Schedule Of Events:

Wednesday, November 1, 2023

9:00am - 4:00pm

Class: Re-visioning Your Story: A Clarifying Lens for your Manuscript
Struggling to see what your manuscript needs next? This class will help you refocus on the big picture. Discover tools to examine your work-in-progress from different angles to pinpoint what more you need for your narrative arc and your character connections - as essential in memoir as for fiction. Re-visioning will help you see through to a better ending and determine what's needed for a more effective opening. Through writing exercises, readings, sharing, engaging discussion, and the calm of retreat, learn to look anew at your writing and let your own words navigate the way to fully realizing your story.

Cost: $295.00

Thursday, November 2, 2023

9:00am - 12:00pm

Recently, what excites me is that not-knowing, early stage of a poem. This isn't to say my intentions and impulses are bad—it's good to be aware of where I start—but sometimes what I think is best for a poem needs to take a backseat to what makes poetry different from any other genre: prioritizing language play. In this generative workshop, I'll provide various prompts and ample time to write. We will also read work from contemporary poets, and briefly discuss how these poems are working before we write based on each of those poems. Prerequisite: general knowledge of the craft of poetry.

Cost: $80.00

9:00am - 4:00pm

Explore the editorial crossroads of capturing personal history with technical recipe collection and recording community foodways. Define your family story through the lens of kitchen time, everyday eating, and memorable celebration. Students will delve into storytelling and learn methods of collecting and testing recipes with the goal of working toward a cohesive, personal narrative.

Cost: $145.00

9:00am - 4:00pm

Struggling to see what your manuscript needs next? This class will help you refocus on the big picture. Discover tools to examine your work-in-progress from different angles to pinpoint what more you need for your narrative arc and your character connections—as essential in memoir as for fiction. Re-visioning will help you see through to a better ending and determine what's needed for a more effective opening. Through writing exercises, readings, sharing, engaging discussion, and the calm of retreat, learn to look anew at your writing and let your own words navigate the way to fully realizing your story.

Cost: $295.00

1:00pm - 4:00pm

For most writers, their baptism begins when they find their voice. The real challenge then becomes how to plug that voice into appropriate themes. Some of the skills I've learned have been passed onto me from many literary greats ranging from George Saunders to Patricia Hampl. This class is a good fit for those who want to push their writing to the next level.

Cost: $75.00

4:30pm - 5:30pm

Join North Shore Readers and Writers Festival Author David Mura as he reads from his novel, The Stories Whiteness Tells Itself. David is a memoirist, essayist, novelist, poet, critic, playwright and performance artist. In his newest book, David intertwines history, literature, ethics, and the deeply personal, to look back on the foundational narratives of white supremacy to show how white identity is based on shared belief in the pernicious myths, false histories, and racially segregated fictions that allow whites to deny their culpability in past atrocities and current inequities.

Cost: $10.00

7:30pm - 8:30pm

Library Friends of Cook County and the Grand Marais Art Colony invite the community to a panel discussion featuring five esteemed Minnesota authors and educators. The discussion will center around the primary questions: 1) Who can best tell the story of people of color in literature? 2) Why is agency and authenticity important in the creation of works of fiction? There will also be ample time for questions. The panel will be moderated by Staci Drouillard and feature Michael Kleber-Diggs, Carol Miller, David Mura, Mona Susan Power and Michael Torres.

Cost: Free

Friday, November 3, 2023

9:00am - 12:00pm - Class: Revision as Dowsing Rod

There comes a point in nearly every poem I write where I get trapped in the poem I've built. What I mean is, it becomes difficult to consider other possibilities because I've whittled the poem down one thing. This is where radical revision techniques come into play. In this workshop, each student will bring in two of their own poems and apply various revision techniques as a way to understand the poem more clearly or from different angles. The objective isn't so much about getting a “better” poem, but about recognizing our writerly obsessions and concerns. Prerequisite: general knowledge of the craft of poetry.

Cost: $80.00

9:00am - 12:00pm - Class: Narrative Construction and the Four Questions of the Narrator

This class will cover some of the basic techniques of Western narrative construction, including the goals of the protagonist, blocks to the goals of the protagonist, irreconcilable conflicts, the three act structure (from drama and myth), the difference between plot and subplot. Instruction will draw from the lessons of drama, film scripts and myth. The class will also touch on the four questions of the narrator—Who is the narrator? Whom is the narrator telling the story to? When is the narrator telling the story? Why is the narrator telling the story? The first two questions lead to questions concerning the identity of the writer and audience, which in turn leads to significant issues concerning how the issues of race show up in fiction.

