The Gilliam Writers Group is not in the business of peddling overly abstract advice – the kind unqualified professionals use as a smokescreen for missing knowledge. Instead, we're committed to providing actionable, practical feedback that helps every client become a better writer, no matter their training or goals. 

To this end, we believe that a creative writing coach should offer not only technical support, but a collaborative, participatory learning experience, to each person they work with. The interactive, growth-oriented nature of this service is what distinguishes writing coaching from editing; while editing is (primarily) asynchronous, coaching calls for real-time human connection. While editing is product-focused, coaching attends equally to the writer, their product, and their process of production.

Accordingly, GWG’s fiction coaches take a hands-on approach to our clients’ writing. Meeting on Zoom and Google Docs simultaneously allows us to engage with written text in a uniquely tactile and organic way; using shared digital documents, we can shift seamlessly between dialogue and demonstration, idea and experiment, critique and revision. The virtual environment introduces an unprecedented level of immediacy into the workshopping process, enabling us to intervene in a client’s output at nearly the speed of thought. 

Practically speaking, this means our creative writing coaches can mark up your work with you live on video, demystifying editorial techniques. It means we can observe your writing process in real time and provide actionable pointers on technique. It means we can instantly demonstrate the skills we want you to learn — all without the awkwardness of peering over each other’s shoulders or passing notebooks back and forth.

If you’re still feeling uncertain (or excited!) about the logistics of one-on-one fiction writing classes online, we invite you to schedule a consultation call. A representative from our company’s leadership team will be happy to answer any questions you may have.

Whether you want to learn to write a novel or you’re looking for short story writing help, we hope you’ll consider building a long-term creative partnership with your GWG fiction writing coach. Why? Because the longer you work with a writing coach, the more impactful their insight becomes. A coach’s most valuable assets – nuanced interpersonal awareness, an intuitive grasp of clients’ evolving skill sets, and deep familiarity with their work – just aren’t available off-the-shelf. 

These layers of comprehension take time to emerge, relying as they do on data from months and even years of regular meetings. As time passes and the client-coach relationship deepens, this data becomes understanding, and informs our work as creative writing coaches in countless beneficial ways. We rely on the long process of trial and error to gain perspective on which interventions lead to the greatest improvements in a given client’s writing, for example, or which strategies most consistently mitigate their writer’s block. The more thoroughly we know our clients as individuals, the more precisely and impactfully we can apply our expertise to their writing.

Many of our senior faculty members have met with the same clients weekly for years; in fact, several of GWG’s very first customers are still active in our community today. Long-term collaboration is a core value of the Gilliam Writers Group, foundational to both the sustainability of our business and the quality of our services.

Gilliam Writers Group coaches are highly trained writers, expert editors, and passionate teachers of the art and science of fiction. Scroll through our Faculty page and you’ll see graduate degrees in writing and literature from the country’s top MFA and PhD programs; years of professional experience in the publishing industry, media, and education; and strong track records of literary publication. 

Writing by our faculty and emeritus faculty appears in top publications including Granta, The Southern Review, The New York Times, Tin House, Vice, A Public Space, AGNI, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Al Jazeera, Michigan Quarterly Review, The Sun, The Cincinnati Review, American Poetry Review, The Common, Los Angeles Review of Books, Ploughshares, and more.

Before hiring an online fiction writing coach through the Gilliam Writers Group, we invite you to request a writing sample from their portfolio. That way, you can experience for yourself the exceptional combination of talent and training our team has to offer.

Even for practiced authors, the prospect of writing a novel can be as daunting as it is inspiring. For beginners, such a long-term goal can seem completely out of reach. Technical inexperience, excessive self-criticism, trouble with habit formation, reliance on procrastination, short-term thinking – these are just a few of the many (conquerable) obstacles that prevent capable writers from starting – and finishing – novel manuscripts. What a loss for the reading public! 

Luckily, the Gilliam Writers Group has a solution – one we’ve seen succeed time and time again. Our faculty has supported countless creative writers, from hobbyists to full-time professionals, and we have found that no matter a client’s training or experience, regular meetings with a novel writing coach can significantly ease the process of planning, drafting, and editing a book.

