Author | Teacher | Editor
Before I stepped down from my role as Head of Online Courses at The Unthank School of Writing to focus on my own writing, my final project was a very pleasant one indeed. With my old friend and colleague Ashley Stokes, Head of School, I jointly edited Unveiled: The First Unthank School Anthology. Having canvassed… Continue reading Unveiled: The First Unthank School Anthology
New post for the Unthank School of Writing blog... I’ve just finished teaching two online groups for the Unthank School of Writing, the modular How To Write A Novel course and the Online Fiction Workshop. These were hard-working and dynamic writers’ groups, and I’m delighted to report that several students have decided to stay with… Continue reading A Motivational Writer’s Toolkit
From the Unthank School of Writing blog, Eilidh Horder of Riverstudios talks about the Online Fiction Workshop with Stephen Carver... For anyone considering the Unthank School Online Fiction Workshop, I unreservedly encourage you to do so. I originally signed up for the How to Write a Novel course, as I, well, wanted to learn how to… Continue reading Student Experiences: Priceless Advice
From the Unthank School of Writing blog, Zoe Bell talks about how our Online Fiction Workshop has helped her grow and shape her novel... Before I attended the Unthank Online Fiction Workshop I thought I could do it on my own: a biology degree and a career at a multinational corporation were adequate preparation for writing historical… Continue reading Student Experiences: Turning an Idea into Reality
Writing this list is beginning to feel like a Christmas tradition, alongside the good single malt and the seasonal ghost story. As ever, reading for pleasure has been mediated and muddled by research and editorial work, and I honestly couldn’t tell you how many books I’ve read in the last year.
Here's a great post on the writer's journey from the author S.J. Butler which addresses a subject that, as you know, is very close to my heart, and which also mentions yours truly... So do creative writing courses work? Of course they do!
One of my most popular posts last month was ‘How to Write a Novel.’ This was basically a plug for a course of the same name that I teach for the Unthank School of Writing, and although enrolment is buoyant, I’m guessing that a lot of the hits were actually people looking for advice on how to write a novel. In that case, as November is National Novel Writing Month, here are a few free tips to get you started…
When I consider the sheer volume of creative writing courses, masterclasses, retreats, manuscript assessment and ‘author solutions’ services currently available to aspiring authors (for example when I can’t sleep), I am often reminded of the rapid rise of Spiritualism in the 1850s, a process that the mathematician Augustus De Morgan likened to the spread of smallpox.
Stephen Carver 