Cost: $75.00

12:00pm - 1:00pm - Author Talk | Brenda Child

Join Brenda Child, North Shore Readers and Writers Festival author, for an author talk at the Grand Portage National Monument. Brenda is a Northrop Professor and former Chair of the Departments of American Studies and American Indian Studies at the University of Minnesota, where she received the President's Engaged Scholar Award in 2021. She is a 2023 Guggenheim Fellow. Brenda is the author of several books in American Indian history, including Boarding School Seasons: American Indian Families, 1900-1940 (Nebraska, 1998), which won the North American Indian Prose Award; and Holding Our World Together: Ojibwe Women and the Survival of Community (Penguin, 2012). Her 2014 book My Grandfather's Knocking Sticks: Ojibwe Family Life and Labor on the Reservation (MHS Press, 2014) won the American Indian Book Award. Brenda was a member of the Board of Trustees of the National Museum of the American Indian-Smithsonian (2013-18) and was President of the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association (2017-18). She was born on the Red Lake Ojibwe Reservation in northern Minnesota.

1:00pm - 4:00pm - Class: The Art of Finding Truth in Your Fiction

This discussion-style class will inspire fellow writers at any level of practice who wish to write from a place of adventure and vulnerability. Rather than always “writing what we know” or what we plan, sometimes it's vastly more rewarding to write what we need to know. Our fictional characters can work as guides to help us discover the story we perhaps never intended to write, yet becomes the story that changes our lives. Via conversation and in-class writing exercises, we will take chances and see where intuition takes us.

Cost: $75.00

4:30pm - 5:30pm - Grand Marais Writers Salon

Join Lin Salisbury and friends for a Writers Salon where local writers will share their current work followed by an open mic open to any participant. Join us for wine, cheese, and a robust reading from a variety of genres. Local writers joining Lin to read include Rose Arrowsmith, Jim Boyd, and Nina Simonowicz.

Cost: Free

7:30pm - 8:30pm - Film: Jingle Dress Dancers in the Modern World: Ojibwe People and Pandemics

Join University of Minnesota Northrop Professor of American Studies and 2022 Guggenheim Fellowship recipient, Brenda Child, as she shares her film which considers the history of the Ojibwe Jingle Dress Dance tradition and its origin in the global pandemic of influenza in 1918 – 1920. Brenda is a member of the Red Lake Band of Chippewa and has previously served as a member of the board of trustees of the National Museum of the American Indian-Smithsonian.

Cost: Free

Saturday, November 4, 2023

9:00am - 3:30pm - Author Readings, Featured Authors

Join our North Shore Readers and Writers Festival Authors as they read their most recent works. This is an all-day event taking place at Studio 21. You have the option to purchase individual tickets for each event, or purchase a day-pass that will give you entry to all the readings. The lunch reading is NOT included in the Author Reading Day Pass.

Scheduled Author Readings:

9:00am
Kate St. Vincent Vogl
Iron Horse Cowgirls

10am
Micheal Torres
An Incomplete List of Names

11am
Lisa Golden Schroeder
Untamed Mushrooms: From Field to Table

12pm
Lunch Reading (MN Children's Press)
North Shore Power of Place

Tickets: Free or $20 for lunch (more to come on ordering lunch but the options will include veggie, gluten free, and meat).

Cook County Quintet, our 5-book Child's Eye History series, was co-created by Minnesota Children's Press Story Scouts kids and mentors in 2021- 2023. The picture books begin with Anishinaabe storytelling and traditions that establish this area as a storied place, then cover 200 years of English language written storytelling, from the first 1823 fur trader's diary to local children ages 5-15 researching, writing, illustrating, editing, designing and publishing our history.

1:30pm
A Council of Dolls
Mona Susan Power

2:30pm
Zelda's Bed
Klecko

3:30pm
Rebecca Foust
Only

5:00pm - 7:00pm - Special Event: Dinner Discussions

Celebrate the culmination of the North Shore Readers and Writers Festival by joining in on our table discussions hosted by festival authors. Tables will seat 6 – 8 participants. Please see ticket descriptions to select the discussion you would like to attend. Dinner is included in the ticket fee, with vegetarian and gluten free options available.

Cost: $55.00

A number of Minnesota book professionals and presses will be joining us again this year! The Exhibitors Hall will be open at the Art Colony's Studio 21 (21 West Highway 61):

Friday, November 3, and Saturday, November 4  - 8:30AM – 12:30PM and 1:30PM – 5:00PM

Welcome Center Hours at Studio 21 (21 W Hwy 61)

Wednesday, November 1, 2023 - 12:00PM – 5:30PM
Thursday, November 2, 2023 - 8:00AM – 5:30PM
Friday, November 3, 2023 - 8:00AM – 4:30PM
Saturday, November 4, 2023 - 8:00AM – 5:00PM

Date: November 1-4, 2023

Location: Grand Marais Art Colony, 120 West 3rd Avenue, Grand Marais, MN 55604

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