This is not as good as the first course "The Craft of Plot". It's more about the lecturer, I think. The whole course is mostly with boring interviews and it's not well-structured, unlike the first course. The lecturer either reads the excerpts from the books or talks with non-famous novelists in interview settings. Plus, the assignment sometimes are not well-constructed, what it was talked about in the lesson and what was asked in the assignments sometimes don't relate to each other.

The content was good. The peer-reviews were disappointing; I received (-, asdasd's, and 123's) on a couple of my assignments. The descriptions for some of the assignments were convoluted and needed some polishing. The interviews did not feel as informative as the interviews in course 1 of the specialization (the craft of plot). Amy Bloom did good but maybe a couple more rehearsals for the course could have yielded a clearer delivery.

The instructors are fine......the review process is not. There is no input from an instructor and the reviews by persons in the course are very spotty: one or two are by people who know what they are doing, but a good number are not. In my last assignment, my review was total jibberish and I had spent many hours on the assignment.

I found the assignments very challenging to understand as there was very little clarity in the way they were written. Had to constantly reach out to mentors and forum discussions to actually understand what the instructor wanted.

Overall, I did not enjoy this course as much as I enjoyed the other three courses of this series.

The peer review is terrible. Many trolls and disinterested people. They didn`t engage, didn`t provide feedback and didn`t even make the slightest value judgment in peer-review.

It was quite simple but the tips are quite general. It is good for beginners. However, it was a good excersize and was fun in a way.

I didn't think there were many solid pointers...and not much that was original coming from the instructor herself.

The lessons do not seem to match the assignments. The instructions for the assignments are confusing.

I cannot submit the last assignment

The course is really nice, but there is a lot of reading other people's books out loud and conversations and not a lot of practical support. The most useful piece of advice I got was on Week 2 from one of the discussions boards, which was actually hard to find because the discussion board is flooded with people requesting their material be reviewed, which brings me to the next point - I don't this the random assignment algorithm used by Coursera is very efficient. Many times I had to wait for a while to get my assignments reviewed. Also, because this is peer graded, there are a lot of people who are not taking the course seriously enough and provide crappy feedback. For the price of $49 it should be a much better course.

I never received reviews.

bad

In this course, Amy Bloom teaches students the different ways of creating a character, whether by observing family members or friends or creating them from scratch—this course goes into detail on what it takes to craft convincing characters and understand them so that the reader is persuaded into believing their goals and actions. The course also goes focuses on the narrator's voice and the many different points of view that a writer can use (first person, third person omniscient, etc). This is a good entry level course for beginners who want to gain an understanding of character creation basics. The assignments were thought-provoking and really helped with putting into practice the concepts laid out by the videos. This Course is meant for writers that are just starting out by allowing them to develop setting, dialogue and actions for in-depth characterization of people in a story.

I am nearly 19 yeras old, I've been writing since I was 12 years old and maybe even when I was 10. I used to write something like poetry in school (of course it wasn't good). Anyway, the stories I used to write weren't that good, but I wrote the first novel when I was like 15/16 years, it was actually very good and then I started to write more and my writing was progrprogressing very well, and now I'm writing another novel and my writing is so good like I actualy can be happy about my talent, creativity. So I took this course while writing my current novel and this course helped me to open my eyes on a lot of things I didn't know and things I knew but I didin't know how to do it or I dididn't care about. So, thanks to this amazing course and thanks to the amazing instructors who teached this course. I'm planning to take the 5 courses, I'll start the 4th one soon.

--The videos were very interesting, especially the discussions with other writers.

-- The four exercises were worthwhile and challenging--perhaps too challenging for some of the participants, based on the pieces I read. Note that two hours isn't nearly long enough to do most of these exercises if the objective is to produce a piece that is both well thought through and well written.

--I found the peer reviews to be highly variable in quality.

-- Some textual material should be included in the course. We can always cut and paste the transcripts of the lectures--but why not provide easily accessible lecture notes? And there should also be instructional materials other then the lectures.

-- The questions asked of the peer reviewers are good ones. They would provide useful guidance in dealing with the assignment. Why not give them out along with the assignment?

