'A template for writing success'

 

“I needed to find my way to write. I need about six hours of uninterrupted time in order to produce about two hours of writing, and when I accepted that and found the way to do it, then I was able to write.” – Robert B. Parker

 

Born in Springfield, MA on this date in 1932, Parker intended to teach for a living.  And he was well into an English Lit career at Northeastern University (where he became a full professor) before switching to writing when his novels about a detective named “Spenser” hit the bestseller lists and then were made into a popular TV series.  Parker wrote 41 books about the private eye – his stories often credited with changing the style and face of the crime-writing genre.  

 

Beginning in 2005 Parker’s second best-known lawman, Jesse Stone, also made a book and TV splash.  The 9 books in his “Jesse Stone” series also sold hundreds of thousands of copies and became the focus of several made-for-TV shows starring Tom Selleck.

 

Parker - who died in 2010 - loved the Boston area (the setting for the "Spenser" books) and walked the streets, learned the vernacular of its various districts, and studied policing there.  It's a template for writing success, he said. Knowing your setting like the back of your hand.

“There can never be any substitute for your own palate nor any better education than tasting the wine yourself.”