Writing workshops

How do you make your reader feel the danger ahead without simply telling them? What defines gothic horror today? Bestselling author Katherine Beutner joins us at The Novelry to share her experience crafting a nail-biting story in this genre. Katherine’s second novel Killingly (2024) is a haunting novel of intrigue, longing and terror, based on the real-life disappearance of a Mount Holyoke student in 1897 and perfect for fans of Donna Tartt and Sarah Waters. Her debut Alcestis (2010) is a retelling of the Greek myth and won the Edmund White Debut Fiction Award from the Publishing Triangle in 2011. Now, Katherine teaches English at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. She joins The Novelry writing coach Alexis Henderson for a live Q&A on January 6.

What’s on an agent’s list right now? When should I submit, and to whom? To answer these questions and any more you might have, Nicole Cunningham from The Book Group joins us on December 16 for a live session with our writers. Nicole represents a range of fiction, nonfiction, and illustrators, and works with writers and artists who share a sense of wonder, curiosity, and tenderness about the world. Founded in 2015, The Book Group is a New York-based full-service literary agency representing authors like Ann Napolitano and Liane Moriarty as well as The Novelry graduate Daisy Carrington.

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Developing your writing entails understanding interpersonal relationships and all their little intricacies—and Kate Sawyer has a knack for it. Waterstones Fiction Book of the Month This Family was praised for its gripping, intriguing depiction of character dynamics, and Kate’s debut novel The Stranding demonstrated ‘perceptive and unflinching’ human relationships in an apocalyptic setting (Jessie Burton, author of The Miniaturist). Kate joins us at The Novelry for a live writing class on crafting real, complex human relationships across genres. For a session not to be missed, join us as a member.

Finding humour in the darkness is a writer’s greatest tool. But how do you find the light when writing from your own painful experiences? In this session, bestselling memoirist Alice Carrière discusses her journey writing Everything/Nothing/Someone and her emergence from an unconventional, emotionally fraught childhood. Alice’s memoir was described by New York Times as ‘not self-pitying but raw, filled with sorrow, dark humor and sharp observation’, and writers of all genres will appreciate her insights into writing challenging themes and finding your own, honest voice.

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The author of global sensation and record-smashing Netflix adaptation Bridgerton joins us for this exclusive live writing class with writers of The Novelry! Julia Quinn introduced us all to the power of Regency-era romance, with its potential for scandal and sensation heightened by an anonymous narrator (Lady Whistledown, dear gentlereaders!). In this session, Julia will discuss her writing journey, her experience in the historical romance genre, and how she crafts stories dripping with intrigue and sensuality. Join us as a member so you don't miss out!

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What are the biggest publishers selling right now? In this live session, Penguin Random House Director Patrick Guaschino joins The Novelry to talk about the trends he’s seeing in science fiction and fantasy (SFF) and genre fiction. As Associate Director of Retail Sales at Penguin Random House, Patrick oversees and manages the adult PRH client titles lists at Barnes & Noble and Books-a-Million. Over 13 years of experience in the publishing industry has granted Patrick insights into the latest sales trends that writers from all genres, and particularly SFF, will find invaluable. He joins our writers for a Q&A on October 21.

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What defines the Gen Z rom-com? How do you create compelling, complex love interests? And how spicy is too spicy? To tackle these questions, the leading voice of diverse, complex and sexy romances Talia Hibbert joins us for a live session on October 7. Talia’s debut, Get A Life, Chloe Brown, was a USA Today and Wall Street Journal bestseller, winning 2019’s Ripped Bodice Award for Excellence in Romantic Fiction. Sixteen published books later, Talia continues to write with warmth and empathy for her characters, ensuring readers from all walks of life find themselves seen and understood. Join us as a member to hear more about Talia’s craft and writing process, and to ask her any questions on contemporary romance!

The Novelry’s Krystle Appiah is joined by Bria Ragin (Penguin Random House) and Foyinsi Adegbonmire (Macmillan) for an exciting panel on the YA market, discussing what makes a book stand out in this booming genre, what trends we’re seeing, and what makes for a bestseller.

Bria Ragin is currently an editor at Delacorte Press and Joy Revolution, an imprint of Penguin Random House Children’s Books. Bria has worked with bestsellers Talia Hibbert, Amalie Howard and Angela Montoya, and has over a decade of experience in the industry.

Foyinsi Adegbonmire is an editor at Feiwel & Friends, an imprint of Macmillan’s Children’s Publishing Group, and has acquired YA favorites like Tomi Oyemakinde and New York Times bestselling author Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé (Ace of Spades) among many others. Come along for a friendly and informative session with the opportunity to ask any questions you might have about the YA industry.

