How to apply

If you are interested in taking part in the Chapter and Verse mentoring scheme, please email Joe Sedgwick with the details outlined below, or fill in an application form to be contacted with more information.

You can now book a 15 minute ‘Discovery Call’ with Mentoring Co-ordinator Joe Sedgwick to find out more about the Classic and Premium schemes. /" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Click here to book your introductory chat to learn more.

“Yet again TLC have come up with a scheme that is both cutting-edge and a winner. Think of the mentoring scheme as a literary life support machine – so sign up and get creative.”

Simon Trewin, Literary Agent, United Agents

If you decide to go ahead with the TLC Mentoring programme, please follow the following steps:

1. Please fill in our Application Form.
2. Send us a sample of your writing, of up to 2,000 words, along with a covering letter.
3. TLC will then find you the most suitable mentor. We have extensive experience in creating the right match between writers and tutors, but if you would like to work with a particular TLC mentor, then you are welcome to make a suggestion.
4. Once we have confirmed a mentor with you, we will send you and your TLC mentor a contract, and ask for the full fee. Our fees include VAT which is applicable to all UK residents. If you are ordinarily resident outside of the UK, there is no VAT payable. This will be processed via a secure online bank transfer. Payment is required upfront, or in two instalments, with the second due on the date of your third mentoring submission.
5. Once we receive your payment, your mentor will introduce themselves to you via email to agree a mutually convenient schedule.
6. Please check our Terms and Conditions for additional information about the Chapter and Verse mentoring programme, or visit the FAQs page for more information on the process.

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What to expect?

Mentors will aim to respond to your submissions with their feedback within around two weeks (unless otherwise agreed by you). Many of our mentors will be happy to include up a 15 minute phone call at the beginning of the process as part of their tuition, but please be aware that mentors’ working practices vary. We will discuss your needs at the outset of the course with you.

“The value of the industry day for me was twofold. The event demystified and de-romanticised the publishing business to some extent. I also came away with some pithy advice and principles about approaching agents and publishers.”

Ben O’Toole

Once you have completed three or more sessions, you will be invited to attend a TLC industry day at the Free Word Centre in central London; these are held twice a year. The aim of the day is to give you further insight into the publishing industry and how to get published, and will include informative discussion with TLC, a literary agent, and an editor or publisher. You will also have the chance to meet other people on the mentoring scheme and learn from each other.

After you have completed your mentoring sessions, you submit your complete work for a professional TLC manuscript assessment. Your TLC reader will be different from your mentor, so you can benefit from two editorial views within the scheme. This is included in the fee. Your reader will be given feedback from your mentor prior to receiving your work, so that they have a sense of what you and your mentor have worked on together. However, it is important to realise that views of your editor may differ from those of your mentor. In our experience, the combined experience of having a mentor followed by a TLC editorial assessment will strengthen you as a writer.

For those exceptional cases when work is suitable for submission to an agent or publisher with a genuine chance of publication, TLC has established links with a range of leading literary agencies. We will not recommend agents or publishers if we do not consider the work ready to send out, but will, in our assessment, explain our reasoning behind decisions made.

“In 2016 I began writing a novel that I knew would be a challenge. I had completed an MA in Creative Writing some years earlier and was part of a writer’s critique group but for this I felt I needed something more intensive. I decided to try the TLC Chapter and Verse Mentoring Scheme. My mentor was well chosen. She was engaged with what I was doing and genuinely wanted to help. Our dialogue and bi-monthly reports helped me to figure out the structure of the novel, give the writing more power and the story more drama. The submission deadlines were exactly right for keeping the momentum going. At the end of the year I had six months to write another draft. Again the deadline helped me to keep focus. I was allocated someone who not only appreciated my writing and what I was trying to do, but also thought the subject matter was important and wrote very useful feedback about what I still needed to work on. I am more confident about my writing, which has greatly improved in the past two years. I will be submitting the manuscript to agents/publishers when it is complete. The mentoring scheme is extremely useful for writers who want assistance with their writing. It is well devised and led and as a writer I have felt respected and well thought about.”

Emma Cameron