Rob Parnell's Writing Academy Blog

  In today's world, every few minutes, someone asks the same question with a slightly different tone of desperation. “What makes writing viral?” They ask it the way medieval villagers might have asked, “What makes rain?” As though somewhere, hidden behind a king's paywall or guarded by monks in a candlelit library, there exists a single sacred formula. One incantation. One structural secret. One magical headline that, if uttered correctly, causes the internet to bow down and chant your name. The uncomfortable truth is that viral writing is less like rain and more like weather systems colliding. It is emotional pressure, timing, audience psychology, cultural context, platform mechanics, and a pinch of luck swirling together until something sparks. And by the time you try to reverse-engineer it, the storm has already moved on. But that doesn’t mean we can’t study it. We absolutely can. We just have to approach it with realism instead of superstition. First, let’s define what...

  Series fiction is one of the most reliable roads to writing success because it turns the lonely act of writing a single book into something far more powerful - a relationship. A standalone novel is a one night conversation. A series is an ongoing friendship. It’s the difference between a reader saying, “That was good,” and a reader saying, “Where’s the next one, and why isn’t it already on my Kindle?” And here’s the practical truth that makes series fiction so attractive, especially for wannabe writers: it gives you multiple chances to win. If Book 1 is only “pretty good,” Book 2 can be better. If Book 1 doesn’t find its people, Book 3 might. If the series starts quietly, it can still build momentum over time. A single book has one chance to take off. A series is a flywheel. It also helps you, the writer, for a reason nobody talks about enough. When you write a series, you stop reinventing the wheel. You’re not building a whole new world from scratch every time. You’re returni...

I’ve been online long enough to remember when the internet felt like a room. Not a marketplace. Not a casino. Not a billboard jungle humming with invisible machinery. An actual - busy - room. Back in 2002, I’d post something - an article, a thought, a rant, a lesson - and within hours my inbox would begin to fill. Real names. Real questions. Real disagreements. Readers arguing with me. Readers thanking me. Readers sending me long, rambling life stories because something I wrote hit a nerve. I needed staff, not to analyze traffic - but to answer real human beings. Now I look at my stats and it feels… kinda abstract. One article spikes hits into the thousands. Another barely twitches. There's no obvious pattern. No steady correlation between effort and response. No predictable feedback loop so that I can focus on what people need or want... And the emails? These days mostly silence. Sales - yes. But conversation? Sparse. So I start wondering what many long-time o...

  Every writer faces the same quiet moment. A blank page. A flicker of an idea. Perhaps a setting. Perhaps a situation. Perhaps just a mood. And then the real question rises. Who is this about? Inventing characters is not about assembling traits like parts in a kit. It is not about choosing hair color, profession, and a quirky habit. That might give you a silhouette, but it will not give you a person. A character becomes alive when they begin to want something, fear something, believe something - and when those internal forces start to shape their behavior. So where do characters come from? They come from observation first. From paying attention. The way someone hesitates before answering. The way someone laughs too loudly. The way someone avoids eye contact when a particular subject arises. Real people are inconsistent, contradictory, vulnerable, proud, tender, stubborn. Fictional characters must feel the same. But observation alone is not invention. It is raw material. The...

  Colleen Hoover is currently the bestselling author on the planet and yet you could walk straight past her in the supermarket without batting an eye. Maybe you just did - wouldn't that be weird? There is a strange fantasy that circulates in our culture - that success must be loud. That if you make it, really make it, you’ll need sunglasses indoors and security guards outside. That fame is a kind of permanent spotlight you can’t step out of. It’s nonsense, of course. But it’s seductive nonsense. Here’s the delicious truth nobody tells you - writing is one of the very few professions where you can have the rewards of success without surrendering your freedom. You can earn well. You can be respected. You can influence millions. And you can still walk to the shops in your scruffiest jumper without a single person turning their head. Writers get the credits, the cash, and the credibility - and they get to keep their anonymity. Look at Stephen King . One of the most successful novel...

There comes a moment in every writer’s life when the words stop. Not forever. Just long enough to make you doubt yourself. You sit down at the desk. You open the document. You stare at the blinking cursor like it owes you money. And suddenly the person who once had a thousand ideas can’t find a single sentence worth keeping. If that’s you right now, let me say this clearly - you’re not broken. You’re not untalented. You’re not finished. You’re just stuck. And stuck is temporary. Here are seven ways to get yourself moving again. 1. Lower the Bar Until It’s Embarrassing One of the biggest reasons writers stall is expectation. You want the next paragraph to be brilliant. You want the chapter to sing. You want to feel that rush you had when you first conceived the idea. So here’s your permission slip - write badly. Deliberately. Shamelessly. Awkwardly. Tell yourself you’re only allowed to write 200 terrible words. Not good words. Not publishable words. Just words. The magi...