Plot-Structure-GMC Getting Your Manuscript Ready Series with Tere Michaels

The Getting Your Manuscript Ready series is a comprehensive look at all the moving parts that make your manuscript the best it can be.

We'll break down Beginnings, Middles, and Ends, discuss their unique challenges - and how to fix them! - as you create a book that flows from start to finish.

These three workshops, taken together, expand the concept of just editing your text. We will dive deep into each book section, learning to look for problems that impact tone, characterization, the flow of action, and emotional satisfaction.

Learn how to examine your own work in order with the eye of a developmental editor!

Part I: Making a Good First Impression: The First Five Chapters

Your opening chapters are a book’s first date with a reader! They’re going to make decisions on if this is the right match for them based on their first impressions. So how do we write engaging, enticing, informative first chapters that set up your story, and your characters and keep readers reading?

In this workshop, we’ll discuss all the factors that go into creating a smart and effective start to your book.
How much information is too much? Not enough?

Are you starting in the right place in your timeline?

What are genre expectations?

How are your readers emotionally engaging with your story and your characters?

We’ll also touch on additional topics such as POV, red herrings, worldbuilding, and more!


Part II: Stuck In the Middle

This class focuses specifically on the middle of your story, the bulk of the action that takes place after the set-up and builds up until you reach your “disembarking point” and the book’s ending.

• How do you crank up conflict and emotion without writing yourself into a corner?
• How do you fulfill the promise of your beginning (and your blurb), to deliver the book you’ve promised readers?
• How do you keep readers emotionally engaged without having to use tricks and red herrings to make sure those pages keep turning?

Whatever your process—from highly detailed outlines to seat-of-your-pants writing, and everything in between—this class will help you build a framework for a successful, satisfying book. We will map out the high points (and low points) of the middle of your book. We will discuss how your “midpoint” is not exactly in the middle, nor does it indicate one moment in time. And we’ll help you decide precisely how to shake up the world you’ve created (so you can fix it in time for the end).


Part III: The Last Three Chapters: Tying It All Together

Great is the art of beginning, but greater is the art of ending. ~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

What best sells your next book? The ending of your previous book! A satisfying ending ties together all the pieces of your novel - the character arcs, the relationship arcs, the plot, the carefully laid out details - and gives the reader a feeling of completion and satisfaction. They have trusted you with their time and emotions and have been rewarded with an ending that makes them sigh (and recommend your book!).

The journey resulted in a positive experience and they will be open to taking that trip again with you, with your next book. A good ending feels like a story never ends in a reader’s mind and heart, and that means a continued satisfaction that you are responsible for. What better marketing is there?!

We’ll discuss all the parts of your story that need to be considered as you end your book - everything from major character arcs to little details. We’ll consider the big and small in concluding your story in a satisfying way to make your readers happy!