Pleased to note that I’ll be teaching for a week at the 2023 Speculative Fiction Novel Bookcamp this August 13-19 at the Siena Retreat Center in Racine, Wisconsin. More details below:
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2023 Speculative Fiction Novel Bookcamp Staff Announcement
NEWS RELEASE
Novel Bookcamp
Dave Rank, director
director@novelbookcamp
http://www.novelbookcamp.org
Award-winning Staff Named for 2023 Bookcamp
RACINE, Wisconsin (February 25, 2023) – Award-winning novelists, literary agents, and publishers will instruct writers working on a first-draft novel at the 2023 Speculative Fiction Novel Bookcamp this August 13-19 at the Siena Retreat Center in Racine.
Presented by the nonprofit Novel-In-Progress Bookcamp and Writing Retreat, LLC, celebrating its 10th Anniversary offering quality long-form writing residential programs, the Speculative Fiction Novel Bookcamp offers three concurrent instructional tracks to choose from: The Bookcamp Workshop, the Writing Retreat, and the new Book Coach Program.
Joining returning instructor Sue Burke, Science Fiction novelist, are Stoker Award-winning Horror novelist Hank Schwaeble, and award-winning Fantasy and Science Fiction writer and university literature professor Mary Anne Mohanraj. Schwaeble and Mohanraj will head up the morning Bookcamp Workshop classes while Burke will handle the afternoon Working Writer Clinic and is the Bookcamp Writing Retreat Mentor. All three provide one-on-one consultations for enrolled Workshop writers. Prolific author, editor, and Bookcamp Assistant Director Lisa Lickel will debut the new Book Coach program.
For the latter half of the week, three visiting publishing experts will join the Bookcamp team, literary agents Laura Zats and Jennie Goloboy, with the Underland Press editor John Klima.
The Bookcamp Workshop offers an intense learning experience with classes on craft and technique, presentations, one-on-one consultations with three instructors, and opportunities to pitch to agents or publishers. Limited to 15 writers; application required.
The Writing Retreat offers six days of personal work time with access to presentations, an experienced writing mentor, and opportunities to pitch to agents or publishers, within a writing-oriented environment. Open enrollment.
New in 2023, The Novel Bookcamp Book Coach Program is intended for experienced writers looking for a thorough, in-person review of their work by a published novelist with experience as an editor, publisher, and book advisor. Limited to four writers; application required. No discount is offered.
The enrollment fee includes the program, a private room with a bathroom, and all meals during the week. The Bookcamp is held at the Siena Retreat Center in Racine, Wisconsin, located between Chicago and Milwaukee.
Go to the website, www.novelbookcamp.org, or email Dave Rank, director@novelbookcamp.org for more information.
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2023 Speculative Fiction Novel Bookcamp Staff & Websites
Sue Burke, https://sueburke.site/, is an accomplished writer and award-winning Spanish to English translator who has lived in Milwaukee, Austin, Madrid, and now Chicago. Burke’s award-nominated Science Fiction novel Semiosis was published by Tor in 2018 and was included on many best-of-the-year book lists. Its sequel, Interference, was published by Tor in 2019. The stand-alone Science Fiction novel Immunity Index was published in 2021. Dual Memory is coming in May 2023, and the third book in the Semiosis trilogy, Usurpation, in May 2024. A professional writer for five decades, initially in journalism, she’s published short stories, poems, and articles in a variety of magazines and anthologies. Burke has been an instructor for the Speculative Fiction Novel Bookcamp since 2021. Her perfect day would consist of writing, reading, translating, editing, and cooking—and maybe a walk along Lake Michigan.
