Support, guidance, accountability and community for new writers

Fiction Academy is an end-to-end programme to help you get a novel into the world. It is ideal for new writers and those who have written short fiction.

Long-form fiction writing – typically novels – requires particular knowledge and skills. You also need support, guidance, accountability and a community that wants you to succeed.

You also need honest feedback so you know when you’re ready to publish. Then comes the challenge of publishing – cover design, manuscript formatting… and the tech side, such as adding categories to KDP.

I have teamed up with Authors & Co., a fabulous partnership publisher. We would like to offer you Fiction Academy to take care of all those needs.

First, you will learn all the essentials of writing a novel through a full digital course. How to write a scene, character creation, plotting, narrative perspective and voice are some of the lessons you will get to grips with. This will give you confidence and a whole range of lightbulb moments to help you begin creating your novel.

Then, you receive twelve months’ membership in my Storytellers Elite group. This is a supportive community based on hivemind learning and support, including monthly group sessions and one-to-one sessions, writing challenges, feedback and writing sprint sessions, all with the aim of keeping you focused on making progress with your project.

You’re stuck in the middle of your novel?

You’ve written the beginning (Act One) and you’ve got at least an idea of how the novel will end, but the middle is all wobbly? Perhaps your novel outline for the middle just says, “Stuff happens.”

You start writing the beginning of the middle, trying to plough through. A few chapters or scenes in, you run out of things to say. You create events that you hope are exciting or dangerous just to fill pages before you can start writing the climax. You invent a new character to keep things going. Sound familiar?

One of two scenarios takes place. Either you get it done or you don’t.

Character Goals 

The way out of this cycle of unfinished novels – or manuscripts you can’t sell – is to focus on the goals of your characters. In particular, make sure you know the goals of your Lead and your Opposition. Or Protagonist and Antagonist, if you prefer. Identify exactly what your Lead wants to achieve by the end of the book. Also identify exactly what your Opposition wants to achieve by the end of the book. 

Here’s the key… make sure your Lead’s goal in the story is the exact opposite of your Opposition’s goal. There’s a reason the Opposition is called Opposition. When you tie your Lead and Opposition in such a way that one of them has to win and the other has to lose, that drives your story.

The middle of your novel is all about your Lead trying to achieve their goal. At every turn, your Opposition has to try to thwart that in order to achieve their goal. 

So consider exactly what your Lead wants to achieve. Make it difficult for them. Make the Opposition be the reason it is difficult. A novel’s middle is about the power play between the two. It moves in logical steps, like a dance. Then the climax is the point at which they meet – the showdown – and one of them wins while the other loses.

Scene Goals

Your characters’ goals for the whole story helps you plan out the story in big picture terms. Getting through every scene means you need to consider scene goals. A scene goal is what a character wants to achieve in that specific scene. Identify exactly what it is they want. Make sure it is related to their character goal – it’s a single step in the dance. Then they either achieve that scene goal or they don’t.

By breaking the middle of your novel down into single scenes, and viewing them as steps towards the big showdown rather than ‘stuff’ that happens in order to fill pages, you can keep your motivation and sense of purpose high. 

Escape that cycle of half-finished manuscripts. Focus on goals.

What is a Writing Sprint?

Writing sprints are all the rage with writers and authors. It doesn’t matter whether you write fiction or non-fiction. They work whatever genre or sub-genre you write. 

A writing sprint is a closely focused period of time spent writing. Some writers do twenty-minute sprints. Others prefer half an hour or forty minutes. Most authors find that their words start running dry after this time period, but some keep going for an hour. There’s no right or wrong in this. Writers are human too (honestly!) and we are all different.

The benefit of writing in sprints is that it makes you get the words out. You know what happens to your writing time otherwise. You stare at the screen for ten minutes. Then you get up for a cup of tea. Then you decide to edit what you wrote yesterday (big mistake). You change three words. Then you change them back.

Or you decide you’re going to write the scene, produce twenty words, then go down a research rabbit hole about something. You spend an hour on websites searching for the perfect name for a character you’ve just invented.

You meant to get loads of writing done, didn’t you? You’ve got maybe another couple of hundred words to show for it. At this rate, you’ll be ninety before you complete this book.

How do I know this? Because I do it too. If I don’t sit down and set a timer, I’m done for.

