8 Week Workshop
The Novella Workshop with Daisuke Shen
March 3rd to April 28th, 2025
Mondays, 2:00pm to 4:30pm ET
8 Weeks • Fiction • Online • 14 Participants • 2 Instructors
During the past two years, Daisuke Shen has secured an agent and landed a publishing deal, all while writing innovative fiction. This course distills Daisuke's knowledge of contemporary literature, while also giving you extensive support and feedback on your writing, directly from Daisuke Shen.
During this course, you will explore the craft of writing a novella, get feedback on your writing, meet successful visiting authors, study innovative writing, and get personal guidance with the publication process.
As a special guest for this session of the course, that Ari Braverman will be joining as a co-teacher. Ari is a successful author and editor, with a novel published by Melville House, in addition to work published in a wide variety of literary journals. Ari is also an experienced and caring editor.
This course is focused on providing you with detailed, personal feedback as you write the first draft of a novella (up to 20,000 words). As you write your novella, you'll submit 2,500 words at a time. Daisuke or Ari will then respond with a detailed letter, with advice and notes designed to help you move forward with your project.
Once you've written all 20,000 words, your instructor will then give you editorial notes designed to help you polish your work, and prepare it for publication. Daisuke and Ari will also recommend publishers who may be a good fit for your project.
Novellas have always been a popular form throughout literary history, and this popularity continues to surge in recent years for readers and publishers alike. Among the many innovative and award-winning writers of the novella include writers such as P. Djeli Clark, Hiroko Oyamada, Kathryn Scanlan, Olga Ravn, all of whom have found success in pushing the boundaries of storytelling through this exciting form.
Each week during the course, you will:
- Get craft lessons and exercises designed to designed to help you experiment with new possibilities of form and structure.
- Get personal feedback on up to 2,500 words of your work directly from Daisuke Shen. (For a total of 20,000 words.)
- Learn more about opportunities within the indie publishing world.
- Meet live with Daisuke Shen and classmates, so you can ask questions and discuss your work.
- Have the chance to participate in live “write togethers” with the entire class.
This course is a wonderful fit for writers eager to produce new writing, develop their craft, experiment with innovative forms and structures, read examples from a variety of narrative traditions, and get in-depth professional feedback throughout the entire writing process.
Daisuke and Ari areoffering extensive feedback on student writing as part of this course. Each week you will have the opportunity to submit up to 2,500 words for feedback. This is in addtition to the regular meetings, check-ins, and text-based discussion with Daisuke.
Keep in mind that you will have a full six months to submit your work for feedback. (Giving you the flexibility you need to produce writing at the right pace for you.) Please note that our focus will be on creating a self-contained work, as opposed to working on previously-completed novel excerpts.
The course starts on March 3rd, 2025. Everything is hosted online. For those who need extra time, you will have a full six months to complete the course and submit your work for feedback.
Please note: Enrollment is strictly limited to just 10 participants. No exceptions. For those interested in participating, you are encouraged to enroll right away.