Craft Counseling
Craft Counseling
“Working with a writer’s coach has been the single, most important investment of my writing career. ”
Think of me as a healer for your writing.
In Craft Counseling, I read the first 50 pages of your work-in-progress and give you an in-depth letter (and the pages back with track changes) that walks you through story and craft strengths and growth areas. Then, I offer curated and strategic exercises and resources to help you boost those skills. We top this off with a 90-minute editorial call where we jam about all things craft and story.
This is the kind of thing I wish I'd had before I got my MFA. Someone to guide me in where and how to grow and ALSO someone who could articulate my strengths and help me figure out how to use them to my advantage. For example, when I have a writer who really struggles to create emotionally resonant characters, but they're GREAT with setting, we use the objective correlative (a literary device) to deepen character. We use their strength of description and tone and sense of place to help us get in the character's skin through external objects. Cool, right?
All of this work will be in light of my Writing Bingeable Characters and Unlock Your Novel work, which create a structure for you to plot from character so that you get vivid, fresh, emotionally resonant stories. If you haven’t accessed those materials yet, no worries. I’ll give you the quick and dirty concepts in my letter to you.
What You Get
In-depth critique (track changes and letter) of the first 50 pages of your manuscript
90-minute editorial call
Curated resources and exercises to build your craft and story skills
Writer’s Gym Action Plan: Basically, we’re going to create a writing workout for you so that you can work on your strengths and areas of growth on the regular.
“I was blown away by the phenomenal insights she provided in her editorial note. She absolutely gets the big-picture perspective as well as the nitty gritty. She offered excellent advice, guidance and suggestions on how to improve the overall story message, the structure and most importantly, my main character. Additionally, the level of detail she provided throughout the manuscript was incredibly helpful. Each comment got me to dig deeper and find better solutions.
Heather’s careful dissection of my novel gave me room to make several smart revisions and recreate a more likeable and engaging main character with a great story to share. Heather helped me to move beyond the first and very rough draft into the next one and beyond. I trust her opinions, guidance and honesty.
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