About the Course

May 13-July 1, 2020

Join Us To:
Develop your book’s editorial style guide to keep details clear, concise, and consistent as you revise. Work with an editor to learn revision strategies, including line editing, to use on your work-in-progress. Explore resources and complete assignments to find the balance between description and action, strengthen your character’s emotional arc and examine your word and dialogue choices.

The course is divided into 8 sessions:
  • Session 1: Course Overview and Introductions
  • Session 2: What is in a Style Guide?
  • Session 3: Your Style Guide Check-in and Line Editing Introduction
  • Session 4: Finding the Balance Between Description and Action
  • Session 5: Revising to Strengthen Emotional Arcs
  • Session 6: Driving Your Plot with Dialogue
  • Session 7: Analyzing Language at the Word Level
  • Session 8: Where Do We Go From Here?


What You'll Learn
In this workshop, you will develop your editorial style guide and apply revision strategies to your work-in-progress. You will:
  • Watch videos, explore resources and complete structured assignments.
  • Have weekly online chats with your instructor and one phone consultation about your book project.
  • Review sample style guides and develop your book's editorial style guide.
  • Discover the value of line editing to improve your manuscript.
  • Find the balance between description and action: removing unimportant details, examining exposition.
  • Strengthen your book's emotional arc through character actions, reactions, thoughts, and inner struggles.
  • Learn how to drive your plot with dialogue.
  • Analyze your word choices: sentence length, metaphors, similes, rhythm.

Attend If:
  • You have an in-progress or completed draft of a middle grade or young adult novel. In this course, you'll create a style guide to help you keep details clear, concise, and consistent as you revise.
  • You want to learn strategies to improve your novel draft. This course will give you valuable revision strategies to use on your work-in-progress and on future novels.
  • You need a workshop that fits into your schedule. This is an online course and you are free to work at your own pace.

Agenda
The course is divided into 8 sessions:

Session 1: Course Overview and Introductions
  • Overview of Thinkific online-learning platform.
  • Course overview, including setting purpose for each section.
  • Instructor introduction.

Session 2: What is in a Style Guide?
  • One-line pitch or tagline: What is your book about?
  • List of characters, noting physical details and character traits.
  • Setting: Locations, buildings, distances, orientation.
  • Timeline: days, seasons, weather, chapter chronology.
  • List of words, phrases that are particular to your story.
  • Review of sample style guides.

Session 3: Your Style Guide Check-in and Line Editing Introduction
  • Questions about creating your style guide and shared insights.
  • Personalized advice to aid in creating your style guide.
  • Introduction to Line Editing: Words, Experiences, Emotions, Dialogue.

Session 4: Finding the Balance Between Description and Action
  • Avoiding stage direction (remove unimportant details).
  • Considering choreography (use setting and movement).
  • Examining exposition (turn summary into action).

Session 5: Revising to Strengthen Emotional Arcs
  • Investigating "I/he/she/they thought" statements.
  • Comparing physical reactions to taking action.
  • Understanding the stakes through character emotions.

Session 6: Driving Your Plot with Dialogue
  • Revising attribution tags.
  • Adding in physical action ("beats").
  • Using misdirection.

Session 7: Analyzing Language at the Word Level
  • The good: the musicality of word choice—sentence length, alliteration (in moderation!), rhymes and rhythm, metaphors, similes.
  • The bad: Overused words and phrases—repeated words, overused adverbs, weak verbs, transition words, needless fillers.

Session 8: Where Do We Go From Here?
  • Sharing questions we may still have.
  • Scheduling one-to-one consultations and optional unworkshop.
  • Setting a goal to put the lessons into practice.


Special Guest Editor Andrea Cascardi will be a special guest for the course.

Faculty

Faculty

Jennifer Gennari

Jennifer Gennari is the author of Muffled (Simon & Schuster, 2020) and My Mixed-Up Berry Blue Summer (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2012), a Bank Street Best Children’s Books of the Year selection and an American Library Association Rainbow List title. An engaging speaker and thoughtful teacher, she has presented at numerous SCBWI workshops, The Writing Barn, and the National Council of Teachers of English conference. She serves as the Marin County Co-Coordinator for the SF North and East Bay Region of the Society of Children’s Book Writers & Illustrators. A graduate of Vermont College of Fine Arts, she lives on the water in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Special Guest

Andrea Cascardi

Andrea Cascardi has held senior editorial positions at Random House and Disney Publishing, and was an agent with Transatlantic for ten years before returning to the Publisher role at Egmont USA. As an editor she acquired and edited Caldecott Honor and Coretta Scott King winner Tar Beach by Faith Ringgold, and Pura Belpre winner Before We Were Free by Julia Alvarez among many other award-winning books. As an agent she represented many bestselling and award-winning titles including Clare Vanderpool’s Newbery winner Moon Over Manifest and Printz Honor winner Navigating Early, e.E. Charlton-Truillo’s Stonewall winner Fat Angie; and New York Times Bestseller Nubs: A Mutt, A Marine, and a Miracle. Now back at Transatlantic Agency as Senior Literary Agent, Andrea’s client list ranges from picture books through adult, and she welcomes diverse voices.