How to do a Writing Sprint

Sprints are easy to do on your own. Decide what you’re writing and what you want to achieve (this fight scene between your Lead and Opposition; that arrival scene on the planet Norbling). Set a timer for a realistic period. Nothing fancy required – just your phone. Write for that period of time. When the time is up, check your progress against your goal. 

Maybe you’ve achieved your writing goal entirely. Maybe you managed half the scene. It doesn’t matter. Progress is progress. Let yourself feel good about it. Give yourself a reward or a break (that cup of tea; put the washing on if you care about such things). If your day allows it, come back and do another sprint, then another and another. It depends on your schedule/children/work/dog/mother-in-law and so on.

The Storytellers’ Academy

I keep this Facebook group quite small. It’s a space where writers feel safe to share their early drafts, to celebrate their wins, to get feedback (I run weekend challenges) and to be part of a supportive community of writers who care about writing.

Write a story that will make someone cry

Many writers wish they knew how to write a story that will make someone cry. They want to know how to make their readers feel such strong emotion that they sob while reading about fictional characters. Many such writers get part of the answer on their own: they understand that to make people cry they need to have characters in their stories who feel strong emotions themselves. However, they are often still missing a key part of the characterisation process. That key part is character resilience. 

Once you’ve created this character we admire, give them something to struggle with. Give them an event that’s really hard for them to cope with, because it challenges the thing they care most about. If they care most about their young family, threaten that family. If they care most about getting a promotion that they’ve worked for since forever, introduce a character who’s even better qualified.

OK. You’ve challenged your character and they’ve answered the challenge. What next? Your character now needs to encounter hardship and difficulties on their journey to solving the problem. Things have to be hard. You have to give them something that’s difficult to achieve. You also have to make the obstacles in their way tougher and tougher to overcome. Their emotions need to be stretched tighter and tighter as they start to crack under the pressure.
They might feel a great temptation to give up and let the bad guy get what he wants. They must sink into a pit of despair. And there must be a terrible loss. To make someone cry when they read your story, you must put your character through an event that is too much for anyone to realistically bear. But even that is not enough.

You must go a step beyond this. What will make your reader cry is not so much the fact that something awful has happened. What brings your reader to tears is your character’s reaction to this event. There will be the immediate despair, of course. But then he or she must show their true mettle. They must pick themselves up, look their defeat in the face, and face it anyway. They must be defiant and resilient even though it is surely impossible that they will overcome.

Again, The Hunger Games offers us a great example of defiance and resilience. Katniss loses a friend and ally. She initially despairs but then shows her true courage and is defiant in the face of the enemy.

It is the resilience of the human spirit that makes a reader cry, not the sight of a character crumbling.

Will your character finally overcome the obstacles to their happiness and snatch victory from the jaws of defeat?

Maybe. That’s up to you. You’re the writer. In a sad story with a tragic ending, certainly your character won’t. But they’ll go down fighting. The key to making your readers cry when they read your story is always your character’s resilience. 

How to Write a Book to Generate Leads

It seems that every business owner wants to know how to write a book to generate leads. They want to stand out from the crowd and attract more clients. Writing a book will position themselves as an expert in their industry.

It has been some years since self-publishing became possible for everyone. In the early days, it was easy to stand out from the crowd just by having a book with your name on it. But lots of people have jumped on the bandwagon and today people expect more. Everyone knows that it’s possible to publish just about anything you want on a platform like Amazon, get a swanky cover for it, and call yourself an author. People aren’t impressed any more.

To position yourself as an expert, you have to offer something better than the average self-published book. People have become immune to ‘average’.

How Do You Generate Leads With A Book?

Most of the business messages and new books people are being bombarded with are ignored. This is the way to write a book that gets through to people…

Write a book your audience finds useful.

That is what it boils down to. If you want people to change their habits, you must show them how. If you want them to work with you, you must show them that you can make a difference to their lives. If you want them to think of you as the expert in your field, you must share your expertise.

Your audience is savvy. They’re too savvy to want to work with you because you told them all about your life. They’re too wise to do what you tell them to do just because it worked for you… they’ll come up with a thousand reasons why they’re different from you. They’re too used to seeing new books published to believe that you must be the expert because you’ve got a book with your name on the cover.

