn, The Highlights Foundation Conference Center in Boyds Mills, Pa. (See www.highlightsfoundation.org/workshops)
May 28-June 3: Capturing the Unexpected; starting your novel – right. A week long workshop of morning exercises on the craft, and one-on-on consultations as writers begin their novels. Daily writing opportunities in the writers’ cabins and The Barn. Evening sharing. At The Barn, Highlights Foundation Conference Center in Boyds Mills, Pa. (Class size limited to 9)
July 9: Summer Camp. Keynote Speaker, opening banquet Sunday night to introduce week-long multi-workshop program at The Barn, Highlgihts Foundation Conference Center in Boyds Mills, Pa. . Summer Camp is the Boyds Mills, Pa. derivative of the Chautauqua Writer’s Week which Highlights sponsored for almost thirty years. Outstanding authors, editors, agents present a varied and publishing-wise program, along with daily one-on-one manuscript critiques. Evening Sharing.
November 3-5: Master Class: Understanding and Using Close Third Point of View. At The Barn, Highlights Foundation Conference Center in Boyds Mills, Pa. This point of view has been a primary one for writers since Jane Austin. Writers of children;s and young adult fiction are no exception. Giving the writer a way to tell both the inner and outer story of a character, this point of view broadens the writer’s opportunities to write a story that is both wise and emotionally powerful. A new workshop led by Patti.
About the 2018 Calendar
March 25 – 31: Novel Writing with Patti Gauch: Move your Novel to the Next Level. At The Barn, Highlights Foundation Conference Center, Boyds Mills, Pa. A course working one on one and in workshops on finished drafts of novels, considering voice, point of view, plotting power, and development of ecstatic scenes to make your novel submission ready. (Class size limit 9; class filled).
May 28 – June 3: Gary Schmidt and Patti Gauch in HIstoric Concord, MA – Writing Novels for MG and YA Readers. At The Colonial Inn in Concord, MA. Getting inspiration from the historic place itself, Gary and Patti will team up, for one on one and group sessions for an exciting week considering the major elements of fiction: Voice, diction, alternative points of view and honing a novel for real fictional power. (www.whalerockworkshops.com; Class size limit 15; class just opened.)