HFC One-on-One Mentorship
& Group Coaching Program
Want to write your first historical novel or need help with a current one?
HFC is now offering mentorship programs with two top best-selling authors!
Rebecca Pickens
GROUP COACHING
From Dream to Manuscript: Personalized four-month group coaching sessions from Developmental Editor Rebecca Pickens.
$350 PER MONTH - 4 months (with option to extend)
I believe that words matter and that stories can change the world. I am passionately committed to supporting fiction and nonfiction writers build sustainable writing practices that enable them to write bravely, boldly, and beautifully with maximum efficiency and success.
With over fifteen years experience teaching and editing, as well as professional success writing my own fiction, I’m privileged to work with new writers, seasoned storytellers, and all the folks in between. Whether you’ve got a new idea that’s percolating, or you’re confronting writers’ block, cruising through revisions, or ready to pitch to agents, I have tools and techniques to help.
Dr. Wendy J. Dunn
ONE-ON-ONE MENTORING
From Dream to Manuscript: Personalized mentoring sessions from
award-winning author & editor, Dr. Wendy J. Dunn
$2057 for ONE-ON-ONE MENTORING SESSIONS
Wendy will read and assess the novel in its entirety, then meet with the mentee via Zoom, initially for 1-2 hours, to discuss the winner’s inspiration and goals, and to identify ‘roadblocks’ requiring Wendy’s assistance. She will provide in-depth feedback on plot, characterisation, pacing, dialogue, world building and effective use of research. Recordings of the Zoom sessions will provided together with Wendy’s comments and notes.
Three further 1-hour sessions, followed by a final 1-2 hour session, will then be arranged to track progress and provide encouragement and support. Wendy will also proofread the manuscript and provide a light edit and comments on the way forward.
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Dr Wendy J Dunn is an award-winning Australian author, playwright and poet. She is the author of two Anne Boleyn novels: Dear Heart, How Like You This?, The Light in the Labyrinth (2023 HFC Silver Award winner), her first young adult novel, and two Katherine of Aragon novels, Falling Pomegranate Seeds: The Duty of Daughters and Falling Pomegranate Seeds: All Manner of Things (2022 HFC Gold winner). Her first major nonfiction work, Henry VIII’s True Daughter: Catherine Carey, a Tudor Life, was published by Pen & Sword books in 2023. They have now commissioned Wendy to write a second nonfiction work.
A respected and longtime member of the Tudor writing community, Wendy was the Founding Editor of Backstory and Other Terrain, two academic writing journals belonging to Swinburne University. She is a sessional tutor for the university’s Writing Department. Wendy still manages Other Terrain (https://www.otherterrainjournal.com.au/).
Wendy is fascinated by Tudor history – so much so she was not surprised to discover a family connection to the Tudors, not long after the publication of her first Anne Boleyn novel, which narrated the Anne Boleyn story through the eyes of Sir Thomas Wyatt, the elder. Her family tree reveals the intriguing fact that one of her ancestral families – possibly over three generations – had purchased land from both the Boleyn and Wyatt families to build up their own holdings. It seems very likely Wendy’s ancestors knew the Wyatts and Boleyns personally.
Endorsements
I was lucky enough to win the Historical Novel Society – Australasia’s first Elisabeth Corbett Mentorship Program (December 2020). The prize was access to the wonderful mind and talent of Dr Wendy Dunn. Wendy was a wonderful mentor, and the experience was so positive for me.
Wendy is enthusiastic, respectful, and extremely knowledgeable. She has a special knack of making a mentee feel important and capable. Although she has enormous wisdom and vast experience writing historical fiction, her talent for gently guiding the writing process is extremely helpful and proved to be exactly what I needed.
As I am wont to do, I got stuck and frustrated at the end of Act 2 of my YA historical novel manuscript. Wendy patiently and sagely pinpointed the things I was doing that were contributing to my stuckness, namely a career-long habit of pushing myself and my art too hard for too long. Using her considerable experience and incredible empathy, she was able to help me not only get unstuck but also find better balance in my creative life. She gave me permission to pause, step back, and recharge—a valuable lesson that I will take forward in my writing life. Upon finishing the mentorship, her feedback on my manuscript was encouraging, thought-provoking, and useful.
I highly recommend Wendy as a writing mentor. I consider myself incredibly blessed to have tapped into such a kind and learned soul. She is the epitome of knowledgeable, empathic guidance.
Ali Stegert, author of Her Majesty’s League of Remarkable Young Ladies.
