So you want to write a book
Turn your idea into a finished first draft, one clear step at a time.
A year-long writing programme for aspiring authors who are ready to stop planning, stop restarting, and finally WRITE IT.
This is the year that you get that book written.
Writing a book asks you to keep hundreds of ideas in your head at once.
Characters. Plot. Structure. Theme. Dialogue. Pace.
It's a lot.
One of the reasons so many writers stall isn't because they've run out of ideas. It's because they've reached a point where they can't see the whole book anymore.
Write It helps you zoom in.
Each month has one focus. One section of the manuscript. One set of storytelling questions to solve.
You don't need to think about Chapter Twenty when you're writing Chapter Three.
You just need to know what you're writing next.
Inside Write It, writing your book feels like this:
You sit down knowing exactly which chapter you're working on.
You stop rewriting the opening because the rest of the book is beginning to exist.
You learn story structure while you're applying it to your own manuscript.
You keep writing, even when life gets busy, because picking the thread back up is easy.
You have other writers to celebrate with, brainstorm with, and occasionally ask, "Does this chapter make any sense?"
Your manuscript grows chapter by chapter until one day you're holding a complete first draft.
Write It exists to take the book out of your head, your notebooks, and your ever-growing drafts folder, and put it onto the page.
WELCOME TO
WRITE IT
Learn how books are built, then build your own.
One of the reasons I teach this programme over the course of a year is because books take time.
Not just to write.
To think about.
Some of your best ideas will arrive while you're at your desk. Others will appear halfway through a dog walk, in the supermarket, or just as you're trying to fall asleep.
Stories carry on working when we're not looking at them.
That's why every module is intended to take around a month.
You'll learn one part of the craft, apply it to your manuscript, solve the problems that naturally arise, then move on to the next stage of the book.
There's no rush.
But there is momentum.
By this time next year, you'll have a completed first draft.
Throughout the year you'll receive:
A new writing module every month
Each module focuses on the next stage of your manuscript, so you're always learning the craft that's most useful for the pages you're writing.
Companion workbooks
Every exercise is designed to develop your own manuscript, giving you space to plan, explore ideas, and make decisions as your story takes shape.
Monthly craft masterclasses
Once a month we'll take one aspect of storytelling apart and look at how it really works, from dialogue and tension to scene construction and character.
A clear path from beginning to end
The programme follows the journey of writing a book, from the first foundations through to completing your draft and understanding what comes next, whether that's editing, querying, or publishing.A private community
Share ideas, celebrate milestones, ask questions, and spend the year alongside writers who understand exactly what it's like to wrestle with a manuscript.
Monthly writing challenges
A little accountability goes a surprisingly long way. Complete the monthly challenge and you'll be entered into a draw to win a 60-minute mentoring session with me.Lifetime access to the lessons
Move through the programme at your own pace, revisit modules whenever you need them. Because I hope this won't be your last book.
The result?
Every lesson leaves its mark on your manuscript.
By the final module, you'll have a completed first draft, a deeper understanding of storycraft, and a writing process you can return to every time a new idea arrives.
Write at your own pace.
I spent a long time wondering whether this should be a cohort.
Then I remembered what life is like.
Books are written around jobs, children, holidays, deadlines, illnesses, and the occasional week where nothing creative seems to happen at all.
So Write It gives you a framework without demanding that life stands still.
If one month takes six weeks, that's fine.
If you fly through three modules in a season of uninterrupted writing, that's fine too.
The programme will be waiting exactly where you left it.
And if you'd like to experience Write It as part of a live cohort in the future, you'll have the opportunity to upgrade without starting again.
Meet Your Guide
Write It is taught by Dr. Shelly Sayer Lorts: cultural historian, writing teacher, storytelling scholar, and professional writer.
Shelly has spent more than fifteen years teaching people how stories work, from university classrooms to private book coaching.
Her work focuses on structure, character, rhetoric, mythology, and the strange alchemy that turns an interesting idea into a story a reader wants to follow.
Inside Write It, she teaches you the craft in plain language, then helps you put it to work on your own book.
