Start Your Crime Novel in Five Days – 21 July 2025 Start Your Crime Novel in Five Days – 21 July 2025 Start Your Crime Novel in Five Days – 21 July 2025

Start Your Crime Novel in Five Days – 21 July 2025

Want to learn the art and craft of writing a murder mystery? Start writing your crime novel with expert guidance from novelist Margie Orford.

Level

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Starting out

What do these levels mean?

Location

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London

Length

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1-5 days
  • Start Date
  • Time
  • Monday–Friday, 10:00–16:00

Places available

£595

15 in stock

Quantity:

Dive into your crime story

How do you turn a story of crime or transgression into a gripping novel? In this intensive five-day course, acclaimed crime novelist Margie Orford will guide you through the key elements of crime fiction, from noir to cosy mysteries, as you begin plotting your own page-turner.

You will read and discuss extracts from a range of crime novels to learn the tricks of the trade from the leading writers of the genre. You’ll also have the chance to bring and discuss your own favourite works, while considering which writers you would like to keep as companions on your writing journey.

Along with close readings of exemplary texts, you’ll have dedicated time for writing – both quick free-writing vignettes and longer pieces where you can develop your ideas and characters. Each day will include time for reading (if you wish to share) and discussion on what makes good crime writing work. In addition, there will be individual tutorials with Margie who will offer expert advice on your work-in-progress.

By the end of this intensive week, you will leave the course with new technical skills, a deeper understanding of the craft, enough writing in your notebooks to map the way forward towards a novel and a plan for your next steps.

Is this the right course for me?

This course is designed for those who have always wanted to write a crime novel but have not known where to begin. It would equally suit those who have already started a crime novel but have got stuck and want to reignite their writing.

If you love crime fiction and have always wanted to write or complete your own novel, but need time, some new techniques and the support of other writers, then this course is the ideal starting point.

    This course takes place Monday to Friday at Faber's offices in Hatton Garden. Teaching time will run from 10:00 until 13:00 each day, followed by a break for lunch.

    The course will then continue between 14:00 and 16:00. Afternoons will be spent working on your writing in an open, supportive workshop environment, with time for both quiet work and workshops.

    Workshops will enable you to share your own emerging story with your tutor and the rest of the group, on a voluntary basis.

Course Programme

Session 1

Monday 21 July, 10:00–16:00

Genre and Story...

Session 2

Tuesday 22 July, 10:00–16:00

Plot and Character...

Session 3

Wednesday 23 July, 10:00–16:00

Writing Violence...

See remaining sessions

Course Programme

Start Your Crime Novel in Five Days

Session 1

Monday 21 July, 10:00–16:00

Genre and Story

An overview of the genre – cosies, noir, procedurals, the PI, the detective, the vigilante, the psychological thriller. Understanding and finding stories – crime vs sin, righteousness, revenge, justice – what is legal is not always what is right. Understanding realism, verisimilitude and fantasy. Sifting through the social codes that crime fiction brings into play – power, sexuality, gender, class and race, and how it works with them and can also subvert them.

Session 2

Tuesday 22 July, 10:00–16:00

Plot and Character

Plot is character and character is plot: finding yours – the investigators and the killers – serial or otherwise – and the victims means finding your story and how to tell it. Your hero or heroine, who will carry the book (and if you are a serial writer, make a series) will be the centre of the book. Making the reader care will be how you hook them, so growing and knowing your central characters, and their moral and immoral impulses, is central to the crime novel.

Session 3

Wednesday 23 July, 10:00–16:00

Writing Violence

The dead and the damaged are amongst us. They are also made the ultimate ‘other’ by the violence, so point of view and intention are key to writing this effectively and as you intended. The ethics and aesthetics of writing violence are complex but essential for your writing: what to do with the women and children, what to do with dead men?

These are questions that are resolved in the writing, in perspective and point of view. Affective violence and the creation of empathy are key to the story you tell – how to bring your (dead) victims back to life. Here the art of your storytelling is crucial – and we will focus on this – so that the representation of violence does what you, the author, intends it to do.

Session 4

Thursday 24 July, 10:00–16:00

Place, Setting, Science

Location is as vivid in gripping crime fiction as the characters are – how to make a world that is not your own? So is the detail and the minutiae of an investigation, so how to handle the science and the setting, forensics, autopsies procedures, cops, ballistics, DNA, mobile phone data – while keeping the story going. The writing – and the uncanny effect of some places, some spaces – are key to the atmospherics of the crime novel and to the creation of the believable world your reader wants. We will explore how to do this alongside how to unlock the intensity that science can create.

Session 5

Friday 25 July, 10:00–16:00

Structure and Pace

Get in late, leave early: crime fiction is all about the second act. So, on the final day, you’ll look at storyboarding, planning and flying by the seat of your writing pants, crescendos and climax and rhythm in order to keep you writing beyond the course.

You’ll also explore how to handle time, especially backstory (make it front story, says Elmore Leanard), make your readers care and create that sense of jeopardy that keeps the reader turning (and you writing) the pages until the end.

Tutors

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Margie Orford

Margie Orford is an internationally acclaimed writer. Her Clare Hart novels – a literary crime fiction series that explores violence...

More About This Tutor
Margie Orford

Margie's course was a rich and inspiring experience [...] it has renewed my sense of possibility and interest in my own writing.

There was definitely magic in Margie's words and in the spirit of our group.

Margie's course was a rich and inspiring experience.

Location

The Bindery

51 Hatton Garden

London EC1N 8HN

How to get here

Faber’s office, The Bindery, is well connected by public transport, with Farringdon Station just five minutes’ walk away, and stops for several bus routes in the area too. If you’re coming from outside of London, the office is a short bus or taxi journey from Kings Cross, Euston and St Pancras stations.

Browse the Reading Room

From author interviews and writing tips to creative writing exercises and reading lists, we've got everything you need to get started – and to keep going.

For more information, message us or call 0207 927 3827