Update – almost sold out, last spaces available! Please book soon.
DEVELOP YOUR NOVEL FOUR NIGHT WORKSHOP AND WRITING RETREAT with Rebecca Horsfall
May 15th – 19th 2023 (4 nights)
Rebecca‘s retreat is always oversubscribed: it sold out completely in May 2019 and her workshop in October 21 could have sold twice over. Please get your booking in early, direct with Retreats For You.
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Full board, wine included at supper, mini gym, summer house, roaring fire in cooler months. Own room with an amazingly comfortable bed, crisp white sheets, writing table, tea and coffee making. £679 for four nights. (Two ensuite rooms are available at a supplement, please enquire – first come first served.)
Develop your novel-writing skills
In-depth exploration and practice of key skills that mark out novelists as professionals, as well as detailed individual coaching, and oodles of quiet writing time.
The week will include daily 2-hour sessions of teaching and exercises, followed by private writing time. There will be in-depth one-to-one sessions, with follow-up meetings as the week progresses, and opportunities for evening gatherings to share our work through informal readings and supportive group discussions.
Tuesday morning 10 – 12: The idea for your novel. Often overlooked, having a strong core idea for your novel is the key to making it work wonderfully, and to making sure publishers and readers will want to buy it. We’ll work in depth to make sure the idea for your novel is strong enough, and improve it if necessary, and look at how to perfect what is known in the publishing world as “The elevator pitch”.
Wednesday morning 10 – 12: Writing a great opening for your novel. How and where do we start? – This is the trickiest thing to get right for every novelist, whether it’s our first novel or our twentieth. We’ll explore the many aspects to consider to make sure our opening paragraphs, pages and chapters really work.
Thursday morning 10 – 12: Techniques in fiction. We’ll look at the most important structural techniques in fiction writing, including “showing not telling,” writing dialogue, keeping the narrative pace strong, and avoiding the mid-novel slump, and try them out for ourselves.
From your tutor:
When I’ve run this retreat before it usually includes both people who are half way through a first novel and some who have written one or more novels already and are developing a project or expanding their skills. What’s great about the retreat format is we can start from wherever you are with your writing and build from there. It’s definitely suitable for working on advanced aspects of novel-writing. The content of the group sessions is formed by the level and interests of the group.
As for me, I’ve worked with more than 200 authors over the years, some already published and others just starting out and, of course, some who were just starting out when I began working with them now have careers as published authors. I often continue to work with authors who have been on my retreats and courses as it’s obviously good to be able to have that continuity.
Any questions about the retreat before you book, please ask and Debbie will put you in touch. Hope to see you at the retreat!
More about Rebecca
Rebecca Horsfall is a best-selling novelist as well as an experienced creative-writing coach and book doctor. Her first novel, the 740-page bestselling epic Dancing on Thorns was published in the UK and USA to critical acclaim in 2005. Over the past fifteen years she has worked as a book doctor and editor with more than 150 different new authors, a number of whom have gone on to achieve critical and commercial success as novelists. She runs courses and workshops for the literary consultancy Jericho Writers at the Festival of Writing in York, as well as teaching masterclasses at the University of Westminster and Regent’s University in London, and is a creative-writing tutor at West Dean College of Arts in Sussex.
Twitter: @HorsfallAuthor