Sunday Times bestseller Lucy Clarke is the author of eight destination thrillers. They include Waterstones Thriller of the Month The Castaways, Richard and Judy Book Club pick One of the Girls, and most recently, The Hike. Lucy’s novels have sold over a million copies and are published in more than 25 territories worldwide.

Lucy’s thriller No Escape (also published as The Blue) has been released as a major international show for Paramount+. Set in the Philippines, the seven-part series is directed by Hans Herbot (The Serpent) and stars Abigail Lawrie and Rhianne Barreto as best friends Lana and Kitty.

‍The Castaways has also been adapted for screen and was the Guardian Pick of the Week. BAFTA award-winner Sheridan Smith stars as Lori, and Celine Buckens plays her sister, Erin. The five-part thriller is available to stream on Paramount+.

Join us for a Live Q&A with Rebecca Ritchie, literary agent at A.M. Heath. From George Orwell to Hilary Mantel, A.M. Heath have represented authors for over 100 years.

Bonnie Garmus is the New York Times and Sunday Times number one bestselling author of Lessons in Chemistry, which has been translated into 42 languages. A television adaptation starring Brie Larson aired on Apple TV last year.

Among the prizes Bonnie has won are the British Book Awards Author of the Year 2023, the Waterstones Author of the Year 2022, the Paul Torday Memorial Prize for a first novel by an author over 60, and the Forbes Magazine EMEA 50 over 50 2024. Lessons in Chemistry was shortlisted for the 2023 RSL Christopher Bland Prize.

A copywriter and creative director who has worked widely in the fields of technology, medicine and education, Bonnie is an open-water swimmer, a rower, and mother to two pretty amazing daughters. Born in California and most recently from Seattle, she currently lives in London with her husband and her dog, 99.

Penguin Random House and Bloomsbury have signed Kate Weinberg’s ‘crackling, comical, tender, and mysterious’ novel, There’s Nothing Wrong With Her. U.S. rights were sold to Putnam (Penguin Random House) by Janklow & Nesbit, and Bloomsbury acquired U.K. and Commonwealth rights.

‍There’s Nothing Wrong With Her is about a woman suffering an unnamed condition that confines her to a physical and mental state she calls ‘The Pit.’ This is a book ‘about mental health, the certainties of medicine, buried trauma, love, death and time lost in the crushing—and comical—hopes of modern life.’

Kate says: ‘I’ve used the inspiring resources of The Novelry for help in developing both of my novels, The Truants and There’s Nothing Wrong With Her. I can say, hand-on-heart, that it has given me more tools and confidence—in both the art and craft of novel-writing—than my year-long prestigious Masters degree in Creative Writing ever did.’

Trellis Literary Management is a full service agency formed in 2021 whose clients include New York Times and international bestsellers; winners of the National Book Award, the Whiting Award, the Graywolf Nonfiction Prize, and the Rona Jaffe Foundation Award; finalists for the National Book Critics Circle, PEN Award, National Magazine Award, and more. Trellis clients have been selected as fellows and scholars by MacDowell, Tin House, the National Endowment for the Arts, Steinbeck, the Sewanee Writers Conference, Kundiman, among other lauded institutions. Trellis clients’ books have been chosen for national book clubs including the Good Morning America Book Club, Reese’s Book Club, Read With Jenna, Belletrist, and more; and have been adapted for film and television, including Tell Me Lies by Carola Lovering (now a series on Hulu) and The Other Black Girl by Zakiya Dalila Harris (now a series on Hulu), with many others in development. Trellis agents’ interests range from literary to commercial to genre-bending fiction, from narrative to memoir to pop culture nonfiction and everything in between.

Hannah is the internationally bestselling and Sunday Times number 1 bestselling author of Godkiller, the first book in a trilogy which will be translated into Portuguese, Bulgarian, Croatian, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Polish, Romanian, Spanish and Turkish. She has her heart in Scotland and her roots in the north of England.

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Carla Jenkins debut novel will be published this May by Trapeze, an imprint of Hachette, who scooped the rights for a ‘powerful and engrossing’ debut novel by The Novelry graduate Carla Jenkins in a two-book deal from Madeleine Milburn at Madeleine Milburn Literary Agency, who saw off competition from nine other agents to represent Carla after submission by The Novelry.

‍Fifty Minutes will publish in hardback in May 2024, with her follow-up novel due to publish in 2025.

Carla says: ‘From the initial idea for my novel to the point of getting agent representation, The Novelry were on hand with support and advice. The dream was always to get an agent and so to receive interest from several was mind-blowing—to have Madeleine Milburn within that list was more than I could have hoped for. I’m thrilled!’

Abigail Dean’s first novel, Girl A, was published in January 2021 and became an instant New York Times and Sunday Times bestseller. Translated into 36 languages, the book was optioned for film by the producers of the HBO series Chernobyl. Abigail’s second novel, Day One, is out in March 2024.

