Coming soon – Register Your Interest
There’s a story the world is waiting for.
A story only you can tell.
And this ‘Whole Story’ course will give you the tools you need to write that story.
Is it a course on writing? Or is it a toolkit?
Whatever word we use, if you want to write science fiction or fantasy, this is your chance.
From the sentence on the page, to the final chapter’s last line. This course can turn your ideas, your character, and your setting into a story that’ll engage both editors and readers.
It’s built from fifteen years of coaching. I was writing for all of those fifteen years, and each mistake I’ve made in writing is here. This course will help you avoid those mistakes.
Your ideas are there. Your world is mapped out. The characters have histories going back three generations.
But the story on your page isn’t the one that was living in your mind.
That gap between vision and the page is a craft problem.
And craft can be learned.
The Whole Story: from the Writer’s Secret Toolkit.
LOOK AT THESE PROBLEMS BELOW
Any of them sound familiar?
This course fixes these issues
Your characters feel flat on the page
Inside your mind they’re alive and vivid. Real people with real desires and fears.
But on the page they feel like furniture
Your dialogue could be spoken by anyone
Each character uses the same rhythms, and the same words.
You know it’s wrong. You don’t know how to fix it.
Your scenes don’t build tension
Readers aren’t interested in what happens to your characters.
They don’t read on to see how your story unfolds.
Your opening doesn’t do its job
Your first line doesn’t hook the readers.
You’ve re-written it forty times, and it still doesn’t pull your readers in.
What’s included?
Sentences & Voice
We’ll work together to build blocks of prose that sound like you.
We’ll look at how to avoid under and overwriting, and those weasel words that dilute and never deliver.
Characters
Wants, tension, relatability, and all the techniques that make every character sound different.
Secondary characters, antagonists, and the art of making even the smallest role unforgettable
Narrative Distance & Point of View
How close should you get to your character’s minds? And when should you pull back?
How do you handle third person, omniscient narration, or first person?
This course has the answers.
World-Building
How to build a world readers can believe in – using subtlety, implication, and well placed detail.
We’ll cover how to explain what’s happening without stopping your story.
Dialogue
Make each of your characters sound distinct. And make sure your readers know who is speaking at any moment.
And avoiding ‘on the nose’ dialogue that kills your story.
Shaping Scenes
We’ll see how to build a scene that earns its place in your story.
Tension, pacing, chapter endings that compel, section breaks that work, and how to weave in subplots
Show not Tell done properly
What it means, where it applies, and when telling is your best choice.
I’ll give you real examples to show how this critical concept works
Themes, Openings & Endings.
Great speculative fiction carries ideas, but never turns into a lecture.
We’ll look at first lines that hook. We’ll examine that dreaded middle section, and find endings that close on the right note.
Descriptions & Emotions
Engaging the right senses. Avoiding the mistakes that flatten descriptions.
How to make setting and emotion work together to create storytelling miracles.
“Kevin doesn’t teach you to write like him. He teaches you to write like yourself – but better. That’s a rare thing.”
Who’s behind this course?
I’m Kevin Elliott, a self-published author of science fiction and fantasy (or speculative fiction). I’m old enough to have met both Tolkien and Asimov, and those two persuaded me that science fiction and fantasy were stories well worth telling.
For the last fifteen years I’ve worked with hundreds of SFF writers through workshops, critique groups, and one-on-one coaching.
I’ve spoken at WorldCon, FantasyCon, and EasterCon. I’ve spoken on voice, on character, on story development, and the best way to put something genuinely original on the page.
I’ve always thought it best to work hard and make lots of mistakes. Success arrives when you run out of mistakes. My writing career has seen me mucking up lots of times. I didn’t want to repeat any of my errors, so each time I screwed up I wrote down what I’d done wrong. That book is staying hidden, but the thinking inspired this course.
I’m not a guru with a system. I’m a working writer who has made every mistake in the book. Over the years I’ve worked out how to resolve those problems.
It would have been nice if Dr Asimov or Professor Tolkien had handed this course to me when when I started writing, but you can’t have everything. (But you can have the Full Story course).
My novel Lightmaker, and my short story collection Go When the Light Turns Red are both available on Amazon.