Novel Boot Camp 2016 – Starts July 1st!
The third annual Novel Boot Camp will be held this July. It will include lectures, discussion questions, and writing workshops. This year, for the first time, lectures will be done in video format. To join Novel Boot Camp 2016, you can follow the blog or my YouTube channel.
Novel Boot Camp 2015
The second annual Novel Boot Camp was held in August 2015.
Novel Boot Camp 2014
Novel Boot Camp was a lecture series and online workshop held in July of 2014. The posts are listed below for your convenience.
The Lectures
Lesson #1: The First Page Promise
Lesson #2: Introducing the Main Character
Lesson #3: How to Avoid Info Dumping
Lesson #4: Writing Believable Dialogue
Lesson #5: Character Motivation
Lesson #6: Internal and External Conflicts
Lesson #7: Be Ruthless
Lesson #8: Writing Believable Antagonists
Lesson #9: The Saggy Middle
Lesson #10: The Character Arc
Lesson #11: Developing Your Voice
Lesson #12: Writing a Series
Lesson #13: Handling Romance
Lesson #14: Strengthening the Setting
Lesson #15: The Climax
Lesson #16: Nailing the Denouement
Lesson #17: Dialogue Tags
Lesson #18: Identifying Your Novel’s Genre
Lesson #19: How to Self-Edit
Workshops
The workshops are closed, however you are welcome to view and learn from the old posts.
Workshop 1: The Genre Guessing Game
Workshop 2: First Page Critique Session
Workshop 3: Help Me, Help Me!
Workshop 4: Ask the Editor
Workshop 5: Query Letter & Blurb Critique
Connect with Other Novel Boot Camp Participants
Even if you missed Novel Boot Camp, you are more than welcome to join us on Twitter or Facebook.
Donate to Novel Boot Camp
This free online course is one of the most ambitious things I’ve ever taken on. My goal is for the course to be a wild success so that it can be repeated (with new content!) year after year. If possible, your donation would help support the huge time investment of Novel Boot Camp. If you can’t afford a donation, I totally understand! Please consider sharing my posts and writing positive reviews on your blog.
Any showing of support (in the comments or through a donation) is so greatly appreciated! Thank you!
Ellen Brock 
Hi Ellen, Is there any way to access the earlier lectures? I got waylaid by some family 911s and wasn’t able to keep up. I’m trying to catch up now…
Hey Ellen,
My wholehearted gratitude for what you’ve been doing for all of us. After reading, watching, listening to a ton of materials on writing I can say with absolute certainty that you blog, videos and NOVEL BOOT CAMP are the single most relevant source there is.
Big ‘Thank you!’ and YOU ROCK!
I love reading selections and commenting, but boy, once I leave a comment and try to access the next story, it’s really hard to get back there. That may be one reason people quit commenting.
I’m sorry you’re having trouble with this. What would you suggest as an alternative?
I found my way around. I just got derailed here and there, and I am not a strong enough techie to give any suggestions. Sorry I mentioned it.
You’re amazing. Thank you so much for everything.
I am very excited to watch these videos. I found you on YouTube and watched all I could there. Your teaching is succinct and clear. Thank you for your contribution to my writing.
Never mind, I realized they are notes, I’m excited to read what you have to say. LOL
It maybe just me Ellen, but I find it very frustrating trying to navigate around your website, I’m forever finding myself in 2014 or having to go to your search or back to an email to find what I’m looking for. A simple index at the top of the homepage with links to the pages would be a big help.
Thanks for so much free advice.
In the sidebar on the blog page if you scroll down you can select the month from the drop-down menu. If you select July 2016, you will only see posts from this Novel Boot Camp unless you click on the recommended posts at the bottom or side.
This is my third year trying to make it through Novel Boot Camp. (My first year I took a new job the day it started and I found myself packing up my home and moving halfway across the country. The second year I was at said job in a remote location with no internet, so I would download the content and read or comment during the rare intervals where I had wifi.) I found the best way to follow along is to subscribe and get daily notifications for each lesson. I can simply click on the lesson title at the top of the email and go directly to the newest lecture. Even when I get a few days behind, the lessons are waiting in my inbox in chronological order.