Spring Retreat 2025

Mar 13, 2025 - Mar 16, 2025

Bear Lake UT

Join us for a weekend of writing!

Registration opens December 16th 2024.

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Welcome to our Annual SCBWI Utah South Idaho Spring Retreat in Bear Lake! This year, we'll have TWO editors and ONE literary agent in residence as our special guests.

And this year we were able to reduce pricing for our SCBWI members!

For four days and three nights, you'll get to rub shoulders with three children’s publishing professionals, enjoy a one-on-one consultation with the editor or agent of your choice (based on availability), gain invaluable insights from our special guests' group presentations, join in optional peer critique sessions, mingle with fellow writers and illustrators, and take advantage of solo writing/illustrating time. All meals and snacks are included in your registration fee!

You'll love this luxurious 10,000 square foot property, which boasts 13 bedrooms, 12 bathrooms, 7 water heaters, two living rooms, a home theater room, a game room (pool table, Foosball, air hockey, xbox), an arcade room, a card playing room, plenty of nooks and crannies where you can hide away with a book or your laptop, and a children's indoor playroom where you can set your inner child free. Bonus: the property is conveniently located right on the famous Bear Lake Scenic Bike Trail.

Retreat options:

SCBWI Member Pricing:

Non-lodging option: $220 (After Feb. 5th: $320)
Twin Bunk Bed in a Shared Room with a Shared Bathroom: $320 (After Feb. 5th: $420)
Full Size Bottom Bunk in a Shared Room with a Shared Bathroom: $345 (After Feb. 5th $445)
Queen Bunk Bed in a Shared Room with a Shared Bathroom: $370 (After Feb 5th $470)
King or Queen Bed in a Multi-Bed Room with a Shared Bathroom: $520 (After Feb. 5th: $620)
Queen in Private Room with a Shared Bathroom: $520 (After Feb. 5th $520)
King or Queen Bed in Private Room with a Private Bathroom: $720 (After Feb. 5th: $820)

Nonmember Pricing:

Non-lodging option: $395 (After Feb. 5th: $495)
Twin Bunk Bed in a Shared Room with a Shared Bathroom: $495 (After Feb. 5th $595)
Full Size Bottom Bunk in a Shared Room with a Shared Bathroom: $520 (After Feb. 5th $620)
Queen Bunk Bed in a Shared Room with a Shared Bathroom: $545 (After Feb 5th $645)
King or Queen Bed in a Multi-Bed Room with a Shared Bathroom: $695* (After Feb. 5th: $795)
Queen in Private Room with a Shared Bathroom: $695 (After Feb. 5th $795)
King or Queen Bed in Private Room with a Private Bathroom: $895 (After Feb. 5th: $995)

NOTE: Shared rooms may be mixed gender (hostel-style). We will try to accommodate requests for same-gender rooms if possible. Please reach out to Tracy Daley at utahsouthidaho-ra2@scbwi.org with questions.

Your registration includes:

Accommodations
All meals
Snacks throughout the weekend
Verbal critique with one of our amazing special guests
Presentations from each of our special guests
Optional critique groups with other attendees
Solo writing time

See the tentative schedule here!

See the house here!

NOTE about bathrooms: Because this property primarily consists of suites, most of the bathrooms are attached to the bedrooms. And in order to offer the widest range of pricing options possible—plus SCBWI's requirement that all paid faculty are provided with private bathrooms—this means that everyone who registers for one of our most affordable options (in a multi-bed room) will need to coordinate shower time with up to 8 people per bathroom. Make sure to pack your toiletries in a separate case that's easy to carry in and out of the bathroom.

Simon Boughton, Publishing Director

Simon Boughton joined W.W. Norton in 2018 to establish a new children's and young adult publishing program, Norton Young Readers. Among the books he has edited and published at Norton are the YALSA Nonfiction Award winner FREE LUNCH by Rex Ogle; YALSA Nonfiction Award winner, National Book Award finalist, and Coretta Scott King Honor book VICTORY. STAND! by Tommie Smith, Derrick Barnes, and Dawud Anyabwile; Boston Globe-Horn Book Award winner FROM A WHISPER TO A RALLYING CRY by Paula Yoo; NICKY & VERA by Peter Sís; and THE OLD TRUCK by Jarrett and Jerome Pumphrey. Previously he was Publishing Director at Roaring Brook Press, Farrar Straus Giroux Books for Young Readers and First Second, and he has held editorial positions at Random House and Simon & Schuster. He is the author of THE WILD RIVER AND THE GREAT DAM: THE CONSTRUCTION OF HOOVER DAM AND THE VANISHING COLORADO RIVER (Christy Ottaviano Books/Little Brown, 2024).

Natascha Morris, Senior Literary Agent

Natascha joined The Tobias Agency in 2020 after previously working at BookEnds Literary. With a B.A. in English Literary Studies and a M.S. in Publishing, Natascha is a self-described “publishing nerd.” She spent most of her childhood in a leather chair, with her nose in a book, and her passion for books across genres, coupled with her desire to find amazing talent, drove her to make the transition from editorial to literary agent. Natascha’s editorial philosophy stems from the idea that all books should be well written and entertaining, and that all children should see themselves and their lives in books. Some of her books include ALA award winning Queen of Physics by Teresa Robeson, Grandpa Grumps by Katrina Moore, JLG selected We Wait for the Sun and Oona illustrated by Raissa Figueroa, and The Library of Lost Things and A Cuban Girl’s Guide to Tea and Tomorrow by Laura Taylor Namey.

Stacey Barney, Associate Publisher

Stacey Barney joined Nancy Paulsen Books for Young Readers as Associate Publisher in 2021. She edits a diverse list of award-winning and bestselling young adult and middle grade fiction as well as select picture books and nonfiction. Her list includes New York Times bestselling authors Krystal Sutherland, Renée Ahdieh, Katherine Arden, Ellen Hopkins and American Ballet Theater principal dancer Misty Copeland as well as Caldecott Honor-winning The Cat Man of Aleppo by Irene Latham and Karim Shamsi-Basha, illustrated by Yuko Shimizu.