Ken Follett, author of 'Never' - Multi-million selling writer talks about the pressure of success, keeping things simple, and the important outline

Writer's Routine

Dan Simpson

Arts, Hobbies, Books, Leisure

4.9 • 599 Ratings

🗓️ 26 November 2021

⏱️ 39 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

This week, Ken Follett shares his writer's routine. He's one of the UK's most successful authors, selling over 170 million books across 80 countries. He has a staff of over 20 working on all aspects of book selling, so he can concentrate on book writing.

We talk about whether that puts pressure on his writing, knowing he has staff relying on him for a salary. Also, what his writing routine of a year looks like, and why his outline is the most important thing he works on.

Ken's made a career publishing thick historical novels, 'The Pillars of the Earth' from the 'Kingsbridge' series sold bucket-loads, got him critical acclaim, and spawned a TV series. His new novel is 'Never', about events that could lead to WW3.

We talk about research, planning, sentences, keeping things simple and how he starts.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello, welcome along to a brand new episode of writers' routine.
0:11.8	This week, we're with Ken Follett, a hugely successful author.
0:17.7	Listen to this.
0:18.5	Sold over 178 million books across 80 countries. He usually writes historical
0:26.5	fiction, but he's back with the thriller. It's called Never. Now, we talk about the pressure of huge
0:31.7	success when you've got a team working for you and you're kind of writing for them as well, I guess.
0:37.3	Also, why his outline is crucial across three years of novel writing and why he doesn't want to be too mealy-mouthed about things.
0:45.3	Did I use a Latin or French type word like, say, malediction,
0:53.3	when I really should have used a good old-fashioned English word like say malediction when I really should have used a good old fashioned English word like
0:57.5	curse you know that's the kind of thing that occurs to me in in the rewrite when I'm re-keying stuff
1:04.5	I realized that I haven't haven't used the best possible words a sentence I see a way to make a sentence easier to understand.
1:15.3	I want my sentences to be understood instantly.
1:18.1	I never want, I never want people to read a sentence of mine twice.
1:22.3	There is more on the way with Ken Follett in this week's writer's routine.
1:31.6	I'm going to do. Follett in this week's Writers Routine. Yes. Hello, welcome to the show. It's Riter's Routine. We take a look inside the
1:35.5	working day of some of the world's most successful authors. And that's certainly true today.
1:41.0	My name's Dan Simpson. Thank you for finding us. Thank you for following, streaming,
1:44.6	coming back, downloading, however you've reached us. I appreciate you being there.
1:49.4	Now, what I love most about chatting to the authors I do over the last, what, 200 episodes or so,
1:56.7	and I hope you enjoy hearing this part of it. So it's the wide range of writers we have. Some are just starting out. Some have come to it late. Some nonfiction, some memoir, some kids books and some enormously massive. Today, it's one of those. Ken Follett has sold over 178 million books across 80 countries. He has a whole staff of
2:20.2	people working on everything else, or the contracts, or the legal side of things, or the publicity.
2:25.5	They do that so he can just focus on telling his story, on writing pretty much every day of the
	...

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