Learn the Fundamentals of Story Structure

About the Course

Have you always wanted to write a novel? Have you started a novel only to run out of steam halfway through? Led by international best-selling authors and professors from The University of British Columbia’s world-renowned School of Creative Writing, this is course one of a three-course series designed to take your novel from concept to completion.  

Outlining is a crucial step in the novel writing process, one that fuels creativity and prepares the writer to stay on track and avoid common pitfalls. Through hands-on weekly exercises with a focus on craft and process, as well as insights from the real-world practices of accomplished authors, this course explores the core elements of fiction writing necessary to build an outline. You will learn the fundamentals of character development, world-building and the basics of storytelling architecture. You'll work intensively on your own creative project and hone your outline through discussion with fellow writers. Faculty will be available to answer learner questions during a regular Q&A podcast. 

Whether you’re seeking literary fame or working on a project to share with family and friends, this course offers the tools and skills necessary to plan a novel others will be excited to read.

This course is recommended for any writer or aspiring writer who wants to learn the outlining process. it's also the initial course in our three-course series that leads you through the entire novel writing process.

During the course, you'll work intensively on your own creative project and discuss the assignments and your own process with your fellow writers. Faculty will be available to answer learner questions during a regular Q&A podcast. 

h3>What You'll Learn

• The elements of a successful novel outline and writing plan
• The dynamics of how character and conflict intersect
• How to build a story using the architecture of story structure
• An overview of common story problems and weaknesses
• How to advance from outlining to writing a draft

Format

This course is 100% online, asynchronous, and not for credit. Each week for six weeks, we'll release a new module of material full of insightful lectures, assignments, and video interviews with working writers, agents and editors. You'll have the chance to discuss the assignments with your fellow students, but we won't be grading or giving feedback on your writing - this course is all about learning craft: everything is designed to give you the tools to continue on your own, long after the course ends.

We'll have a TA helping out in the discussions, and the instructors will answer your questions during the course in a lively Q&A podcast format.

 Length: 6 weeks | 4-6 hours per week

 Instructors: Nancy Lee and Annabel Lyon

 Genre: Fiction 

Level: Beginner to intermediate. Open to anyone in the world - no university registration required.

 Prerequisite: None. We recommend you have a novel idea or ideas you wish to explore, and some thoughts about the characters who your novel will include. We also recommend you take the three courses in this series in order: Stucture & Outline, then Writing the Draft, and finishing with Edit & Revise. However, it's not a requirement.

Syllabus

How to Write a Novel: Structure & Outline - Course Syllabus (PDF)

About the Instructors

Nancy Lee is the award-winning author of two works of fiction, Dead Girls and The Age, and a poetry collection, What Hurts Going Down (McClelland & Stewart, 2020). Her books have been published in the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the Netherlands, and her work most recently appeared in Ploughshares, The Adroit Journal, The Puritan and Arc Poetry Magazine. Nancy has served as Writer-in-Residence for Historic Joy Kogawa House, the city of Richmond, and the city of Vincennes, France.

Annabel Lyon's first novel, The Golden Mean, was published in 2009 and won the Rogers Writers Trust Fiction Prize. It was a Canadian bestseller and was published in multiple countries and languages. Her second novel, The Sweet Girl, a companion to The Golden Mean, was published in 2012. Imagining Ancient Women, the text of her Henry Kreisel Memorial Lecture, was published the same year. She won the Engel-Findley award for a body of work in 2015. Her latest novel, Consent, was published in 2020.

Questions?

You can contact us at: crwr.noncredit@ubc.ca

Some frequent questions:

Do I need to have started a novel to take this course? 

No. However, you should have one or more novel ideas that you wish to work on. We will ask you to start developing your idea right away.

What if I'm already in the middle of a novel? 

If you have already started a novel, or are having issues with a partially finished manuscript without an outline, this course can help you clarify your intentions and work out structural issues. We believe the process of outlining helps writers understand a work in progress in a way that simply ‘writing through’ cannot.

Is this course related to an existing for-credit UBC writing class?

This is an entirely new course, designed for a wide audience of writers. Nancy and Annabel have years of experience teaching the art of fiction writing to undergraduate and graduate university students and created this course as the novel writing series they'd always wanted to take themselves.

How often is this course offered?

This course is normally offered twice per year, in Spring and Fall. You can find the schedule of upcoming courses on the main Creative Writing page on this site.  

What are the other courses in the series?

How to Write a Novel: Writing the Draft introduces the essential fiction craft toolbox for writers struggling with the common hurdles of first drafts. How to Write a Novel: Edit and Revise is suitable for students who have completed a full draft of their novel.

How long will I have access to the course materials?

You should have indefinite access to your section of the course. Indefinite is a hard-to-define word; assume at least several months after the course ends, and most likely longer. We also provide downloadable transcripts of all videos and you're free to save these for future reference.