Class Description
Finished a draft of your novel and wondering what to do with it next? This class will give you a toolkit of revision strategies to help you take your first draft (or fifth, or tenth!) to the next level. In each class, students will do a few in-class exercises to help them see their manuscript with fresh eyes, identify areas to work on and refine their voices on the page. The exercises are designed to work with novels of any genre and focus on standard elements of fiction such as plot, character, setting and dialogue. In the last class, students will share a short revised excerpt (5 to 10 pages, depending on the number of students enrolled) for on-the-spot feedback from their classmates and the instructor.
Please bring a one-page (single-spaced) synopsis of your novel manuscript and the first five pages to the first class. If you have not recently reread your manuscript, please do so before the first class as well, so that you have the whole work in your head when we meet. You will need to refer to the full manuscript in subsequent classes.
If you have not finished a full draft of your novel, you are welcome to sign up, but some of the exercises we do might be of limited applicability.
Writing Roadmap: We've created a simple, goal-based writing roadmap to help you find the perfect GrubStreet course for your writing needs.
Thanks to the excellent literary citizenship of our donors, scholarships are available for all GrubStreet classes. To apply, click the gray "APPLY FOR SCHOLARSHIP" button. In order to be considered for a scholarship, you must complete your application at least one week before the start date of a class. Please await our scholarship committee's decision before registering for the class. We cannot hold spots in classes, so the sooner you apply, the better. Scholarships cannot be applied retroactively.
For more detailed information about GrubStreet scholarships, including how to contribute to scholarship funds for other students, click here.
This class will take place using Zoom videoconferencing. After registering, a yellow Resources tab will appear in this section containing a link to join class. Please note that you will need to be logged into view the Resources tab.
Zoom Participation:
In our experience, the intimate nature of a writing workshop benefits from on-camera participation. Students are of course welcome to turn their camera off whenever they need to, but it is a community norm for cameras to be on most of the time. You can learn more about using Zoom here.
Zoom Accessibility:
You can enable closed captioning at any time during the meeting by clicking the CC button at the bottom of the screen. If you'd like to access the transcript after class, please make sure to let your instructor ahead of time that you'd like a copy.