Jeffery Archer on Writing

On Friday I attended a very entertaining lunch with this prolific author. He really is an amazing story-teller and the talk was unexpectedly funny. He spoke about his writing journey and the trials and tribulations of becoming a successful writer. He started off his talk by saying that 1 in 1000 books submitted to publishers is accepted, and 1 in 1000 books published becomes bestsellers. He reaffirmed what I am rapidly learning - that writing is not for sissies!

I was quite impressed with his rigorous work schedule – he takes 50 days to write a book. He goes off to his house in Majorca (no telephones and no television) and writes: up at 05h00 writes from 06h00-08h00, 10h00-12h00, 14h00-16h00 and 18h00-20h00. In the breaks he takes two one-hour walks to clear his head and to allow the plot and characters to develop, and for exercise. He is in bed by 22h00 and up again at 05h00 the next morning.

A question from the floor was about the effect of technology on his sales. The percentage of sales of his books for Kindle has been increasing slowly and steadily, and the expectation now is that 50% of sales of his latest book will be electronic. In the 1970s, to promote his second book he went on a 17 city/21 day tour around the US, appearing on television shows and doing book signings. Now, he says, no one wants to see him. He has a blog, as well as a Face Book page and a Twitter account to keep his readers happy.

He urged those interested in writing to write about what they know, not what is in fashion. He said Jane Austen wrote about what she knew, viz. life in a small village. Her first book was about a woman trying to marry off her four daughters, the second about a woman marrying off her three daughters, in the third there were two daughters, and the last one was about a woman desperate to get married!