Story Stalking in Ukiah this June

Story Stalking: Historical Fiction Writing Workshop with novelist Molly Dwyer is set for 10 a.m. – 4 p.m. on June 20, 2009 at Mariposa Center, a rural retreat in an oak-filled canyon ten minutes from Ukiah in Mendocino County. The $75 workshop fee includes a copy of her award-winning novel, “Requiem for the Author of Frankenstein” and a box lunch. Molly will use guided and free writing exercises, conversation, and presentation to explore four aspects of writing historical fiction:

• RESEARCH: Including linear approaches (such as the internet, primary sources, and period literature) and intuitive methods (such as travel, location scouting, dreaming, and synchronicity).

• FRAMING: How to shape fact into fiction and develop a strong sense of time and place with special attention to the sensibilities of characters living in another period or culture.

• STRUCTURE: How to organize a complex body of work to facilitate movement between research and writing, and how to coordinate between background, foreground and back-story material.

• ETHICS: How to stretch the facts to fit the fiction and transform fiction to fit the facts, and how to strike a balance between the two.

“GLOWING! Molly Dwyer gave one of the best, most articulate presentations about writing I have ever experienced, at any venue. I highly recommend her. Molly’s perspective is grounding, informative, inspiring, and current. Write on!”—Cindy Pavlinac, Vice President, California Writers Club Marin Branch

Molly has been a transformational educator for twenty years. She earned an MA from SSU and a PhD from the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco. She studied creative writing with Irish poet, Seamus Heaney, studied fiction writing at Galway University in Ireland, novel writing with England’s prestigious Arvon Project and literature in an Oxford University summer program. Her debut novel, “Requiem for the Author of Frankenstein” was just nominated for the Northern California Book Award in Fiction as one of the best works by a northern California author published in 2008.