California Writers Club, Sacramento Branch

Dedicated to Educating Writers of all Levels

Writers’ Retreat with Heather Lazare

Afternoon Writers’ Retreat with Former “Big Five” Senior Editor Heather Lazare:

Finding Your Path in the Publishing World

 

Heather Lazare

Editorial and Publishing Consultant
Former Editor, Simon & Schuster, Random House
Co-Founder, Northern California Writers’ Retreat

 

What have you always wanted to know from an insider about getting your book on the publishing path? Come to this exclusive opportunity to hear and interact with Heather Lazare, first-time in Sacramento!

Intensive session will cover how to get your book on the path that will hopefully lead to an auction. We’ll discuss query letters, comp titles, independent editors, retreats, conferences, beta readers, and more.

Session will cover:

  • How to find an independent editor (and how to know if you need one).
  • How to know when your book’s ready to submit to an agent.
  • Query letters: The Yes, the No, and the No Way. How to avoid pitfalls and make your book stand out.
  • What publishing houses are looking for and how to position yourself and your book.

Heather Lazare, Editorial and Publishing Consultant and co-founder of Northern California Writers’ Retreat, is a former Simon & Schuster Senior Editor. Prior to that, she worked as a Random House Editorial Assistant. Now she’s back in California, where with Literary Agent Chelsea Lindman she founded the Northern California Writers’ Retreat. Heather specializes in adult and young adult fiction, historical fiction, women’s fiction, literary fiction, and thrillers. She has edited numerous high-profile books, which makes her a standout source of information. Examples of Heather’s work:  Madame Toussaud, Cleopatra’s Daughter, Jasmine Nights, Astor Place Heritage, Mermaid, The Fairest of them All, Three Maids for a Crown, Yoga Cures, Female Nomad and Friends, Lighthouse Bay, Royal Mistress, The Chalice, Destiny’s Divas, The Enough Moment, Landing Gear, Happily Ever After.

When: 1:30-5:00 PM, Sat, May 18 – Following the regularly-scheduled luncheon meeting

Where: Cattlemens Restaurant, adjacent to Nimbus Winery off Hwy 50, 12409 Folsom Blvd., Rancho Cordova

What to Bring:  Your query letter and/or the first couple pages of your novel –  let an expert give you her advice!

What is Provided:  Writing materials, coffee, soda, and snacks

Cost: $65/Members (40% discount); $109/Non Members

(go to  www.sacramentowriters.org/about-cwc/join/ for details on how to join and pay the member price!)

Deadline: May 4 or until session is filled. Seating Limited! Register now to ensure a seat!

Refund Policy: Refunds will be considered upon written request, submitted no later than May 4 to CWC Sacramento President Kimberly A. Edwards at sacramentowriters@gmail.com

Click here to register.

Please print and bring your registration receipt to the retreat.

 

Kathy Marshall

In 2017, Kathy “Kanika” Marshall wrote The Ancestors Are Smiling! which is a collection of uplifting, funny, touching, maddening, and sometimes harrowing real life stories, creatively told by Marshall’s ancestors and their descendants.

In 2018, she published a research-oriented storybook investigating her enslaved ancestors from Maryland, entitled Finding Otho: the Search for Our Enslaved Williams Ancestors. These true stories are woven by Marshall with the African fabric of American historical events. Marshall has been exploring her family roots off and on since 1976 and is a self-avowed missionary for family history, encouraging others to write their own family history stories NOW!

Marshall was a researcher, analyst, and technical writer for the California Highway Patrol for 36 years. In addition, she has been the owner/artist for her Kanika African Sculptures business since 1993, sharing her love for African fabric, clay, welding, and ethnic-inspired, indoor-outdoor sculptures.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sigrid Bathen

 

Sigrid Bathen was a staff writer for the Sacramento Bee for 13 years and has written for numerous publications, including the California Journal, an award-winning magazine about politics and government, where she was senior editor. Her work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, Capitol Weekly, California Lawyer, the American Lawyer Newspapers, California Medicine, California Republic, the Sacramento Business Journal, Comstock’s Magazine, the Sacramento (and Chico) News & Review and Sacramento Magazine, where she was a senior writer. She is a contributing writer for online health-care media published by the California Health Care Foundation. She has been an adjunct professor of journalism at California State University, Sacramento, since 1988. She served as Press Secretary to California Superintendent of Public Instruction Wilson Riles and to Attorney General John K. Van de Kamp, and was Media Director for the California Fair Political Practices Commission.

Her writing has won many awards: the Berton J. Ballard Press‑Bar Award for Distinguished Reporting on the Administration of Justice from the State Bar of California; the Catherine L. O’Brien Award for women’s interest reporting; Society of Professional Journalists awards for commentary and enterprise reporting, and California and National Mental Health Association awards for coverage of mental-health issues.  She was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize for her Bee coverage of conditions in state mental hospitals. www.sigridbathen.com