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If you are a writer, you know that writing your first book, or your 100th book is not a piece of cake.
There are hundreds of things to deal with – from finding the inspiration to start your book, to finding the right style for your book cover to marketing your book after publishing it.
Renowned writer James Patterson, in his MasterClass, teaches you how to overcome all of these issues, while also giving insights into his writing style and his experiences.
But with classes from so many other world-famous writers, is this MasterClass worth your time? Here is a detailed review before you make your decision.
Who is James Patterson?
James Patterson is a renowned author who had written 140 books so far, most of them being best sellers. His first publication was in 1976 when he wrote ‘The Thomas Berryman Number’. He also sold over 325 million copies of his books across the world.
In his MasterClass, he talks about how he was rejected by 31 publishers before he published his first book. Now, he has written some of the most famous books worldwide including ‘Along came a spider’, ‘The Quickie’, ‘1st to die’. 😉😉
His fast-paced writing has been admired by critics and fans across the world, and his endings are some of the most suspense that the readers get hooked on. He also spent most of his initial career time in advertising, and when he wrote his first bestseller, he became a full-time writer.
He also holds a Guinness record for having most books on the New York Times bestseller list, and he holds the record for becoming the first person that sold over a million ebooks.
He brings his years of experience to his MasterClass and talks about various stances in his life that make up to good lessons for the upcoming generations to learn from.
Course Overview
James Patterson’s classes are divided into 21 lessons that are pre-recorded video sessions, which adds up to over 3 hours of viewing material. Each class is just over 5 or 10 minutes, and the classes are further fragmented into smaller sections for the viewer to be on their toes while watching the class. 😊
In his class, Patterson teaches how to find your idea and inspiration, and how to get started with writing. He also talks about how to begin and end your story, and where your imagination should take you.
Apart from this, he also talks about complexities that follow after you finish writing – like editing, styling the cover, title, and how to make it in Hollywood. Patterson’s classes also come with added access to the Community Hub, where the students can interact with fellow authors and writers for collaborations.
There is also a 66-page workbook that can be downloaded that sums up everything that Patterson teaches in his class, and a PDF outline for his book, ‘Honeymoon’.
Lessons By James Patterson
Here is the course structure for Patterson’s MasterClass on Writing. There are 21 lessons apart from the introduction, that sum up to 3 hours 50 minutes of learning time.
- Introduction
- Passion + Habit
- Raw Ideas
- Plot
- Research
- Outlines: Part 1
- Outlines: Part 2
- Writer’s Block
- Creating Characters
- First Lines
- Writing Dialogue
- Building a Chapter
- Writing Suspense
- Ending the Book
- Editing
- Working with a Co-Author
- Getting Published
- Book Titles and Covers
- Marketing the Patterson Way
- Hollywood
- Personal Story
- Closing
What will you Learn in this MasterClass?
Patterson’s MasterClass is a full circle – from developing an idea to finishing the book, editing, styling, and finally marketing your book. In this class, you will learn how to develop the plot, how important research is, and how to go about with both of these things. 😍
You will also learn how to deal with writer’s block and find your passion for your book again. Patterson also talks in-depth about how to create your characters, and how to introduce them to your readers.
He teaches how to write their first lines, and how to build suspense around a character, while also speaking of how to make them naturally likable or unlikeable.
He teaches dialogue writing. In conclusion, you will learn how to write your dream book and deal with the negatives of writing your dream book, and how bring it to the public.
Pros and Cons
👍 Pros
Additional resources: Apart from the 21 lessons, Patterson’s MasterClass also comes with a 66 page PDF downloadable workbook, with assignments, writing calenders, embedded links, chapter reviews, note pages, and recommended readings. This provides the students to engage in the course a little bit better and tests their knowledge.
His approach to teaching: Patterson is funny, creative and a mastermind who makes the classes extremely engaging, as he speaks of real problems in a way that everybody can relate to. He brings his experiences to the table every time he talks about tackling issues while writing, and this keeps the viewers hooked onto their screens.
Learning how to end your book right: While most authors talk about building characters, and focusing on dialogues, Patterson is one of the only ones who talk about how to end a book right, that too by using examples from his books.
Office hours: Patterson also engages with his students on an interactive community called ‘Office hours’, where you can submit questions and expect a video or an audio answer.
👎 Cons
Spoilers: Patterson, in an attempt to teach his lessons from examples from most of his books, does give out spoilers for readers who are unfamiliar with his work. He admits this in his classes too, that you will lose the mystery of a book after listening to his class.
Not too much for beginners: While Patterson talks about basics when he begins the MasterClass, his class is mostly focused on advanced writers, as he talks about dialogues, editing, and how to market your book after the editing part. Beginners might find this hard to follow, as his fast-paced teaching style is focused on effective writing.
#4 Key Lessons for James Patterson MasterClass
Building characters
Patterson’s initial lessons are focused on building the characters for your story. The reader, he says, should not forget the characters as that is all they associate within your story.
In this class, he teaches how to give realistic traits to your character to make them natural, but also keep your protagonist and antagonist complex. He cites examples from his books and others to help you understand how to make characters interesting.
Research
James Patterson stresses many times how research is the most important way to seek inspiration to build your credibility and likeability for your characters.
He shows how the research will help you write about characters from the opposite sex, and uses many examples and case studies to prove that learning about a subject thoroughly only leads you to build the right story. 😚
He also explains how to get out of your writing comfort zone to build stronger research that will give depth to each of your characters.
Writer’s block
Patterson talks about writer’s block in a very short but crisp lesson, where he explains how to overcome this phenomenon, something that every author faces very often.
He says that taking a break, making the most out of your word count, setting deadlines, and taking productive time off can be some of the ways to overcome writer’s block. 😇
He takes himself as an example and gives an insight into his own life and his writing style to explain how he, as an author, compels to stay productive most of the time.
Editing
MasterClass Patterson teachers one of the most crucial things before that every writer struggles with. He explains that editing is not always a hassle it is just a process where you make your book even better than what you see while writing.
His advice is to break editing into little chunks by starting with just eliminating the parts that you do not like experience writing bestseller novels he says that understanding the reader is one of the most important things, and while editing you have to understand and edit your book in a way that the reader expects you too, but is also in a mystery till the book ends.
Final Verdict – Is this MasterClass for you?
The class is extremely fun, entreating, inspiring while also being very useful. If you are a writer who is looking for some guidance, or if you are in the process of deciding if you should write, this class is definitely for you.
FAQs 🤔
Patterson’s MasterClass can be accessed if you can buy a full access pass for $180, which includes his course, community hub, and a 66-page workbook. The pass will be cost annually, boiling down to $0.49 a day. With this subscription, you can take lessons from multiple experts throughout the year of your subscription – from cooking with Gordon Ramsay, fashion from Marc Jacobs, Space exploration from Neil DeGrasse Tyson, or Conservation from Jane Goodall.
Patterson’s MasterClass comes with a feature called ‘Office hours’, where the students can submit their questions to the writer themselves and get an answer. Some students also said they received critiques and suggestions on their writing styles.
Yes. Patterson’s class is for all levels of writers, and he imparts his wisdom as an easy vocabulary for everyone to follow. However, he spends very little time teaching the basics and jumps into the important, and advanced levels quickly.
On MasterClass, you can download your classes in video or audio mode, and can stream the classes anywhere, anytime. You can also download the PDF versions of the classes to brush up on the learnings.
No, MasterClass will not offer you a completion certificate if you finish Patterson’s course, or any other course on the platform. However, you will receive an email when you finish a course, that can be used in the same way as a certificate. In the email, you will also receive links to the workbooks.
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