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finish your novel
We'll get you there
Jonathan and Clare know how hard it is to write, and they understand why you want to do it and - crucially - how to make you do it. Deciding to work with them should be the second decision an aspirational novelist makes after deciding to write a novel.
Jacqueline O'Mahony, author of A River in the Trees
(Quercus 2019)
Maybe you have always wanted to but don’t know where to start
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Maybe you have attended a short course and you like what you have so far… but don’t know how to shape it into a novel
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Maybe you have a Creative Writing MA but haven’t yet managed to turn that 15,000 word dissertation into a completed novel
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Or maybe you have started several novels but never got past the Thirty Thousand Word Hump
If so, we can help.
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For over a decade we – Clare Allan and Jonathan Myerson – ran the ground-breaking Novel Writing MA at City University London. That course (now closed) was unique: it was the only course in the UK which demanded that students write a complete novel in order to graduate. That made it special. And as a result:
More than 1 in 6 of our students went on to sell their novels to publishers (making it the highest achieving course in the UK)
In 2020 we launched Finish Your Novel, escaping the strictures (and expense) of the university system, in order to focus on what we do best: guiding writers from first idea to finished manuscript. We know just how to take you from the Germ of an idea to Full Outline to First 15,000 Words over the 30,000 Word Hump and through to Completed Manuscript ready to send to agents
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We have a wide range of experience in helping all sorts of students at all stages of this process: some students find the prose easy but the story difficult, some know exactly what’s going to happen but struggle to find the right voice, some charge ahead and then stop dead half way through. Since 2008 we have been working with students and helping them over these hurdles.
who are we?
our services
Every novelist is different and every novelist requires a different approach. So we suggest these as starting points, and are happy to tailor a 'course' to suit your needs.
The Full Course
A series of ten individual sessions, taking you from first idea to finished manuscript.
Bouncing Off Your MA
You've got your first 15,000 words, but now you need to push on and make it work as a complete novel. We suggest monthly mentoring sessions culminating in a reading of your complete First Draft.
You've got a First Draft
and you know it needs a second (what book doesn't?) We will read your draft, write a report and spend an extended mentoring session getting you set up to write the next one.
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