WRITING FOR ADULTS: (FICTION & NOVELS) GRADES 9-12
This is a Certificate Course.
You will be awarded an Adult Fiction Writer 'certificate of program completion' after obtaining a grade of 80% or higher.
All submitted work will be edited and reviewed by a published writer. The hallmark of our course is one-on-one personalized instruction from an impressive faculty of active professional writers.


SECTION I:  A writing course for those who want to see results now. Covering the entire process, from story building to manuscript preparation and marketing, this series shows the novice and experienced writer how to start writing and how to get immediate results. Students will find everything they need to know about managing time, finding an idea, getting that first word down on the page, staying unblocked, shaping ideas into compelling stories, and submitting their work to agents and publishers. It goes beyond the old "Write what you know" to "Write what you can imagine." Filled with insightful tips on how to manage doubts, fears, blocks, and panic, this series will help writers develop their skills in as little as ten minutes a day, if necessary.

SECTION II:   A guide on how short stories and novels should be structured from beginning to end. When you read fiction only for entertainment, it's easy to forget that there's as much craft involved in writing as there is creativity. It's hard to teach creativity, but a series like this can be really helpful in recognizing the conventions that most well written books follow. Some of these conventions seem fairly obvious when you read about them, such as providing sufficient motivation to show why a character changes during a story and delivering at the end of the story the implied promises made at the beginning, yet there is a lot of published fiction that could have benefitted from the advice in this series.  The concepts are clearly and concisely explained information given to the beginning writer without confusing terms. This section will probably put any beginning writer ahead of the game

SECTION III:   This section deals with the topic of editing. There's not much of the old-style editing going on at publishing houses today. It teaches fiction writers the techniques professional editors (many of whom have gone independent) use to prepare a manuscript for publication. Both novice and seasoned fiction writers can ensure themselves greater publishing success by correcting textual problems before submitting their manuscripts to an editor. This exemplary instruction manual offers readers the wisdom of two experienced editors who focus on writing/editing techniques (the mechanics of dialog, characterization, point of view, etc.). Adhering to fiction's underlying principle of "show and tell," this lively text includes both good and bad examples in each lesson.

SECTION IV:   This section addresses the topic of character development and viewpoint. Viewpoint is a tough subject and it covers the basics rather well. It discusses common mistakes, as well as ways to improve. And explains the good points, as well as the bad points about each point of view, then lets you decide which to use. A basic format to "create" a person - writing character back-stories, etc. advice for creating the necessary changes that have to occur over the course of a story, and also gives the reasons why these changes must occur. There are numerous contrasting examples of good characterization/bad characterization.

SECTION V:   Section 5 tackles the issue of plots. It identifies the choices available (whose viewpoint? stop and explain now, or wait? how can this lead to that?), when creating, fixing, steering, and discovering plots and then learning what narrative problems they are apt to create and how to choose an effective strategy for solving them. you'll also discover how to:
1) Test a story idea (using four simple questions) to see if it works
2) Convince your reader that not only is something happening, but that something's going to happen and it all matters intensely
3) Handle viewpoint shifts, flashbacks, and other radical jumps in your storyline weave plots with subplots
4) Get ready for and write your Big Scenes
5) Balance scene and summary narration to produce good pacing
6) Handle the extremes of melodrama by "faking out" your readers--making them watch your right hand while your left hand is doing something sneaky
7) Form subtle patterns with mirror characters and echoing incidents
8) Choose the best type of ending --linear or circular, happy or downbeat, or (with caution!) a trick ending


SECTION VI:  Section 6 talks about rejection slips and how to avoid them. A literary agent --one whose clients include Pulitzer Prize nominees, New York Times bestselling authors, Pushcart Prize recipients, and American Book Award winners, tells how to identify and avoid bad writing," so that your manuscript doesn't come boomeranging back to you in that self-addressed, stamped envelope. Agents and editors don't read manuscripts for fun; they are looking for reasons to reject them. This series is arranged in the order of what editors look for when trying to dismiss a manuscript, starting with presentation and concluding with pacing and progression. Each chapter addresses a pitfall of poor writing--overabundance of adjectives and adverbs, tedious or unrealistic dialogue, and lack of subtlety to name just a few--by identifying the problem, presenting solutions, giving examples and offering writing exercises. It provides an inside look at manuscript submission. Included are suggestions, examples, and practice exercises designed to lift ordinary prose to a higher level. Covering writing fundamentals, including viewpoint, tone, pacing, character development, grammar, and more, Lukeman sprinkles examples of common writing.


CAREER KIT PRICE: CERTIFIED FICTION/NOVEL WRITER  $470.00  (INCLUDES SHIPPING)
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