The only way to make the time and effort of writing a book to build a brand, generate leads, etc. worthwhile, is to write the book your audience want to read. You can’t fool them into thinking you’re worth their time. You have to prove that you are worth their time.

If you want to write a book that makes a real difference to your audience’s perception of you… and you don’t want to stick any old thing up on Amazon… find out more.

How to create a huge following

Are you asking Google how you can self-publish a book to build your brand and make your audience fall in love with your message? Looking for the magic answer you’ve been searching for to create a huge following of loyal customers and super-fans? You’re asking the wrong first question.

It’s not a wrong question entirely. It’s just not the first question to ask.

Of course you want to attract more customers and position yourself as an expert. And a book is a great way to do that. It’s low cost to the reader and is incredibly shareable in its format. But going straight to asking ‘how do I publish a book?’ is not the place to start.

It’s a great question for a later part of the process. I can recommend a company that will publish your book for you, help you publicise it, design your cover – all the whistles and bells. Or you can do it yourself through a platform like Amazon. Different options suit different writers. But don’t START with the ‘how do I publish’ question.

Position yourself as the expert

Your customers expect the book you write to engage their attention, to be relevant to their needs and to give them the means to start solving their problem. When you show them you can give them that, then they will believe in you.

This means putting your ego to one side. It means not making yourself the hero of the book you write. Instead it means making your reader the hero instead. It means placing the focus on the kind of person you really want to help… your ideal client… and then going ahead and helping them.

When you actually help your ideal client in this way, that’s how you can end up achieving your own goals. Whether that’s positioning yourself as the expert, attracting more customers, growing your following. Or getting your message to resonate with people so they need to share it, you only get what YOU want by pleasing the people reading your book. You won’t achieve those goals by shouting about yourself and dazzling people into working with you. Although you can achieve them by being genuinely useful.

Thinking of writing and self-publishing a book to help, lead or coach others? I’m a writer. My coaching will help you write a book that’s good enough to make people believe in you, work with you, and spread your message on your behalf. 

How do you build your brand with a book?

Many branding experts recommend writing a book. Often, their top tip for building your brand is to write a book. Yes, it is a good idea to do this, for all the reasons they say it is. More specifically, it is a good idea to write a GOOD book. Let’s be honest, though… You know those gurus who tell you that the world is waiting to hear from you? The ones who say you just need to put your story out there and the world will love you, listen to you and be converted to your message? It’s as easy as that? They’re telling you what you want to hear.

What kind of book should you write to start your climb to the top?

If you haven’t reached the top of your industry yet, you’ll need to write a different kind of book. Sure, you’ve got something that can help other people. Of course you can lead others. But ask yourself this… would YOU go for help from someone who does nothing but talk about themselves? Most self-published books that claim to help, lead or inspire people are crap. Full of good intentions, of course. The writers have lived experience and wisdom to share. They set out to show their community the way to fix their problem, and they want to build their brand in an authentic, unique way. Total respect. But these new writers make a fundamental mistake. They write a book that doesn’t solve anyone’s problem. It might be a readable account of their own journey, put up a framework of principles to follow and give some sound advice, but few people who read it will be able to unpick all of that and make use of it. Even fewer readers will recommend it to others.

You need your writing to give people that feeling of having to share it with others. If it doesn’t, all your efforts to publicise and spread your message will go to waste. Your story can make a difference to others BUT you need to weave it into a greater story tapestry. A story in which you do NOT play the hero. Let your reader be the hero.

Let me say that again. You should NOT be the hero in your book. The hero should be the person you want to benefit from the book. 

Would you get up tomorrow and decide run a marathon?

You might decide you wanted to run a marathon, true. You might decide that you were going to start running this week and plan to build up to longer distances. You would probably reach out to your park run organisers and local groups. You would almost certainly ask those in the know how you should start and what equipment you should invest in.

You would NOT, however, dust off the trainers you’ve not worn in ten years, step out your front door and run twenty six miles.

Imagine how that conversation would go with a fitness coach…

“Hi! Let’s start with your fitness goals. What do you want to be able to do? Walk a mile? Walk up flights of stairs without getting breathless? Run 5k? …”

“I want to run a marathon.”

“OK, wow! Good on you. How long have you had marathon running as an ambition?”

“Years. I’ve always thought I’ve had a marathon in me. I’ve just never got around to starting.”