Make of these meetings what you will. Some clients seek structured, linear guidance as they piece together their manuscript; their coaching sessions might resemble a series of online novel writing classes, weekly tutorials in which they learn and practice the fundamentals of craft. Other clients prefer a more open-ended format, approaching each meeting not as a formal “novel writing class” but an editorial scrum, a back-and-forth critique in which client and coach pursue new ideas organically. If you want the structure of a custom novel writing class online, your coach will consult with you on the course’s aims, trajectory, and focus areas. If you’re more interested in workshop-style feedback or developmental editing for your manuscript (delivered in regular weekly or bi-weekly meetings), our fiction coaches can provide that as well.

You do not need a full manuscript, or part of a draft, or even a basic plot outline, to work with a novel writing coach. All you need is the desire to write a novel and a willingness to engage in the coaching process.

Please note that writing coaching takes place live on Zoom and Google Docs. Though most of our work is virtual, the Gilliam Writers Group may also offer novel writing classes near you – especially if you live in New York City. To discuss options for a private novel writing class in NYC, please contact us. For more information on our asynchronous editing services, see our Editing page.

The short story, though in some ways less intimidating than the novel, is a deceptively difficult form to master; many prolific authors have struggled to thrive within its confines. Nonetheless, every creative writer will benefit from learning how to turn a lack of space to their advantage. Guidance from a professional story writing helper can make this abstract goal concrete.

As storytellers, our capacity for digression, for verbosity, is both a priceless asset and a limiting compulsion. Learning to channel this gift more effectively, but in fewer words, requires ingenuity, self-awareness, and artistic subtlety. Most of all, it requires practice – when it comes to creative writing, theory won’t get you far. If you’re looking for hands-on story writing help of any kind, whether lessons in the basics of craft, professional editorial feedback, or anything in between, then we’re the firm for you. 

That’s because GWG’s fiction coaches are highly experienced not only in supporting other writers, but in writing short stories of their own; our team members have published short fiction in many of the most distinguished literary journals in the US and beyond, as well as in several major collections and anthologies – more every year. Our faculty’s extensive writing experience makes them uniquely insightful editors, mentors, and collaborators; each of our writing coaches is also an expert storytelling coach, as sensitive to the more organic elements of pacing, plot, and entertainment value as they are to the technical details of clients’ work. 

Ready to learn the ropes of short story writing? Eager to improve your latest draft? Let’s sit down for a conversation. No matter your level of experience, we’d love to discuss how our storytelling coaching and short story writing coaching service can benefit you. Just fill out the contact form below to book a no-cost, fifteen-minute consultation call with someone on the Gilliam Writers Group leadership team.

Browse our Publications page, and you’ll discover that many a creative writing coach on our faculty has dabbled in flash fiction and microfiction – two literary forms whose rising popularity has, in recent years, inspired countless writers to take up their pens. For the still-uninitiated, a definition of terms may be useful here: while “flash fiction” refers to stories of roughly one thousand words or less, “microfiction” refers to even shorter works of around one hundred or (more rarely) two hundred words. 

It’s easy to interpret the popularity of these forms as yet another manifestation of consumer culture’s “faster, easier” mindset – hardly an encouraging thought. But closer consideration leaves room for other, more auspicious readings of brevity’s growing appeal in literature. In some ways, ultra-short story writing seems like an attempt to bring fiction closer to poetry.

Rather than leading to sloppier, more quickly produced work, the flash fiction and microfiction craze actually seems to be pushing writers to slow down, encouraging us to prioritize quality at a microscopic level by applying rigorous scrutiny to each sentence and word on a page. Such a deliberate pace would impede someone writing a novel, or even a standard-length short story. But the constraints of flash fiction and microfiction – extreme by comparison – actually free the writer to produce less and think more. 