Very concise and great tips and notes from Amy Bloom. The interviews and guests conversations helped as well. I had a bad experience with peer review and reported it, but had not heard what consequences were brought against him. The "wtf" added on peer reviews should not be tolerated and that student should not be accepted for a period. This is a learning environment to encourage learning a craft, developed thoughts and understanding. It is not a place for vulgar, rude and negative peer reviews, and coming from someone who also is taking a course to learn the craft or subject. I hope this student is ultimately been kicked out and not accepted for several courses, whether he is a paying student or otherwise, otherwise, the integrity of Coursera and Wesleyan U is not one I would want to associate with, nor do I want anyone else to.

Very interesting and informative course. I don't know why the craft of plot has more than 4000 reviews and the other modules have around 1500+ , but this module was as helpful as the previous one I've recently finished (I started with craft of plot). The manner of teaching is different, but you get used to it. Many interesting interviews with novelists and their point of view regarding characters. I hope the future courses would be as interesting as first 2. Looking forward to it! P.S. problem with reviews is the same. at least 1/2 reviews I received were like "yes / no" without any descriptions. This is sad considering the fact you'd like to hear some feedback. But if you are okay with it and came to the specialization for knowledge in the first place, the course and the whole specialization is for you :) good luck!

I loved this, giving me alternative ways to approach character descriptions. It broadens my approach to writing, opening me up to possibilities I didn't know existed. It also forced me to go past my comfort zone. I love the lectures by actual writers and teachers.

It is hard to be rated by your peers, even though they've been told to be kind and try to find the good things in your writing. But I believe in one of the modules one of the teachers describes the feeling well: what it is like to bare your soul and have someone criticize it. It is necessary in writing, if you want people to read what you write and enjoy it.

That is the challenge.

There were a lot of good ideas and tips presented that will help a writer to develop characters. These were presented in a logical way, both through direct lecture and interviews. The assignments were well constructed and helped to apply some of the concepts of the lectures. The assignments were challenging and thought provoking, but not too much. The interactions with peers were helpful and beneficial. My one criticism is I think she could have had more content. Compared to other Coursera courses, this one didn't have as much lecture material, and I think there was more she could have said and shared with us to give us even more tips.

Really enjoyed this particular module since, not only do I KNOW a lot of characters, I AM one. This course made me become more aware of mannerisms, cultural and behavioral differences and similarities, plus the results and implications of how these characters inter-mesh with one another. Politics and households mirror one another and I am NEVER without a notebook and pencils since beginning this module. Now almost everyone I see gets captured in the notebook. INCLUDING THE INSTRUCTORS ! They are truly interesting personalities and I enjoyed their Shoptalk segments a lot. It is a great program.

I have enjoyed this very thorough class. Although some of the assignment titles were misleading, the assignments overall were very good once I understood them. At first I did not like having to get feedback and give feedback on assignments, but as the course went on, I was able to see the value in this and understand why it was set up this way. By week 4, the observations of classmates not only resonated with my own about our writings but also enlightened some of the thoughts I hadn't yet put into words yet so I was able to articulate them and understand them better. Great course!!

First, the tasks were really challenging, but they were great. They provided me to think differently on various different points, which was very enjoyable. I loved Professor Amy Bloom's delivery of building a character and developing them, I finally started using my observation skills in expressing my thoughts and my characters. I also got confidence boost from her positive messages even in the lectures. I also liked the talks with other authors, which made me so glad that I can compare my thought process with some great authors. It was another plus for confidence.

Excellent course! I liked how Amy Bloom explained and really broke down the nitty-gritty of writing believable and memorable characters. I especially enjoyed the peer reviews on the assignments; I got very helpful feedback! It was also fun reading what others wrote, and the forums for asking questions. It was like a beautiful community of writers! On the whole, I enjoyed taking the course, learnt a lot (and my writing of characters has definitely improved) and I'm certainly going to take the full specializations of Wesleyan University's Creative Writing Courses!

I found this course very helpful as a step along the path to improving my writing. I really liked the course director Any Bloom, who has an engaging, calm manner and gave very useful insights into writing about character and creating characters that feel as if they have a life beyond the page. The course is well structured and the assignments well designed to help you to think about point of view and character and I found myself being able to develop a fictional character that I have had in my mind for a while. I really enjoyed the course, thank you very much.

The input from the published authors was great, for many reasons. But one of the things I appreciated most is that they weren't all the same. They gave a variety of perspectives that presented the fullness and freedom of writing. Each one had strong opinions and strategies, but since they were different from each other, we were set free to glean different flavors as they fit our own style. This is what sets good teaching apart - giving good solid options to choose from as we craft our characters and our own voice in presenting them.