Great Beginnings : Capturing Readers, Agents and Publishers from Word One

REGISTER NOW    $15 (early bird) | $25

Fiction, Memoir, Essay, Short Story, Flash

Learn what makes your writing sparkle from word one, and how to express your own voice and style on the page while compelling readers to turn the page to find out what happens next.

End the year with some great beginnings!

Will your novel or memoir captivate readers from the first pages? Is your essay shining in the submission pile? Great beginnings have things in common, including a strong voice; a protagonist we want to spend time with; a clear understanding of the “rules” of the story being told. Identifying and using these elements will level up every beginning, from scenes to chapters to your book on the shelf, ready to leap into a buyer’s hand.

Learn what makes your writing sparkle from word one, and how to express your own voice and style on the page while compelling readers to turn the page to find out what happens next. Discover how SUCK (Simple, Unexpected, Concrete Kickoff) hooks readers, and how to scale the concepts for work from flash to full book. This webinar, you’ll apply your new tools to your pages right away —and find out if your choices are working. Allison will live-edit (volunteer) participant work on screen to show how to establish your voice, intention, purpose, and story from the very first sentence.

Our format:

• 35 minutes of teaching
• Short Q&A
• 25 minutes of Writing-in-Company time, where we all work on our own pages, on mute. Allison will answer additional questions in the chat in this time, too.
• Upload your revised first pages to a Google Drive link (optional!)
• 40 minutes of Live-Editing, where Allison will also identify more techniques and tips to apply to your own pages as you see her edit others.
• 10 minutes of Lightning Round, where Allison shares as many opening paragraphs as possible, quickly pointing out what’s great and where to improve
• Short Q&A (and we all breathe!) Our time together will be fast-paced and fun—and you’ll be surprised how much progress you’ll make on your own work in this focused and supportive environment.

In this webinar you will:

• LEARN the five key elements of strong opening pages
• DISCOVER the SUCK that belongs in every first page
• EVOLVE your own first pages, on the spot
• WATCH as participant work is live-edited, and get tips to incorporate in your own work
• ENJOY writing with a like-minded group RELEASE your end-of-the-year tension with focused creative time

This webinar is ideal for all writers–feedback will be scaled to where you are in your process.

Closed captioning is available. ✔
All registrants receive the recording. ✔

ABOUT YOUR PRESENTER

Allison K Williams is the author of Seven Drafts: Self-Edit Like a Pro From Blank Page to Book. She has helped 30+ authors find their agents, and edited and coached writers to publishing deals with Penguin Random House, Knopf, Mantle, Spencer Hill, and St. Martin’s Press as well as literary and university presses and the NYT Bestsellers List. She’s guided essayists and humorists to publication in media including the New Yorker, Time, the Guardian, the New York Times, McSweeney’s, Refinery29, Hippocampus, the Belladonna and TED Talks. As Social Media Editor for Brevity, she inspires thousands of writers with weekly blogs on craft and the writing life. Allison holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Western Michigan University and spent 20 years as a circus aerialist and acrobat before writing and editing full-time. She leads the Rebirth Your Book writing retreats series and co-produces CRAFT TALKS with Sharla Yates.

Questions? Please email Info@writingcraft.com