live classes with actual instructors
(Coming soon!)
Ditch self-paced Video, learn your craft, and get live feedback
We get it. It sounds amazing when you’re an introverted writer to buy access to a library of at-your-fingertips video lessons that you can watch at your convenience.
But do you watch all those videos?
Did you know that online course completion rates are a miserable 15%? How many times have you paid $47 (or $97 or more) for a class that sounds like the perfect solution, only to watch the first video and realize it’s not helpful. Or it’s not even teaching. It’s someone telling you their process.
Their process is not your process, and it never will be.
We invite you to take a class WITH us, not with a video, so you can learn and get live feedback. And if you find yourself paralyzed and procrastilearning when you sit down to write, you have found your people.
write the bleeping book
There are no quick fixes to writing a book, and we firmly believe that live workshops and guided practice yield better results than talking head video libraries that seem never-ending.
12 sessions
In our 12 sessions together, we’ll deep dive into the art and craft of writing a manuscript.
i do, we do, you do
Each class provides instruction, group work, and guided practice of an element of story craft with feedback from the instructors and your fellow participants.
practice giving and getting critiques
The art of giving and receiving feedback is a crucial skill for all writers. Finishing a manuscript is only the first step of the crucial editing and review process.
freebies!
When you sign up, you’ll receive our curated lists of writing groups worth your time, books we recommend, and websites that can save your bleep.
schedule a free 15-minute consultation
Have questions? We would love to chat with you! Sign up for a free 15-minute consultation and get your questions about the class answered.
LIVE class schedule
Our live classes are limited to ten students each, and are available for a special launch price of $150 per month for three months ($450 total).
We believe in and espouse the teaching method of “I do. We do. You do.” You’ll have ample time to practice while learning the elements of story craft.
Sessions
2.5 hours each
Finding Your Writer’s Process & Generate an Idea File
Character – Protagonist versus Antagonist
Developing Great Story Stakes
Logline — your lighthouse for your story
Theme
Worldbuilding
Story Hooks
Plot your novel - how to plot your novel (or look at it for the key elements if you’ve already written it)
Point of View
Understanding Show don’t Tell & Pacing
Leveraging Tension & Conflict to Drive Story
Editing & Revising: When, Where, and How (Joan Wilder doesn’t exist… and honestly, neither does Argyle. Sorry to break it to you.)
And by the way, everything in life is writable about if you have the outgoing guts to do it, and the imagination to improvise. The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt.”
Sylvia Plath, The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath
Get on the list to write your bleeping book!
Be the first to know when we release our inaugural class, and we’ll send you a discount code for 10% off!
MEET YOUR INSTRUCTORs
Chris Wilcox
I’ve been a professional writer my whole adult life, mostly for companies, but it stemmed from pursuing my English degree. I’ve written three manuscripts that are in the throes of edits. Will I query or self-publish? We shall see! Here are some random facts about me:
A former night owl who became an early riser, I began creating stories at an early age (please note, that did not include actually writing them down, and some of them, such as my enthralling story about the life of a skunk, may have been heavily lifted from Collier’s Encyclopedia).
I worked in corporate communications and training for 30 years. I’m still recovering.
Most of my friends are just extroverts who would not leave me alone, despite my efforts to seem closed off and disinterested.
I’m an INFP in the Myers-Briggs world and 5w4 on the Enneagram wheel. These types practically invented doom scrolling and diving down internet rabbit holes. We call them “research.”
I adore research of all kinds, everything from “who is that weirdo I just saw in a documentary” to “how far back can we find grandmothers with last names in our family tree?” Sometimes those lines cross.
I’ve published several pieces over the last three years, including Speculatively Sarah as part of the #1 fiction anthology bestseller Meet Me at Midnight (The Writers Sanctuary Red Herrings Society); a creative non-fiction essay Trying Perfection in The Elpis Letters (Kayla King); and essays Gratitude and Pencils in Found Voices (Medium, Carolyn Ziel). My first short story, No Damn Funeral, was published in 2017 in Angel Bumps (Anne Bardsley).
THINGS I LOVE
Documentaries, historical things, documentaries about historical things, the paranormal, dogs, 7 people in the Universe (maybe 8), secretly thinking I’m all zen and light until I get into traffic when I’m driving, writing, and helping others with their writing. And starting sentences with conjunctions. I’m a rebel like that.
Karen Lycan
I always wanted to be a writer, so when I went to college, I studied English and Communications with an emphasis in Journalism. I had a goal to write books after graduation, but the attitude at that time was, “Novelists are born, not made.” (Hint, novelists can be both born and made). Since there was no one to show me how to write novels or where to start, I pursued work in the publishing world. I worked in the editorial department for a magazine which then led to an advertising role for a local newspaper followed by transcribing for TV.
When the writing world began to change because of the internet, I became an event coordinator, but that was lacking the writing I craved. I went back to school to become a high school English teacher, and I taught for several years. When I left teaching, I started attending writing conferences and taking classes, determined to return to novel writing. During that time, I was hired by a California state park to be a tour guide, and in 2020, they shifted my responsibilities to grant writing, educational materials, and social media content. It was then that I met my future husband at a castle, and he proposed in front of a castle, so my life is essentially a fairy tale.
I am the 2021 CenCal SCBWI award winner for Best Picture Book. I write features for a local magazine, and my short story, “Reasons I Quit,” has been accepted for the November 2024 RHS Anthology, “All the Promises We Cannot Keep.”
