Instructor: Len Leatherwood
Maximum Enrollment: 15
Class Term: 09/07/2026 - 09/28/2026
Tuition/Fees
SCN Member: $125
Non-Member: $140
This course is the first in the nine-month Art and Craft of Storytelling series, but it also stands on its own as a complete month-long course. We begin with purpose, reader, and story promise because these foundational choices shape every element that follows. When writers understand why they are telling a story, whom they hope to reach, and what they are asking readers to trust them to deliver, they gain a clearer guide for making decisions about character, scene, structure, voice, and revision.
Class synopsis
Why are you telling this story, whom are you telling it for, and what are you promising your reader? During this four-week course, writers will identify the deeper purpose of a current project and examine how voice, tone, point of view, genre, and opening choices shape a reader’s expectations. Open to writers of fiction, memoir, essays, and flash.Class description
Every successful piece of writing begins with an implicit agreement between writer and reader. From the opening lines, readers begin forming expectations: Whose story is this? What kind of journey am I being invited to take? What emotional or narrative question will keep me reading?
During this month, students will explore both sides of that agreement. We will begin with the writer’s purpose—the personal urgency, emotional question, or deeper concern beneath the subject matter. We will then turn to the reader’s experience and consider how an opening establishes a story promise through voice, tone, point of view, genre, character, and conflict.
Class goals
By the end of the month, students will be able to:
Distinguish between a story’s surface subject and its deeper purpose.
Identify the intended reader and the experience the writer hopes to create.
Recognize the narrative, emotional, and thematic promises made by an opening.
Evaluate how voice, tone, point of view, and genre shape reader expectations.
Identify questions and tensions that encourage a reader to continue.
Determine whether the remainder of a work fulfills the promise of its opening.
Revise an opening so it more accurately reflects the story that follows.
Class communication method
The course includes two prerecorded instructional videos with handouts and writing exercises, along with two live, 90-minute Zoom sessions. The first Zoom meeting will focus on discussion and guided practice. The second will serve as a salon in which students may share work, receive supportive feedback, and learn from one another’s examples. Course materials, announcements, Zoom links, and instructions will be provided electronically. Students will need reliable internet access and the ability to view videos, download materials, and participate in Zoom meetings.Class outline
Week One: Why This Story?
Video One explores purpose, urgency, and the intended reader. Students will consider why this story matters to them now, distinguish subject from deeper purpose, and identify what they hope readers will feel, understand, or question.
Week Two: Guided Practice and Discussion
In our first live Zoom session, students will apply the concepts from Video One to their own work through guided exercises and group discussion.
Week Three: The Story Promise
Video Two examines the agreement an opening makes with the reader. Students will consider how voice, tone, point of view, genre, character, and conflict create expectations—and how those expectations can be sustained and fulfilled.
Week Four: Salon and Supportive Feedback
During our final Zoom session, students may share an opening or short excerpt and receive feedback focused on purpose, reader expectations, and story promise.
Class time commitment
Students should plan to spend approximately five to seven hours over the course of the month: Two 90-minute live Zoom sessions Two prerecorded instructional videos Time to read the handouts and complete the exercises Optional time to revise and prepare a short excerpt for the salon Students may work at their own pace between meetings. The exercises can be applied to a new idea, a work in progress, or a completed draft in need of revision.Instructor bio
Len Leatherwood, the Program Coordinator for SCN’s Online Classes program, has been teaching writing privately to students in California for the past 26 years. She is a nationally recognized writing coach and award-winning author. Len has published work in flash fiction and nonfiction and has been nominated for two Pushcart Prizes. Her novel, Hope in a Time of Dying, won the American Fiction Award in the LGBTQ+ category. Her blog, 20 Minutes a Day, can be found at lenleatherwood.com.
