Rob Parnell's Writing Academy Blog

Research is good - even for fiction.  These days it's often important to put your story in the real world, where real things happen in real locations. Readers can be fussy.  They'll go along with your story about a werewolf who falls in love with an advertising executive and whisks her off to a fairy castle in Patagonia - but if you screw up the bus timetable or mention plants that don't grow where you say they do, your dear readers will be all over you like a rash. Or like white on rice, as an old producer friend used to say! There's a fine line between veracity and invention. The thing is that if you get your real world facts right, you make your fiction more believable - this is something that modern thriller writers like James Patterson, Kathy Reichs and Lee Child know all too well. And not just facts about cities and roads - but also institutions and organizational structures like the CIA, FBI and police jurisdictions can become i...

Many people email me and ask if they need a college degree or a set of special qualifications to be a professional writer. The answer is a resounding NO! Writing is not like other ways of making a living, especially if you want to be freelance - that is, independent. Your education, while potentially a useful advantage, is not a prerequisite to success. In fact, I 've noticed that the more writing qualifications a person has - or aspires to get - the more difficult it seems for them to keep inspired enough to pursue a professional writing career. Which seems odd but not really... Writing is about creating, and loving the act of creation. Yes, it's about being a type of mini-god. It's about being continually inspired. And most times an inspired writer is a thousand times more compelling to read than any kind of formally educated writer. Have you ever noticed how dull a scientific or philosophical thesis can be? Have you thrown away a non-fiction book by a professor or a doct...

So - we made it to the end of the year.  I hope last year was all that you wanted - and needed - from your present life. We often think that the new year is a time to recycle all those old resolutions.  I think this can be a mistake.  Because we then send a message to our brains that goals and ambitions are to be confined to January - and forgotten when the year gets under way! The time to make resolutions is every day.  Just five minutes in the morning - say at nine o clock - spent making a short list of the things that are important to you - bearing in mind the long term, as well as the short, will pay huge dividends when it comes to reviewing your progress towards your dream life. Year's end is really only a time to ask: Am I living my dream life?  And if not, what can I do to make that happen by the end of next year? Usually any kind of success these days implies self promotion... Writers are often expected to self-promote, either thr...

It seems the longer time goes on, the more traditional publishers are shutting their doors to new authors.  Writers I speak to are getting their manuscripts back sooner and more frequently with those customary rejections these days, even if they've had publishing deals in the past. Anyhoo, where I live, South Australia has more than its fair share of successful writers - Sean Williams, who writes Star Wars novels, for one.  DM Cornish, whose Monster Blood Tattoo trilogy has a Hollywood option.  My wife, Robyn Opie, is the author of 85 internationally published books.  Janeen Brian is the proud author of 75 picture books, the list goes on. Wannabe professional writers should find this encouraging. Of course a lot more writers find success online these days, being independent and carving a niche as an authorpreneur. My subscribers often complain about how long it takes to gain some traction as an independent author. But don't forget it's never be...

I hope you're well and happy and that your writing is going well. Most of you will know by now that I send out a free newsletter every week - usually on Fridays. But I'm not sure everyone will know why. Fact is, I have a dream... I've always known I wanted to write. I actually started writing before I could read properly. I've kept a diary of my private - and not so private - thoughts since I was around five years old. I don't know why, but it always seemed logical and somehow important to record my insights in written form. I guess that's how most writers start out. Later, I wrote plays, short stories, movie scripts, even novels as projects that had to be fit around the rest of my life, working to pay the rent in whichever place I found myself. Mostly London, UK, as it turned out - where I submitted manuscripts and played music to earn a crust for almost two decades. Over that time, I read as many books about writing as I could find. I took cours...