Mary Anne Mohanraj, https://maryannemohanraj.com/ , is author of, Bodies in Motion, The Stars Change, twelve other titles, and the cookbook A Feast of Serendib, celebrating her Sri Lankan heritage. Other recent publications include stories for George R.R. Martin’s Wild Cards series, stories in Clarkesworld, Asimov’s, Lightspeed, an essay in Roxane Gay’s Unruly Bodies, and Perennial: A Garden Romance (Tincture). Mohanraj founded the Hugo-nominated and World Fantasy Award-winning speculative literature magazine Strange Horizons, and is the Executive Director of both DesiLit (desilit.org) and the Speculative Literature Foundation (speclit.org). She is Clinical Associate Professor of fiction and literature at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
Hank Schwaeble, http://hankschwaeble.com/, is a horror, thriller and suspense writer whose credits include Damnable (Berkley/Jove), which won the Horror Writers Association’s Bram Stoker Award for Best First Novel, two other novels, and a horror-noir collection. His latest short story collection, Moonless Nocturne, is slated for publication this summer from Esker & Riddle. A graduate of the University of Florida and Vanderbilt Law School, Schwaeble is a practicing attorney and former Air Force officer and special agent for the Air Force Office of Special Investigations. Schwaeble and his wife, fellow writer Rhodi Hawk, make their home near Houston, Texas.
Lisa Lickel, http://lisalickel.com/, is a prolific author of inspiring fiction, thrillers, cozy mysteries, and an occasional Scifi novel. Lickel is a member of the Wisconsin Writers Association, the Chicago Writers Association, and Assistant Director and book coach for the Novel Bookcamps. She is an avid book reviewer, blogger, editor, Indie publisher, and manager of the Wisconsin Writers Association Press, and takes every opportunity to encourage authors. She now lives in southwest Wisconsin where she enjoys the rolling hills, rivers, and quietude of rural life.
Guest speaker Jennie Goloboy, http://maassagency.com/, joined the Donald Maass Literary Agency in 2017, after six years at a Minneapolis-based agency. A writer herself, Goloboy’s comedic Science Fiction novel, Obviously Aliens, was published last year by Queen of Swords Press. She has a PhD in the History of American Civilization from Harvard, and published a book based on her dissertation in 2016. Goloboy looks for fun, innovative, diverse, and progressive science fiction and fantasy for adults. A fan of character-driven novels, romance and humor are always a plus. If your book combines an oddball premise with a compelling protagonist, she wants to read it. Goloboy also is interested in history for a popular, adult audience.
Guest speaker Laura Zats, https://www.headwaterliterary.com/, is co-founder and an agent of Headwater Literary Management, Minneapolis, Minnesota. For more than a decade, she has worked with books in every way from bookselling to editing to self-publishing. A literary agent since 2014, she enjoys working with authors to build their long-term careers. Since 2016, Zats has hosted Print Run, a publishing podcast, with Headwater co-founder Erik Hane. and is increasingly passionate about teaching and mentorship. She is most interested in Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror, Romance, Mystery/Thrillers, Literary Fiction with speculative elements, select Contemporary and Historical Fiction, and YA. In her spare time, Zats plays tabletop role-playing games, cooks, follows long-distance dogsled racing, and drinks a lot of tea.
Guest Speaker John Klima, https://www.underlandpress.com/, is one of three editors with Underland Press, based in Portland, Oregon. Residing in Waukesha, Wisconsin, Klima’s background includes stints with science fiction magazines Asimov’s and Analog, as well as Tor Books. Returning to school for a Master’s in Library and Information Science, today John hides his true identity behind the alter ego of a mild-mannered assistant director of a large public library. He edited and published the Hugo Award-winning genre zine Electric Velocipede from 2001 to 2013, which was a four-time nominee for the World Fantasy Award and recipient of the Tiptree Honor List for one of its stories. Underland Press exists on the fringes of genres, both literary and weird. It’s keen on science fiction, fantasy, dark fantasy, horror, and noir mystery with a tinge of otherworldliness. The publishing house has won the American Library Association’s Best Horror award, and its books have been nominated for the Hugo Award, the Nebula Award, the Shirley Jackson Award, and the International Horror Award.
