Faber & Faber

Course begins on Monday 8 February 2010

Faber and Faber Ltd.
Bloomsbury House
74-77 Great Russell Street
London WC1B 3DA

Price: £1,750

This new four-month course from the Faber Academy is designed for new and apprentice fiction writers seeking inspiration and guidance. Playful and experimental, serious and fun, it poses questions which all novelists and short story writers ask:

How does a story begin?
How do you develop and shape an idea? 
What does it mean to write about what you know? 
What makes a character get up and walk off the page?

The course has a lively, writerly atmosphere, and exercises in the first half are designed to dispel anxieties and encourage imagination, spontaneity and free expression. In the second half we talk about technique. As Jeanette Winterson has said, ‘there are millions of readers who are not writers, but there are no writers who are not readers.’ With this in mind, we look at examples of strong fiction, and learn how to read like a writer. What is being done here? How is it done? Workshop exercises focus on plotting and point of view; developing character, shaping scenes; giving texture through imagery, atmosphere and sense of place; on pace, tension and contrast. 

By the end of the course you should be beginning to find your voice: the material and style which belong to you; and you should have amassed 5,000 words of fiction: one or two short stories, or a chapter from a novel.

There are 30 places available (two groups of 15 students).

Course Programme


All classes will take place at the Faber offices:

Faber and Faber Ltd.
Bloomsbury House
74-77 Great Russell Street
London WC1B 3DA

The course consists of 16 two-hour evening sessions and 2 full-day sessions. All evening sessions will take place on Mondays from 7pm-9pm. Full-day sessions will take place on Saturdays from 10.00am-5.00pm.

Please note: There is an Easter break between sessions 8 and 9.

The subject matter of sessions as listed below is a guide only. The exact course content will be finalized according to the experience and interests of the group and guest speaker availability. The detail of the course content is at the discretion of the Course Directors and the Faber Academy.

Course Outline

Course Directors

Marcel Theroux is the author of four novels, Far North, A Blow to the Heart, A Stranger in the Earth, and The Paperchase, winner of the 2002 Somerset Maugham Award. His most recent novel, Far North, has been shortlisted for the prestigious National Book Award in America. He lives in London.

Sue Gee is a novelist and short story writer who ran the MA Writing Programme at Middlesex University from 2000-08. The Hours of the Night won the 1995 Romantic Novel of the Year Award and attracted wide critical acclaim. The Mysteries of Glass was longlisted for the 2005 Orange Prize for Fiction; Reading in Bed was a Daily Mail Book Club Selection in 2007. She was a Royal Literary Fund Fellow at University College, London in 2008 and is currently working on a collection of short stories.  

How to Book

Contact Patrick on either patrickk@faber.co.uk or tel. +44 (0) 20 7927 3822.

Alternatively write to:

Patrick Keogh
Faber and Faber Ltd
Bloomsbury House
74-77 Great Russell St
London WC1B 3DA

Those wishing to book will be asked to pay a non-refundable deposit towards the course fees of £500 on registration. The balance of the course fee, a further £1,250, will be payable in 2 further installments of £625 on 6th March, and 6th May 2010 respectively. No refunds will be given to students who miss sessions or drop out of the course once the deposit has been paid.

The subject matter of course sessions is subject to change due to the level of experience and interests of the group and availability of guest speakers.