R.L. Stine Masterclass Review
For my birthday this year, I asked my wife if I could take up a yearly subscription of the Masterclass service I had heard so much about. To my surprise, and delight, she was actually interested in it, too, which made the “yes” I got that much more forthcoming.
For those who aren’t familiar with it, Masterclass is a company that has surfaced in the last few years that goes out and finds the best of the best at their job, celebrities even, and works with those artists, athletes, and other professionals to take their craft and teach it via videos online. Its a prime example of the learning revolution that is going on right now.
Fair Amount of Content – Lots of Writing
The first thing I researched when I looked at Masterclass was how much, and how varied the content was. I basically asked, how much of my interests would Masterclass cover? I mean, the annual $190 subscription was nothing to scoff at.
I was actually surprised, in a good way. They’ve really beefed up the library in the last year or so. There were several guitar Masterclasses, which is the instrument so love that I have been toying around with for years, and a few other fringe interests I had (plus what my wife liked,) but the idea that there were hours and hours of writing and storytelling content across many genres really sold me.
The R.L. Stine Course
I had heard of R.L. Stine like I imagine most parents have. One day, my son came home with a Goosebumps book from his school’s library, and we had to have a conversation as to whether or not he was old enough to read horror novels, albeit for young readers. But that was about it.
As it goes with most celebrity meetings, the man, R.L. Stine, was nothing like I imagined. He was humorous, light hearted, and full of ideas and wisdom.
The format of R.L. Stine’s Masterclass was 28 videos and 4 PDF downloads as classroom (downloadable) resources, which consisted of a class workbook, a character worksheet, and an original vs revised outline as an example of his prose outline style, his major tool before starting each novel.
Suffice it to say that I started watching the R.L. Stine’s class and was sucked right in. The classes felt almost like watching a movie or documentary version of what I experienced when I listened to Stephen King’s, “On Writing” via Audible.
The master children’s horror writer went into his coming up story, and shared writing tips, and even read his own writing, and several letters that children had sent him over the years.
What can I say about the course? I found it pretty engrossing (no pun intended.) I started watching the videos on the app on my smart TV, and then found that I was streaming them in the car (only listening – eyes on the road, Swapp,) and on my phone while I was on the computer, and so on.
When it got to about bed time last night, I had finished. It went by really fast. Not to say that there wasn’t a lot of content, there was. It was just that I had been watching it all day without realizing it.
Recommendation
Do I recommend Masterclass? Absolutely! To think that I am going to get to go through another 10 or so of these writerly classes has me jazzed.
Is there anything earth shattering in the class? I wouldn’t say so. But that’s not the point. That’s like saying I wouldn’t take a class because I can, “google it.” Can you search for the info online? Sure, but that’s not the same as the sum of its parts. That is to say, the value in these classes is going to be that you hear it from the masters (hence the name, Masterclass.) The videos were great, but getting to know R.L. Stine, and his personality, and what it all means to him, and how he puts it together was the secret sauce. I’ll go back through the resources, as I’m sure I’ll benefit from them as I spend more time with them.
In short, I really enjoyed the R.L. Stine course. As a matter of fact, once I finished, I jumped right into the Neil Gaiman course on storytelling next, which already seems to be taking a different angle on writing, and I’m excited about that.
So, yes, if you can afford to take up a subscription, I think you’ll really enjoy it.
