Writing Essentials: Crafting Stories for Young Adults

Over five weekly, two-hour sessions, participants will read, analyse, write and discuss how to apply the fundamentals of storytelling (character, plot, setting, point of view, voice and style) to stories for young adults, whether they’re set in a local school or a fantastical world. By the end of this course, participants will have a toolbox of readings, writing and ideas to set them on their way to developing a young adult story. After the completion of the course, participants will also have the opportunity to share up to 3,000 words of their work-in-progress as an optional extra with one of the course tutors for developmental feedback. Sessions will run on Wednesday 30 September, Wednesday 7 October, Wednesday 14 October, Wednesday 21 October and Wednesday 28 October. Course requirements: Pen and paper or a fully-charged device to participate in the writing exercises.

You Will Learn:

• Methods for developing realistic characters
• Approaches to creating an immersive, atmospheric setting
• Common approaches to structure on the levels of plot and scene
• Strategies for working with point-of-view, voice and sentence-level edits
• The relationship between character, theme and plot

About the Tutors:

Demet Divaroren was born in Adana, Turkey, and migrated to Australia with her family when she was six months old. She is the award-winning author of Living on Hope Street and the co-editor of CBCA shortlisted anthology Growing up Muslim in Australia. Her second young adult novel Blood Moon Bride was shortlisted for a 2025 Aurealis award. Demet’s stories explore multiculturalism, cross cultural relationships, racism, injustice, gender-based oppression and what it means to be human. Ange Crawford is a queer and neurodivergent writer, editor and PhD candidate in creative writing at RMIT. Her debut YA novel, How to Be Normal, won the inaugural Walker Books Manuscript Prize and was shortlisted for five further literary awards; her experimental spatial essays have also appeared in several anthologies.