Discover the best way to tell your story
Choices only you can make, for a story only you can tell.
You have a character and a situation. Maybe you even have pages, like an opening you love.
But what about that wandering middle? Or the draft whose pieces just aren’t quite coming together?
The Story Atlas: Novel Structure is a self-paced course that helps you shape an idea or draft into a usable story map. You’ll identify the conflict at the heart of your story, choose the events that increase its pressure, work through one pivotal scene, and find a beginning and ending that belong to this particular novel.
By the end, you’ll have a concise plan for your story—and three practical next steps for drafting or revision.
What you’ll discover
Across nine short video lessons and a workbook, you’ll make decisions about:
Your protagonist’s goal, central conflict, stakes, and story question
The major events and choices that move the story forward
How causes and consequences propel one pivotal scene
Where your story begins, how it ends, and what changes between those moments
What to write or revise next
The course is designed for writers with a novel idea, a partial or stalled draft, or a draft in revision. A character and a situation are enough to begin!
Writers of narrative nonfiction can also use the structural exercises, though the lessons do not teach the conventions of any particular genre.
Choose the level of support that’s right for you
The Foundations Atlas includes the nine lessons, workbook, story-map template, and a completed example. You can work through the course at your own pace.
The Pro Atlas includes everything in Foundations, plus worked examples using my writing, a video in which I explain my structural choices and revisions, and an optional bank of prompts for common story problems. The examples discuss major plot developments; you do not need to read the novel to use the course.
The VIP Atlas includes everything in Pro, plus a personal, one- to two-page feedback letter on your finished story map. This is one submission and one letter; it does not include a manuscript read, line edits, a revised submission, or follow-up critique. Full submission instructions and timing will be available before enrollment.VIP places will be limited.
There are no live classes or personal critiques in Foundations or Pro. The course will help you make informed structural decisions; it does not promise a finished novel. That part’s up to you!
Learn with Rachel
I’m Rachel Kapelke-Dale, the author of The Ballerinas, The Ingenue, and The Fortune Seller, published by St. Martin’s Press and translated into multiple languages. I’ve taught writing at Hugo House and the American University of Paris, among other places. I studied creative writing at Brown University under Meredith Steinbach, Brian Evenson, and Jenny Nichols, and the teaching of writing under Rhoda Flaxman.
I’ve built The Story Atlas: Novel Structure around my own practices. It’s inspired by a conviction I bring to both writing and teaching: a strong structure emerges from the pressures and possibilities of your own story.
Find out when the course opens!
The Story Atlas: Novel Structure is in development for early 2027. Join the writing-course list for occasional craft guidance, course news, and the enrollment announcement. You can also indicate which course level interests you. Don’t worry—your answer helps me plan, but does not reserve a place or commit you to a purchase.
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