Writing Non-fiction

Learn to write like a non-fiction pro.

The Author Academy non-fiction course is a live, six-week programme for writers who have an idea, outline, or first draft, and need clear, practical guidance to shape it for manuscript review.

This course focuses on commercial non-fiction genres, helping authors turn their ideas into solid book proposals.

This course accepts 15 students per cohort.

What you’ll get:

Six sessions with tutor Liz Marvin. Read below

Two roundtable sessions with HarperCollins authors

Access to 13 Masterclasses featuring HarperCollins colleagues in key business functions and industry professionals. Click here for a Masterclass overview.

Two one-hour sessions with a HarperCollins mentor (on completion of course)

You’ll learn how to:

Structure your narrative

Adapt and incorporate your research

Keep your reader interested and engaged

Each week combines live teaching with resource packs and straightforward exercises you can apply in your own time. In the final two weeks, you’ll join round-table sessions with HarperCollins authors, asking questions and hearing directly about their writing and publishing journeys.

Your tutor:

Liz Marvin

Non-fiction Tutor

Liz Marvin is an editor with over twelve years of experience in nonfiction. She spent eight years as an editor at Penguin Random House, where she worked with authors such as Caitlin Moran, Danny Wallace and Rick Stein.

Since going freelance, she has edited books by a wide variety of authors, including Fearne Cotton, Claudia Winkleman, the Secret Barrister, James O’Brien, Alexandra Wilson, Reggie Yates, and Stacey Dooley. Her publishing clients include HarperCollins, Orion, Simon and Schuster, Bloomsbury, Bonnier and Pan Macmillan, among others.

Liz specializes in structural and project editing, helping authors to shape their stories and communicate effectively with their audience. She particularly enjoys working with first-time authors, guiding them through the publishing process, giving editorial feedback, and generally assisting them to make their book the very best it can be.

She has written several books and curated quotation collections, mainly within the gift and humour genre, on topics as various as Virginia Woolf, CBD oil, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. She always enjoys the wide variety of subjects that her job brings her way!