This is what you'll get inside Write It:
✔ A complete plan for your book
✔ A first draft written from opening to resolution
✔ A clear understanding of story structure
✔ A repeatable scene-writing method
✔ Greater confidence in your decisions
✔ A practical route through the middle
✔ A roadmap for editing and publishing next
This is the support, structure, and guidance that most writers never realise they need until they have it.
Your year, chapter by chapter
Here's how we'll move from blank page to finished manuscript together.
Module 1: Plan It
Before we write a single chapter, we'll build the architecture of your story. You'll develop your premise, characters, structure, themes, turning points, narrator, point of view, and complete story blueprint, so you know where you're going before you begin the journey.
Module 2: The Ordinary World
Write your opening chapters, establish your protagonist, introduce the world they'll leave behind, and quietly plant the details that will pay off much later.
Module 3: The Call to Adventure
Write the event that changes everything. You'll introduce the central conflict, deepen your characters, and begin pulling your reader towards the journey ahead.
Module 4: Crossing the Threshold
Leave the familiar behind. Learn how to build scenes with purpose, momentum, and tension as your story reaches the point of no return.Module 5: Mapping the Middle
The middle doesn't have to be the place where manuscripts go to die. We'll turn your blueprint into a practical scene-by-scene map so you always know what comes next.
Module 6: Writing the Middle
Build the first half of your middle with confidence, weaving together character development, subplots, conflict, and momentum without losing sight of the story you're telling.Module 7: Finishing the Middle
Raise the stakes, strengthen your antagonist, and guide your story towards the turning point that launches the final act.Module 8: The Everything-Is-Awful Sequence
Every great story reaches a moment when everything appears lost. You'll write your Hero's darkest hour before setting the stage for the final confrontation.Module 9: The Hinge and the Ordeal
This is the chapter your entire book has been building towards. You'll write your climax, bring your central conflict to its conclusion, and deliver the transformation your story has promised from the beginning.Module 10: Resolution
Bring every thread together. Craft an ending that feels inevitable, satisfying, and true to the story you've spent months building.BONUS
Module 11: What Comes Next
Finishing the draft is only the beginning. This bonus module walks you through developmental editing, rewrites, querying agents, publishing options, and what professional authors do after typing "The End."
Learning the craft changes everything
The first draft is only the beginning.
The real transformation comes from understanding why a scene works, how stories hold together, and what to do when something on the page doesn't feel right.
Those are skills you'll carry into every book you write.
Testimonials
⭐
"It has been brilliant working with Shelly. Thank you. Really, it's been—it sounds dramatic to say—life changing, because this has really helped me find my confidence and find my feet. I wouldn't have a book without you."
⭐
“I feel as if Dr. Shelly has taken me gently by the shoulders and said—calm down, it doesn’t need to be this stressful, and you can actually enjoy this process—and I have!”
⭐
“Working with Shelly made everything click. I’m really on track now.”
⭐
“Dr. Shelly’s tutorials are fabulous. She is extremely knowledgeable, her methodology is clearly explained in a really fun and interesting way, and she presents new ideas really well; even if you’re a beginner, you’ll understand what you’re doing in no time at all.”
⭐
“I wouldn’t have gotten this far without Shelly. Her feedback and reassurance that I’m on the right track made everything easier. She turned my half‑formed manuscript into a clear structure—my book has completely transformed.”
Write It (Self-Study)
Pay in full
£1,997
Eleven structured modules (with lifetime access)
Forty-four core lessons
Guided workbooks
Monthly craft masterclasses
Complete Plan It blueprint process
Full Draft It pathway
Bonus module on editing, rewrites, proposals, and querying
Pay in instalments
£350 x 6
Eleven structured modules (with lifetime access)
Forty-four core lessons
Guided workbooks
Monthly craft masterclasses
Complete Plan It blueprint process
Full Draft It pathway
Bonus module on editing, rewrites, proposals, and querying
This is your call to adventure
Make this the year you actually write your book.
Write It
is your turning point.
Every published author began exactly where you are now. With an idea, an empty page, and the decision to begin.
The first chapter is waiting.
We'll help you find the second, the third, and every chapter after that.