Like poets, the authors of ultra-short fiction may choose to approach the writing process as an exercise in contemplation. They might allow themselves to pause more, to lose momentum. They might spend hours playing with syntax and structure, exploring the associations between form, content, and emotional resonance. In other words, they might forget the forest for the trees – at least, more readily than they could if they were writing a longer piece. While our online novel writing classes tend to incorporate strategies for increased output, our virtual flash fiction and microfiction courses prioritize close readings.

For a skilled fiction writing coach, the opportunity to support clients in such detail-oriented work can be deeply fulfilling. At the Gilliam Writers Group, we find just as much value in a trek through the proverbial “weeds” as we do in the climb toward a more holistic bird’s-eye view. If you’re interested in speaking with a representative from our leadership team to discuss one-on-one microfiction classes, flash fiction classes, or how an online storytelling coach can transform your writing practice, please click here or fill out the contact form below. Though most of our services occur online, feel free to inquire about the possibility of setting up fiction writing classes near you – particularly if you’re based in NYC.

The Gilliam Writers Group faculty has experience in every type of fiction. Whatever your preferred genre, at least one creative writing coach on our team has either written it themselves or supported an author who has. Don’t be shy with your inquiries. We read, write, and teach it all: literary fiction, speculative fiction (including fantasy, science fiction, and horror), magical realism, historical fiction, young adult and middle grade, action and adventure, thriller, romance, mystery, family saga, autofiction, and more.

To connect with a creative writing coach on the Gilliam Writers Group faculty, we invite you to first schedule a free, 15-minute consultation call with a representative from our company’s leadership team. 

During this phone call, we’ll guide you through a series of standardized questions about your background, experience, and goals, taking detailed notes on your responses. These notes will form the basis of your client brief – an internal document central to GWG’s client-coach matching process. After answering any lingering questions, your representative will conclude the call and email you two important documents. 

First, you’ll receive our new client onboarding brochure, a PDF containing useful resources including a list of best practices, contact information for everyone on our leadership team, and the link to a feedback form you can submit at any point during your work with the Gillam Writers Group. Second, you will receive a link to our service agreement (fillable online). We co-sign this form with all new clients to establish clear terms of engagement and, above all, to protect your interests – for example, to legally bind ourselves to nondisclosure. You can later dissolve this agreement at any time, for any reason, with just 24 hours’ notice.

Within 24 hours of your consultation call, your newly assigned writing coach will reach out via email and text to schedule your first session. 

At this point, they’ll already have a clear sense of your background, needs, and preferred meeting schedule; it is our policy to always read a new client’s brief before making contact. This mitigates redundancy in GWG’s onboarding process; as you establish communication with your fiction coach, you won’t need to rehash the basics of your interest in online novel writing classes, for example, or the personality profile of your ideal short story writing helper. Your coach will already be in the loop.

Our online writing coaching sessions take place on Zoom and Google Docs, and emphasize guided, real-time practice combined with immediate feedback.

The structure of your first session will depend largely on your particular needs and the discernment of your coach; there is no standard formula, though most such meetings are necessarily focused on gathering information, assessing the client’s writing and goals, and developing a plan of action. After your first session, we suggest that you and your coach agree on a regular weekly or biweekly (once every two weeks) meeting time and stick to it. Over the years, we have found that consistent weekly or biweekly sessions generate the clearest improvements in our clients’ writing and writing processes. 

The Gilliam Writers Group is primarily an online company; however, if you’re interested in setting up in-person fiction writing classes near you, please contact us. In certain cases, we may be able to offer a short story or novel writing class in NYC, where many of our coaches live.

If you find that you and your writing coach aren’t a match, or you decide to work with other GWG faculty in the future, our leadership team can support you in choosing another fiction writing coach.

Before matching you with another faculty member, we will usually suggest that you first tell your writing coach as clearly as possible what you believe is missing in your work together. Open, honest dialogue is essential to the service we offer; all GWG coaches have strong interpersonal skills, but none of us can read minds.

If clear communication does not yield the hoped-for results, or you no longer want to work with your writing coach for any reason, just let our leadership team know. We’ll initiate a new, more streamlined client-coach matching process, supplementing your original client brief (the one created during your initial consultation call) with updated information to reflect both your progress and the reasons you are pausing work with your previous coach.