Ella McLeod is a writer, poet and podcaster, who lives in South London with her fiancé and cat. She also co-hosts Comfort Creatures on the Maximum Fun Network. Ella loves Shakespeare, the Harlem Renaissance, mythology, ramen, and firmly believes in the radical power of dreaming. She is the author of two novels: Rapunzella, Or, Don't Touch My Hair, and The Map that Led to You, both published by Scholastic.

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Bea Fitzgerald is the Sunday Times bestselling author of the Hades and Persephone YA fantasy reimagining, Girl, Goddess, Queen. Under her username @chaosonolympus, Bea has more than 116k followers on TikTok. In this practical session, Bea will teach writers how to use TikTok from scratch and explain the importance of BookTok for authors (and readers).

C.L. Taylor is the eight times Sunday Times bestselling author of ten gripping stand-alone psychological thrillers: The Accident, The Lie, The Missing, The Escape, The Fear, Sleep, Strangers, Her Last Holiday, The Guilty Couple and her newest book, Every Move You Make, published on 28th March 2024.

Her books have sold over two million copies in the UK alone, and hit the number one spots on Amazon Kindle, Audible, Kobo, iBooks and Google Play. They have been translated into over 30 languages, been selected twice for the Richard and Judy Book Club (Sleep and The Guilty Couple) and optioned for television.

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A live Q&A with Jeramie Orton from Pamela Dorman Books, an imprint of Penguin Random House in New York, the home of multimillion-copy, #1 New York Times bestsellers by Kim Edwards, Helen Fielding, Gail Honeyman, Sue Monk Kidd, Jacquelyn Mitchard, and Jojo Moyes. Other New York Times bestselling authors include Ashley Audrain, Paolo Giordano, Shari Lapena, Richard Osman, J. Ryan Stradal, and Rosie Walsh.

Jeramie joined Pamela Dorman Books in 2015, after working at Oxford University Press. She is interested in atmospheric domestic thrillers, dark psychological suspense, mystery and some crime fiction, as well as fresh dystopian narratives and general upmarket commercial fiction. Recent and forthcoming authors she edits include Sarah Pearse, Bea Setton, Shari Lapena, Martha Beck, Richard Osman, J. Ryan Stradal, Claire Daverley, and June Gervais, among many others.

Tami Hoag is the #1 international bestselling author of more than thirty books. There are more than forty million copies of her books in print in more than thirty languages. Renowned for combining thrilling plots with character-driven suspense, Tami Hoag first hit the New York Times bestseller list with Night Sins, and each of her books since has been a bestseller.

Chris Bucci represents bestselling and award-winning fiction and non-fiction authors including, Highway of Tears by Jessica McDiarmid; Is Gwyneth Paltrow Wrong About Everything? by Timothy Caulfield; and The War Widow by Tara Moss.

Chris began his career at the University of Toronto Press as an acquisitions editor in the social sciences. He joined HarperCollins Canada in 2003 as a non-fiction editor and then moved to McClelland & Stewart. In 2008 he joined The McDermid Agency as a literary agent and later bought the agency, along with Martha Webb. In 2017 they merged with the Cooke Agency to form CookeMcDermid where Chris was Proprietor and Literary Agent before coming to Aevitas in 2020.

Chris represents a broad range of both fiction and non-fiction as an Aevitas agent based in the NY Metropolitan area. He aims to work with some of the culture’s best writers, thinkers and experts—authors whose work helps us to interpret and understand our times as well as our future.

New York Times bestselling author Tayari Jones is the author of four novels, most recently An American Marriage. Published in 2018, An American Marriage is an Oprah’s Book Club Selection and also appeared on Barack Obama’s summer reading list as well as his year-end roundup. The novel was awarded the Women’s Prize for Fiction.

Sally’s debut novel, The Keeper of Stories, published by Harper Collins in 2022, was a Sunday Times Bestseller. It was shortlisted for British Book of the Year and has sold over half a million copies. Sally has also founded her own pen company, Plooms. Her passion for stationery partly inspired her second novel, The Book of Beginnings, which is set in small stationery shop in London.

Rosie Walsh is the internationally bestselling author of two novels, the global smash hit The Man Who Didn’t Call published in the US as Ghosted and The Love Of My Life, a heart-wrenching, keep-you-up-all-night emotional thriller, which was an instant New York Times bestseller.

Katherine’s most recent book, Enchantment became an instant New York Times and Sunday Times bestseller. Her internationally bestselling hybrid memoir Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times was adapted as BBC Radio 4’s Book of the Week, and was shortlisted for the Barnes and Noble Book of the Year. Other titles include novels such as The Whitstable High Tide Swimming Club.