The Novel Development Course

Your year is structured in two stages to write and edit your book, allowing you the chance to work step-by-step through each phase and take any breaks you need between them. You will write your novel with The Ninety Day Novel. Next, you will be guided on how to raise your book to publishing standards with The Big Edit.

This is a self-paced program, with over 150 lessons served on our beautiful online platform by video and text. You have immediate access to all lessons. Enjoy the lessons on any internet-connected device. Watch the video, read the text and use the ‘speak aloud’ feature to listen. You’ll need 30 minutes for each lesson and probably some thinking time to capture your thoughts and ideas as you start writing. This might be a good opportunity to start setting aside an hour a day just for you and your writing, and you’ll come to love this special time. One hour? You deserve it.

We suggest you allow three months for The Ninety Day Novel, and the remainder of your year, six months or more, for The Big Edit. But as the course is self-paced, you can take each phase at your own pace, according to your lifestyle, holidays, vacations and commitments.

You can book your coaching sessions at any time during your year on the course.

Your coaching begins after the first week of the second phase of your program, The Ninety Day Novel, where you will write and refine your draft novel alongside a currently published bestselling author in your genre of fiction.

Before your first coaching session, we’ll guide you on how to create an outline for a commercially viable novel. You’ll be nudged in the course to use our interactive tool to submit that to us (on a regular basis as you develop your story). We’ll look at your planned storyline as a team, and if we think another writing coach would be best suited to your story, we’ll drop you a line, but you’ll be able to make the final decision (and can always swap coaches later if you wish).

Every writing coach reviews your storyline in advance of the session via the interactive tool we call ‘The Plan.’

Your first coaching session begins with your writing coach understanding your intentions and aspirations for your book and writing career. That’s your brief to us, and allows us to give you the dedicated and personal guidance and support you need to achieve your ambition.

The coaching sessions are 45 minutes online, and you’ll find that’s plenty of time to get help with story development and troubleshoot any problems to stay on track with your writing. All sessions are recorded for you to keep. You may schedule your coaching sessions whenever you wish during your year with us and will be able to browse our diaries to select a time that works for you, in your time zone. Some like to stay on track with a coaching session every two weeks of their writing period, for example, and others like to pace themselves with one a month or get more help up front or more guidance and advance later on. You can get the support you need when you need it.

During the writing of a first draft, our focus is on your storyline, and we work with you to creatively develop and expand the story together, reviewing development in every session and answering your questions for your story.

You can, additionally, book Paid Feedback Sessions which include a report and a live debrief. We suggest you leave getting feedback on your work until later in your program, after the first draft.

Unlike other writing courses, we advise you don’t share or ‘workshop’ the novel at this stage where your confidence and the story are still vulnerable. Some courses have first-time writers on first drafts advising others in their position, and we think this is a bad idea and at best a waste of your very precious time.

At The Novelry, we’ll keep you and your story safe within a one-on-one relationship of trust and care with wise guidance from a published author who cares about your success and will believe in you and your story.

You can browse our writing coaches and find the author you would most like to work with, then book your coaching session from your Library.

You may wish to book with an author experienced in the genre you are writing.

Another great way to consider who you want to write with is to take a peek inside the first pages of their published books on Amazon and see whose writing style appeals to you most strongly.

The wonderful thing about The Novelry is that you can work with the writing coach of your choice but also book sessions with any other writing coach whenever you wish. So if things change for your story, say you swap genre, or need more help on specialist technical matters from another coach, we’ve got you covered.

This is a flexible writing course you can take at your own pace around your other commitments. We suggest you consider taking three months to write for an hour a day in the first phase, The Ninety Day Novel. The remainder of the year will be spent raising your novel to publishing standard with The Big Edit process, in which you’ll want to work in longer chunks of time, when convenient to you.

The time it takes to complete a book depends on the time you can set aside, but with an hour a day we know it’s possible to comfortably complete your book in a year.

However, we fully understand that sometimes life can get in the way—so if you need more time, you can extend your course and roll over your coaching calls and services with our extension plans for a maximum cost of $55 or £45 a month for the entire Finished Novel Course Rollover Plan (less if you pay annually), or remain as a member for just $29.99 or £24.99 a month.

Once you join us for the course, you can purchase Paid Feedback Sessions for £350 or $425 for a 5,000-word section of your manuscript.

You may choose to book a Paid Feedback Session to get a ‘voice-check’ on your writing at any stage of your year with us or to ask for help with any specific questions on the writing from either your writing coach or an editor.

The feedback sessions offer detailed feedback on your writing in a report and a live Zoom session is recorded for you to keep.

If you need or would like more comprehensive feedback on your manuscript, we’d suggest you choose The Finished Novel Course, which includes a full assessment of your entire manuscript.

You will work with publishing editors from the major Big Five publishers—Penguin Random House, Hachette, HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster, and Macmillan—who will guide you in the third phase of your program on how to raise your work to publishing standard for submission to literary agents and onward to publishing. You may work with the editor of your choice.

See our team of experienced professional publishing editors here. These senior editors are known and trusted by literary agents.

We’ll be able to advise you if you can’t find an obvious fit by reading the profiles of our editorial team. Our Editorial Director reviews all bookings and we will be sure to suggest the very best editor for your storyline and genre.

Yes, we are all for Happy Writing. You can review our terms and conditions here. If for any reason at all the course is not for you, you can get a full no-questions-asked refund within the first seven days after purchase. Just email us and let us know.

Our courses are suitable for people with visual or auditory impairment, dyslexia, and for those with English as a second language. We offer an app which translates the course into 99 languages and a speak-aloud option too.