Harvard Online Courses

Course description

This is an intensive workshop for writers interested in developing a middle grade or young adult novel. During each class meeting, we workshop chapters of students novels-in-progress, focusing on elements of craft (character, point of view, dialogue, and plot). In addition, by reading and analyzing sections of work by such exemplary novelists as Sherman Alexie, Angie Thomas, Lois Lowry, and Kwame Alexander, students learn to read like writers and to develop their own voices. Students are expected to have completed approximately 40 polished pages and a working synopsis of their novel by the end of the course.