Writing Historical Fiction Writing Historical Fiction Writing Historical Fiction

Writing Historical Fiction

Bring your historical fiction alive in this intensive twelve-week course with award-winning author Beth Underdown.

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Improving

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Online

Length

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12 weeks
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  • Flexible (see Course Schedule)

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Bring the past to life...

Find the skills and confidence to write your own historical fiction as we journey together into the strange land of the past. In this twelve-week course, we’ll look at the special techniques needed to develop historical plots, and to create characters who live and breathe for the reader. You’ll learn to confidently make choices about structure and narration; how to do research, and how to bring your research into your writing. With lots of practical advice and tools, you’ll learn everything you need to write and pitch a successful historical novel.

The course opens with a month of more intensive contact and community-building through Zoom sessions and a tutor meeting, including feedback on where you’re at with your writing now. In the second month, you’ll work more independently through the weekly themes, with time to take a deeper dive into your writing. The course wraps up with a final month of enhanced contact time, including a second chance for tutor feedback on your writing, as we come together to reflect on our progress. This course will not only give a big boost to your historical fiction writing, but leave you more confident to continue independently once the course is over.

Is this the right course for me?

This course is for anyone keen to get working on a piece of historical fiction. Perhaps you have an idea, but aren’t sure how to start working with it. Perhaps you’re stuck in the middle of a historical novel draft. Perhaps you don’t have a clear book idea yet, but just a strong interest in a particular time period or historical event. If any of these ring true, this course will be a good place for you.

You don't need to have taken any other courses, but you’ll get the most from the twelve weeks if you’ve tried some fiction writing already. For those with a story already in mind, the course is equally suited to those writing about real people/events and those writing a wholly invented story with a historical setting. By the end of the course, you’ll feel equipped and empowered to write onwards into your novel, and approach an agent with it when it’s finished.

    The course lasts for twelve weeks and each new session will open on a Monday.

    Alongside the four group Zoom meetings, you will meet your tutor for two additional 1-to-1 chats to discuss your ideas and a piece of the writing you'll work on during the course.

Course Programme

Session 1

Opens Monday 22 September 2025

Story & History, Week 1: Plot 1...

Session 2

Opens 29 September

Story & History, Week 1: Research ...

Session 3

Opens 6 October

Story & History, Week 1: Plot 2...

See remaining sessions

Course Programme

Writing Historical Fiction

Session 1

Opens Monday 22 September

Plot 1

Module 1: Story and History

We’ll begin by looking at how to find, refine and flesh out your historical fiction idea, and at the basic stuff of story – conflict and causation. We’ll discuss inciting incidents and ‘existing problems’, examining the tension that arises as readers ask ‘What will happen?’ or ‘How will this happen?’ and how these questions become particularly inflected in historical fiction as readers bring their existing expectations to the period or story.

Zoom session: Wednesday, 24 September 2025, 18:30–20:00 GMT

Session 2

Opens 29 September

Research 1

Module 1: Story and History

This week we’ll focus on how we go about developing our knowledge and understanding of the time and place we want to write about. We’ll look at putting together a research plan, and consider what it is we’re doing when we write historical fiction: the freedoms it gives us, and the ethical responsibilities it might bring too.

Session 3

Opens 6 October

Plot 2

Module 1: Story and History

Building on what we discussed in Plot 1, we’ll study fuller plot templates which we can use to map and develop our work, beginning to pay attention to how plots are formed in existing works of historical fiction – those with invented characters and those whose characters are based on real people.

Session 4

Opens 13 October

Research 2

Module 1: Story and History

Following on from Research 1, we’ll look more deeply now at research skills and methods for historical fiction, sharing our own practices and experience. We’ll then turn our attention to how research might become present in our prose, considering how to build a historical world which feels real and textured without overburdening the plot. Together, we’ll apply some of what we learned in Plot 1 and 2 to brief synopses from two or three writers in the group.

