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Enrollment Closed. Opening for second session soon.
Strong Start: How to Hook an Agent—or Any Reader—with Your Opening Pages
Course Description:
What does it take to capture readers’ attention when they pick up your book? What do agents look for as they wade through the slush pile?
Your opening pages are arguably the most important part of your novel. In this class, you will learn to recognize the strengths in your work and develop the areas that need attention. Topics covered will include: creating engaging characters and settings, using a compelling inciting incident, infusing your story with the right amount of tension, increasing the fluency of your prose, and more.
This class is designed for:
This class is for writers who have a completed fiction manuscript and are preparing to submit it to agents, or for those who are in the early stages of their novel and want to start with a strong framework (note, however, that in all cases the opening pages need to be proofread and reasonably polished). It is also useful for authors who plan to self-publish and want to make sure their opening chapters have what it takes to grab and hold reader interest. Participants will have a chance to comment on their classmates’ work and ask the instructor questions throughout the course. The instructor will give feedback on each submission, based on the topics covered that week.
In this class, you will learn how to:
By the end of the class, you will have:
Class Structure:
The class will be conducted within TheNextBigWriter's advanced workshopping and class system. Writers will share the class with their fellow members and the instructor for a truly virtual and interactive learning experience.
Week One
Introduction: What agents want
This lesson will focus on some essential Dos and Don’ts for hooking an agent with your sample chapters. The instructor will cover the following topics, based on her experience of reading thousands of slush pile submissions at a top literary agency:
Week Two
The Basics: Characters, setting, and voice
* Students post a writing sample (first 5 pages of a novel).
This week’s lesson zooms in on three of the elements that must be present in your opening pages. First, the main character(s) have to immediately grab the reader’s interest, either because they are likable, or at the very least, engaging. Second, you must establish the setting so that the reader feels physically grounded and can then concentrate on the events of the story itself. Third, the writing must have that most elusive of qualities: a strong voice. The lesson will focus on how to clarify and strengthen each of these elements and how to avoid the generic or the cliché.
Week Three
Establishing the inciting incident and tension
Within the first few chapters of every great novel is an inciting incident—the event that will set in motion all subsequent action (the story arc). In this lesson, we will look at examples from successful novels. Then we will work on identifying your inciting incident and gauging whether it is “big” enough to ignite reader interest and fuel an entire story.
Once you have hooked your readers, the trick is of course to maintain their interest. For this, the writer’s number one tool is tension, and it should be present from the very first page. We will look at examples of how to create tension, and also at common pitfalls that are sure to make tension levels plummet; for example: too much backstory or setup information, an imbalance of telling versus showing, or too much musing or psychoanalysis by the characters.
Week Four
The Nitty Gritty: Polishing your writing on the paragraph and sentence level
One of the top reasons an agent or general reader puts down a manuscript is that “the writing just doesn’t flow.” But what does that mean? This week’s lesson will look at the mechanics of good prose, focusing on the most common errors the instructor has encountered during her work in the publishing industry (wordiness, redundancy, incorrect register, and more), with tips on identifying and fixing them.
The lesson will close with some advice for your next steps:
Class Start Date: January 19, 2015
The class will consist of four lessons provided on a weekly basis starting on January 19, 2015. Participants will be able to work at their own pace over the four week period.
Class cost and signup:
The cost of the class is $250 with a 10% discount to Premium Members of TheNextBigWriter.
About the Instructor
Anita Mumm is a freelance novel editor and creative writing instructor based in Denver, Colorado. Before starting Mumm’s the Word Editing & Critique Services, she worked in submissions at Nelson Literary Agency, where a few of her slush pile finds were NYTbestseller The Darwin Elevator by Jason M. Hough (Del Rey), international bestseller The Peculiar by Stefan Bachmann (Greenwillow/HarperCollins), Breaking Beautiful by Jennifer Shaw Wolf (Walker Books), and Broken Like This by Monica Trasandes (Thomas Dunne). She also gained international perspective as NLA’s foreign rights specialist, coordinating translation deals for the agency’s authors in the Asian market.
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To Enroll in the Class:
Please email Sol Nasisi at snasisi (at) thenextbigwriter.com.
Questions about the class can also be sent to Sol. Thank you.
Members: 5
Language: English
Points System: No
Founder: Anita Mumm
Link to group at:
https://www.thenextbigwriter.com/group-crafting-the-strongest-start-online-class-43
Access: Private
