Writing Your Way Into Your Novel
How to Find Your Path By Putting Words Down
Sometimes you want to write a novel and you don't know where to start. Should you create an outline or just sit down and start working on the first chapter? Do you need to write in consecutive order? What do you need to know about your characters and setting? What if you don't have a clue what's going to happen in the ending? How many words should you expect to write each day? How do you maintain enthusiasm for a project, and how do you know when you're staying on track versus when you're just spinning your wheels?
In this class, you will learn how to create and execute a plan that includes a schedule with goals and milestones in order to get yourself to the point where you're ready to show your book to beta readers.
Your Instructor
Cat Rambo is engaging, personable, and supportive, providing insight, encouragement, and inspiration to students who want to pursue writing and publishing speculative fiction. She has been teaching classes and workshops for over three decades at levels ranging from 5th/6th graders through college, graduate level, and continuing at institutions including the Johns Hopkins University, Indiana University, Bellevue College, Clarion West, the PNWA conference, and more.
Her credentials include a MA in writing from the Johns Hopkins Writing Seminars, where she studied with John Barth and the Clarion West Writers Workshop and the Clarion West workshop, where she studied with Octavia Butler, L. Timmel DuChamp, Andy Duncan, Gordon van Gelder, Michael Swanwick, and Connie Willis. She is a Nebula Award winner and has also been nominated for the Compton Crook Award for First Novel, as well as Endeavour and World Fantasy Awards. She is the former editor of Fantasy Magazine. Her own work includes over 200 short stories, several novels, a cookbook, a guidebook to Baltimore, and Creating an Online Presence for Writers. She is a two-term former President of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA). Her upcoming works include Exiles of Tabat from Wordfire Press (2020) and You Sexy Thing (Tor MacMillan, 2021).
She founded the Rambo Academy for Wayward Writers in 2009. Students have gone on to publish novels and amass award nominations and wins, including Hugo, Nebula, World Fantasy, and Eppie Awards. In the past decade, she’s assembled some of the most talented and inspiring writers and teachers working in the genre today, each speaking on their areas of expertise.