Book Coaching for Women Over 40
WHAT’S UNDERNEATH MATTERS
Build on a Strong Foundation
You can only grow as high as your roots are deep.
Fiction
This program helps you hammer out the relationship between the causal trajectory of your novel (plot) + the characters’ emotional journeys (the story).
Understanding the link between external story and internal transformation is fundamental to creating a compelling story. Many writers mistake what happened (plot) for the story. But a string of events is not a story. A story doesn’t occur until the plot is connected to a character’s internal desires, challenges, and misbeliefs. That’s the why of a scene or chapter. An event, no matter how adventurous, is meaningless until it’s connected to a character’s heart.
Most of us are stronger in one area of storytelling over another. You might be great with plotting, but struggle with the internal arc—the why of the story. Or, you might be great with the inner workings of character, but struggle to connect the inner journey with an external one.
The novelist is holding many characters in her head, but only one is primary (even if you have multiple narrators). This program will help you feel confident that your primary story arc holds together both in the plot (the external world) and the character arc (the emotional, inner landscape). A story must have both.
The goal of this program is to help you both dream your story alive and create a structure for it.
What You Do:
Deadline 1: turn in your one-page book summary and 2-page outline
Deadline 2: revise your one-page book summary and 2-page outline
Deadline 3: expand your outline to 6 pages
Deadline 4: revise the outline a final time
What You Get:
written feedback after each deadline submission to help you deepen your story
a 60-minute phone or Zoom call at the end of the 4 deadlines to discuss next steps for your project
Approximate time frame: 6-8 weeks
Price: $1800*
*Can be paid in two installments of $900. First payment prior to beginning work and second payment after deadline 2.
Memoir
This program helps you clarify the relationship between the causal trajectory of your memoir (plot) + the characters’ emotional journeys (the story).
A memoir cannot rely only on what happened. The what must be connected to the why, and the memoirist must be willing to lift up the rocks of her life and look, with curiosity, not judgment, at what is lurking there.
In memoir, the protagonist is generally the author, but there is still a crafting that must happen. You are creating a character of you on the page. Say that three times fast! The memoirist must be willing to put ego aside and write into the dark. Readers will follow you when they trust you. The best way to build that trust is to craft a compelling narrative.Understanding the link between external story and internal transformation is fundamental to creating an engaging story.
Most of us are stronger in one area of storytelling over another. You might be great with plotting, but struggle with the internal arc—the why of the story. Or, you might be great with the inner workings of character, but struggle to connect the inner journey with an external one.
The goal of this program is to help you both dream your story alive and create a structure for it.
What You Do:
Deadline 1: turn in your one-page book summary and 2-page outline
Deadline 2: revise your one-page book summary and 2-page outline
Deadline 3: expand your outline to 6 pages
Deadline 4: revise the outline a final time
What You Get:
written feedback after each deadline submission to help you deepen your story
a 60-minute phone or Zoom call at the end of the 4 deadlines to discuss next steps for your project
Approximate time frame: 6-8 weeks
Price: $1800*
*Can be paid in two installments of $900. First payment prior to beginning work and second payment after deadline 2.
Trade Nonfiction
This program is for you if you’re working on a self-help, how-to or hybrid (nonfic + memoir, for example). A nonfiction book, just like a novel or memoir, must offer a compelling experience for the reader. Your job is to shape that journey so the reader can enter the world of your book and receive the gifts you’re offering through your information.
Focusing on a one-page book summary, cornerstone questions, and the table of contents, we’ll work together to craft an immersive adventure for the reader.
We’ll also examine your “why”, ensuring that you have a clear understanding of your own role in offering this book to the world and address potential internal and external stumbling blocks.
The goal of this program is to help you craft a compelling emotional experience for the reader while delivering a unique perspective on your subject matter.
What You Do:
Deadline 1: turn in your one-page book summary, cornerstone questions and draft table of contents
Deadline 2: revise all elements
Deadline 3: flesh out table of contents to 6 pages
Deadline 4: revise table of contents
What You Get:
written feedback after each deadline submission to help you focus your book so it reaches its ideal reader
a 60-minute phone or Zoom call at the end of 4 deadlines to discuss next steps for your project
Approximate time frame: 6-8 weeks
Price: $1800*
*Can be paid in two installments of $900. First payment prior to beginning work and second payment after deadline 2.
Go ahead! I’m ready!
Tell me a story!
These programs are based off of Author Accelerator founder Jennie Nash’s Blueprint for a Book foundation programs.
Check out this great post from my friend, Susan DeFreitas over on Jane Friedman’s blog about the importance of the inner struggle to a working story. (Truly, the plot is not the point!)
Susan is writing about novels, but the concept applies to memoir as well.
You must convince yourself that you are working in clay and not marble, on paper and not eternal bronze; let that first sentence be as stupid as it wishes. No one will rush out and print it as it stands. Just put it down; then another.
- Jacques Barzun
“If you want your writing potential to be tapped, go with Laraine! She helps you be more creative, observant and imaginative. She helps you discover and explore and asks questions to help you probe, not to criticize or judge.”
— Jian Qin
Not sure yet? No problem. Let’s spend a little bit of time together first.
Click below to sign up for RAISE YOUR VOICE! OWN YOUR STORY!
This FREE 5-day challenge will help you silence the voices in your head that have told you to stay small, to stay quiet, to know your place.
We’ve got to kick those voices to the curb so you can hear the whispering of your own voice, your own story.
Let’s make some noise!