Write to the End of Your Novel
Our online creative writing course for all-comers that helps you write the first draft of your novel all the way to the end.
SUMMARY
This online course for all-comers helps you to write a complete first draft of your novel. It uses teaching videos, resources, tasks and a student forum, all hosted on our secure bespoke learning platform. For a great learning package and a taste of what we have to offer at Curtis Brown Creative at an affordable price, enrol on Write to the End of Your Novel by clicking on 'Pay and Enrol' by Monday 29 October. This course makes an ideal follow-up to our Starting to Write Your Novel course and a precursor to Edit & Pitch Your Novel.
Tutors
Anna Davis, Director
Anna is the founder and Director of the Curtis Brown Creative writing school. She is the author of five novels, published around the world in 20 languages: Melting, The Dinner, Cheet, The Shoe Queen and The Jewel Box. She has worked for Curtis Brown for more than a decade as a book agent and has served on the management committee of the Association of Authors' Agents.
Overview
This is our online writing course for people who have already started a novel, and are looking for advice and help to complete the first draft. Using teaching videos, notes, writing tasks and resources, Curtis Brown Creative’s Director Anna Davis will help you develop the skills, techniques and staying power that will get you all the way to the end of your story.
Write to the End of Your Novel is suitable for anyone writing a novel, but is particularly recommended for people who have already taken our Starting to Write Your Novel course. It's open to all-comers, and our online courses are designed for flexible study – you can take part at times to suit you and from wherever in the world you are.
This creative writing course is intended to be relevant and useful for first-time writers, whether they're writing just for fun or taking the early steps in a more serious literary journey. It also offers those who are considering the bigger financial and time commitment needed for our longer, selective courses a taste of what we do at Curtis Brown Creative.
Write to the End of Your Novel – along with our other two six-week online courses Starting to Write Your Novel and Edit & Pitch Your Novel – are aimed at getting you all the way through your novel, from the germ of an idea to a polished draft and pitch.
What does this course give you?
We’re confident that we’ve assembled a great package. By the end of the course you should be writing your novel with confidence, and with all the advice and resources you need to complete your first draft.
- You’ll get six Teaching Modules across the six weeks (see schedule below for details), all delivered online through our secure, purpose-built, specially designed Curtis Brown Creative Learn platform.
- You’ll watch specially filmed Teaching Videos from Curtis Brown Creative Director Anna Davis (three videos per module).
- You’ll read extensive and practical Teaching Notes from Anna, often using case studies.
- You’ll have access to additional Resources – uploaded PDFs which are collected in a dedicated area of the learning platform to support the teaching topics and provide useful reference material for the students. These include lists of ‘writing ground rules’ and a recommended reading list.
- You’ll undertake Writing Tasks set by Anna (at least two per week), designed to help students explore and understand the teaching topics and progress their novels. Students will share material with each other and the Curtis Brown Creative team in the forum, and can comment on each other’s work. Often the writing tasks will relate directly to students’ novels-in-progress.
- You’ll have continued access to all of the teaching materials after the course ends so you can refer back to them at any time to help you with your writing process.
- Students can share work, and communicate with each other and us in the Forum. Our learning platform features separate forum spaces for each teaching unit, arranged in a clear structure that’s easy to use. This enables students to quickly find and take part in discussions and to easily locate task materials they’d like to refer back to. (In our experience most learning platforms used by writing courses offer only one forum space, into which all discussion, tasks, uploaded teaching materials, etc, are poured, never to be found again – a kind of online bucket.)
- We encourage students to offer positive, constructive feedback to each other in the forum as the course progresses. We’ll be taking a look at students’ homework pieces and each week an expert CBC editor will give brief written feedback on several students' work - all students will get feedback on a writing task at some stage during the course. Weekly posts to the group from Anna Davis will reinforce the lessons taught and will offer comment on students' progress in such a way as to be useful to the group in general.
- At course end we invite students to share – with us and fellow students – their opening page, plus an extract from anywhere in the novel (up to 2,000 words), plus a page to tell us how the story will continue. Students can obtain a detailed report (500 words) on this end-of-course material from our expert CBC editor for a fee of £100 (so you can take this course for a fee of £200 - or pay £300 to include a report on your writing when the course finishes). NB: If you're looking for in-depth individual tutor feedback, one-to-one tutorials and tutor-led writing workshops as part of a writing course, do take a look at our longer courses – these aren't included in Write to the End of Your Novel.
Student workload
To get the best out of this course, allow plenty of time to watch the videos, read and reflect on the notes and resources, complete the writing tasks and thinking tasks, and take part in discussions in the forum. It’s also important to be working on planning and starting your novel throughout the six weeks. You can watch/read the teaching materials and complete all tasks in a couple of hours per week, but ideally you should consider spending considerably longer on the materials we offer and on working on your novel. After all, that’s why you’re taking the course… At the end of the course, we ask you to post up in the forum the opening page, plus an extract from anywhere in your novel (up to 2,000 words) and a page to tell us where your plot is headed.
Schedule
Thursday 1 November – Wednesday 7 November
Introduction and Pace
Thursday 8 November – Wednesday 14 November
Dialogue
Thursday 15 November – Wednesday 21 November
Active Planning
Thursday 22 November – Wednesday 28 November
Building Suspense
Thursday 29 November – Wednesday 5 December
Stuck in the Middle + Style and Description
Thursday 6 December – Thursday 13 December
Sex scenes and Violent scenes + Endings
Pay and enrol
To enrol on this course, you just need to click on the £200 'Pay & Enrol' button below, and then input the information requested and make payment using a debit/credit card. If you'd like to join the course AND get a 500 word report on your end-of-course material, choose the £300 option below instead.
(NB: if you haven't yet taken the Starting to Write Your Novel course, we recommend you take a look at that one before you make a decision about which course to enrol on).
If you'd like to ask any questions or discuss anything further with a member of the CBC team, call us on 020 7393 4201 or email us on cbccourses@curtisbrown.co.uk.
Enrolment closes at midnight on Monday 10 September.
If you would like to purchase a place on our writing courses for someone other than yourself, please click here to buy a gift voucher. Read terms & conditions here.
Join the Course
Full participation in this online course.
PRICE £200.00
Course + Report
Full course + 500 word report on your end-of-course submission.
PRICE £300.00