Beyond Chapter One: Novel Workshop for Manuscripts in Progress

Once a novel is underway, new craft challenges emerge.

After the story launches, authors must sustain narrative momentum, manage subplots, deepen character arcs, and shape the larger architecture of the story.

Whether you're 20 or 200 pages into your novel, this course will help you tackle these challenges with new skills and instill the confidence to keep moving forward.

Our discussions will focus on the demands of long-form fiction, including pacing, character development, point of view, and plot.

Each student will workshop up to 5,000 words for constructive feedback from both peers and the instructor.

We’ll also read brief selections from contemporary novels by Adam Ross, Rachel Kushner, David Szalay, and others, examining how writers construct scenes, build tension across chapters, manage subplots, and balance narrative scope with intimate detail.

You’ll leave with a stronger sense of your novel’s direction, clear revision strategies, and techniques to get to your novel’s surprising yet inevitable ending.