First Impressions — The Power of Opening Pages: A Masterclass with Isle McElroy
Thursday, July 10 from 6–8PM ET (Online)
Need financial aid? Apply here first.
What makes a novel impossible to put down? How does a novelist create momentum from the opening page? In her essay, “That Crafty Feeling,” Zadie Smith posits “two breeds of novelist: The Macro Planner and the Micro Manager.” Defining herself as a Micro Manager, Smith details her success rewriting the opening 20 pages of her novel On Beauty before drafting the rest of the book. She chisels sentences, changes perspective and tense, and shifts setting, all in the service of creating the appropriate tone for her novel. After perfecting the first 20 pages, she concludes, the rest of the book was written over the course of five months.
In this this craft seminar, students will study opening passages from authors like Gabe Habash, Raven Leilani, Sarah Thankam Mathews, Imogen Binnie, Charles Yu, and others to learn how novel beginnings convey the arc of the book to follow. As readers, we will focus on tone, setting, characterization, and plot to get a sense of what the writer has done to draw the reader into the world of the novel. Topics covered will include world-building, character development, shifting points-of-view, nontraditional form, unreliable narration, and dialogue. The attention to both introductory and advanced craft elements will make this course suitable for writers at every level.
Class date and time: 2 hour masterclass on Thursday, July 10, from 6–8PM ET. Asynchronous option available.
Location: Online, via Zoom. All registrants will receive 30 days of access to the recording. The recording will be distributed after the event takes place.
Isle McElroy is the author of The Atmospherians and People Collide, named a best book of 2023 by Vulture, NPR, Them, and the New York Times Critics. Their essays appear in The New York Times, The Cut, The Atlantic, and elsewhere. In 2025, they will serve as a Shearing Fellow at the Black Mountain Institute. They currently teach in the MFA Program at Sarah Lawrence College.
Read our FAQ
Thursday, July 10 from 6–8PM ET (Online)
Need financial aid? Apply here first.
What makes a novel impossible to put down? How does a novelist create momentum from the opening page? In her essay, “That Crafty Feeling,” Zadie Smith posits “two breeds of novelist: The Macro Planner and the Micro Manager.” Defining herself as a Micro Manager, Smith details her success rewriting the opening 20 pages of her novel On Beauty before drafting the rest of the book. She chisels sentences, changes perspective and tense, and shifts setting, all in the service of creating the appropriate tone for her novel. After perfecting the first 20 pages, she concludes, the rest of the book was written over the course of five months.
In this this craft seminar, students will study opening passages from authors like Gabe Habash, Raven Leilani, Sarah Thankam Mathews, Imogen Binnie, Charles Yu, and others to learn how novel beginnings convey the arc of the book to follow. As readers, we will focus on tone, setting, characterization, and plot to get a sense of what the writer has done to draw the reader into the world of the novel. Topics covered will include world-building, character development, shifting points-of-view, nontraditional form, unreliable narration, and dialogue. The attention to both introductory and advanced craft elements will make this course suitable for writers at every level.
Class date and time: 2 hour masterclass on Thursday, July 10, from 6–8PM ET. Asynchronous option available.
Location: Online, via Zoom. All registrants will receive 30 days of access to the recording. The recording will be distributed after the event takes place.
Isle McElroy is the author of The Atmospherians and People Collide, named a best book of 2023 by Vulture, NPR, Them, and the New York Times Critics. Their essays appear in The New York Times, The Cut, The Atlantic, and elsewhere. In 2025, they will serve as a Shearing Fellow at the Black Mountain Institute. They currently teach in the MFA Program at Sarah Lawrence College.
Read our FAQ
Thursday, July 10 from 6–8PM ET (Online)
Need financial aid? Apply here first.
What makes a novel impossible to put down? How does a novelist create momentum from the opening page? In her essay, “That Crafty Feeling,” Zadie Smith posits “two breeds of novelist: The Macro Planner and the Micro Manager.” Defining herself as a Micro Manager, Smith details her success rewriting the opening 20 pages of her novel On Beauty before drafting the rest of the book. She chisels sentences, changes perspective and tense, and shifts setting, all in the service of creating the appropriate tone for her novel. After perfecting the first 20 pages, she concludes, the rest of the book was written over the course of five months.
In this this craft seminar, students will study opening passages from authors like Gabe Habash, Raven Leilani, Sarah Thankam Mathews, Imogen Binnie, Charles Yu, and others to learn how novel beginnings convey the arc of the book to follow. As readers, we will focus on tone, setting, characterization, and plot to get a sense of what the writer has done to draw the reader into the world of the novel. Topics covered will include world-building, character development, shifting points-of-view, nontraditional form, unreliable narration, and dialogue. The attention to both introductory and advanced craft elements will make this course suitable for writers at every level.
Class date and time: 2 hour masterclass on Thursday, July 10, from 6–8PM ET. Asynchronous option available.
Location: Online, via Zoom. All registrants will receive 30 days of access to the recording. The recording will be distributed after the event takes place.
Isle McElroy is the author of The Atmospherians and People Collide, named a best book of 2023 by Vulture, NPR, Them, and the New York Times Critics. Their essays appear in The New York Times, The Cut, The Atlantic, and elsewhere. In 2025, they will serve as a Shearing Fellow at the Black Mountain Institute. They currently teach in the MFA Program at Sarah Lawrence College.