“And now you’re ready? Fantastic! Well, you’ve come to the right place. We’ll start with finding out what your fitness level is like and then work on building up your strength and stamina. If you look around the gym you’ll see there are different areas for different types of work – ”

“Oh, no, no! You don’t understand. I don’t want to do all those things.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“No, I don’t want to do those things. What I want to do is run a marathon.”

“Yee-ess. I understand that. What we are able to do here is train you from the place you’re at right now to a place of fitness and stamina that will mean you’re able to run that marathon.”

“Hmm, I see. But there must be another way of doing it. I mean, I’m not saying you don’t know your job or anything, but I learned how to put one foot in front of another when I was really young. Can’t you just show me how to do it – you know, how to get my breathing right and how to go at the right pace and all that – then I’ll just put my name down for the next marathon?”

“You’re kidding me, right? You know it doesn’t work like that, right?”

“Why not? That other gym, the one down the road, say they can do that. It’s on all their advertisements.”

“Is it?”

I have lost count of the number of people I’ve spoken to who have a novel or personal story in mind. They know exactly what it is about and feel they just need to ‘get it out’. I understand that feeling. Of course they want to produce the great work they feel so passionately about.

Then, all too often, I hear the words I dread. The words that mean the person in front of me with such a great story to tell simply isn’t ready to work with me. The words that mean they are going to have to go through the painful process of trying ‘quick fixes’ and falling for flattering words before they can see what’s actually going to work.

What they say is, “I just need someone to start me off and show me what bits to put where and I’ll be fine.”

I used to try to re-educate those people, to try to save them months or years of pain in which they try to write their story but still can’t get it to come out right. I wished they could have understood me when I told them about the need to learn to tell a story that is irresistible – it’s not just about getting the events of the story down on paper. The actual principles of doing that are not very complicated but they take training, just like running a marathon does. I have learned that they will just look at me with that, “Yeah, what do you know?” expression.

They often end up with their confidence crushed, convinced there must be something inferior about them because they can’t do it … it was supposed to be simple and straightforward, wasn’t it? It was just a case of ‘getting it out’. They’re not ready to hear the truth until they’ve learned from bitter experience, which makes me really sad. I wish there was more I could do about it. Horse to water, and all that.

These days I content myself with wishing them the best of luck and reassuring them that my door is open should they change their mind.

Are you writing stories that no one will ever read?

‘Sure, I’ll read your boring novel. The way you’ve told it is like wading through mud, your characters speak like robots and you’ve written lots of dull and pointless description, but I know you’ve spent time writing it and you think it’s fabulous so of course I will give up twenty hours of my life to make you feel good.’

… said no reader EVER.

I spend some of my social media time in support groups for writers and storytellers. I like to keep up with current issues, see what people are worrying about, and it is always possible to learn something new.

Some of the time, though, I end up shaking my head in disbelief. Recently I saw a thread started by a young writer who was worried that he was wasting his time. He was concerned particularly that he might be creating stories that nobody else would ever think were worth their time and effort to read.

Out of the shadows already had come fifty or more group members, almost all singing from the same song sheet…

‘Don’t worry about it, man. So long as you’re writing what YOU love, that’s the point.’

‘Just write from your heart and there will be people who resonate with your story.’

Stories that readers find irresistible

That poor guy was expressing his concern that he might not find an audience to read his stories. He was terrified that he would put them out there and get nothing but tumbleweed around them. He was writing because he wanted to have an impact on people and make a success of himself as an author, not so that he could tuck it away in a drawer or create a support group for a specific issue.

What he wanted was to make his stories irresistible. The reason he posted in that Facebook group that day was because he knew his stories WEREN’T irresistible.

Now I don’t know what was good or bad about his writing: he didn’t share any extracts in the thread. But he knew it could be better and he knew it was his job to make it better.

That guy looked to be in his early twenties. Many of the people offering him ‘advice’ must have been twice his age, at least. He didn’t know it, but he had wisdom that those ‘experienced voices’ simply didn’t have and probably never will have. Despite his lack of confidence, he had grasped the truth that no audience out there will ever read something just because its writer loves it. He could see that every person who chooses to read a story will do so because they can see something in it for THEM. What’s more, he could see that it is up to him to engage people in his stories.

Nobody owes him their time, effort or money to give him an audience. That goes for the rest of us too. It is the job of all of us to write stories that are irresistible.