Zoom session: Wednesday 15 October 2025, 18:30–20:00 GMT

Session 5

Opens 20 October

Character

Module 2: Past Voices, Past Selves

Moving into the middle section of the course, which features weekly recorded lectures to absorb at your own pace, we’ll begin by focusing on character and motivation. We’ll look at how to create characters who feel real and full, with their own histories and psychologies, paying particular attention to the challenges of helping your reader to relate to the worldviews and lived realities of historical characters.

Session 6

Opens 27 October

Narration 1

Module 2: Past Voices, Past Selves

This week we’ll study first person narration in historical fiction. We’ll think about developing a historical voice for a first person narrator, and how to use these same skills to create well-differentiated voices within dialogue (so, this will still be relevant to all writers, even those firmly fixed on using a third person narrator).

Session 7

Opens 3 November

Narration 2

Module 2: Past Voices, Past Selves

Following on from last week, we’ll focus on third person narration. We’ll look at constructing an external, non-character narrator and the kinds of access this type of narrator can give the reader to a historical character’s experiences. We'll cover how what you include or omit from your narration can alter your reader’s feelings or understanding, and think about how these skills are useful for those writing in the first person, too.

Session 8

Opens 10 November

Unreliability

Module 2: Past Voices, Past Selves

As our time concentrating on character and narration draws to a close, we’ll look at unreliability in historical fiction – both unreliable first person narrators and unreliable point-of-view characters in third person narration. We’ll link our thinking back to what we understand about plot, and consider the special ways unreliability can be brought to bear in telling stories based on real history.

Session 9

Opens 17 November

Structure 1

Module 3: Framing Time

Moving into the third section of the course, this week we’ll talk about structures of pace and narrative ordering within our fiction, with opportunities to take apart our favourite historical novels to see how they work, and to find out how narrative order in particular can be manipulated to create stronger plots in fictions that are based on real history.

Zoom session: Wednesday, 19 November 2025, 18:30–20:00 GMT

Session 10

Opens 24 November

Structure 2

Module 3: Framing Time

Following on from examining structures of pace and ordering last week, we’ll look at frames and prologues within historical fiction, as well as the division of narratives into parts and chapters. We’ll study front and endmatter within historical fiction, picking up on ideas from Research 1 as we think about the ways fictions might make claims to truth or materiality.

Session 11

Opens 1 December

Publishing

Module 3: Framing Time

This week, we’ll think about where our work might sit within literature as a marketplace. We’ll talk about recent trends in historical fiction, and about what makes the historical fiction we love most so successful. We’ll return to what we learned all the way back in Plot 1 to think about how we might pitch our developing novel to a publisher.

Session 12

Opens 8 December

Writing

Module 3: Framing Time

In our final week, we’ll get together to consider our private, (mostly) solitary writing selves. We’ll talk about finding and embedding writing and editing processes that work for us, and where we might turn next for help when we need it. Picking up on our thoughts back at the start of the course, we’ll consider again what it is we’re doing when we write historical fiction – our own motivations, aims and dreams.

Zoom session: Wednesday, 10 December 2025, 18:30–20:00 BST

Tutor

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Beth Underdown

Beth Underdown was born in Rochdale in 1987. She studied at the University of York and then...

More About This Tutor
Beth Underdown

Location

Faber Academy's bespoke online classroom has been built from scratch specifically for helping writers develop their craft. Through this platform you will access your weekly sessions, watch video lessons, join any Zoom sessions, download class materials and interact with your fellow writers in dedicated forums at a time that suits you. Our online learning model prioritises interaction, lively discussion and workshopping in small groups to help you get the most out of your learning experience.

Beth became my writing mentor at a time when I was seriously thinking of giving up on writing altogether. It’s entirely thanks to her guidance that I’m now a Sunday Times bestselling author. Beth taught me to think and feel differently about writing historical fiction, viewing the past as a landscape genuinely inhabited by the characters of history rather than a mere series of events.

Former Student

Beth was personable, dedicated, and genuinely enthusiastic when it came to helping myself and my fellow students. She often went above and beyond, offering advice and support at every turn.

Former Student

Beth became my writing mentor at a time when I was seriously thinking of giving up on writing altogether. It’s entirely thanks to her guidance that I’m now a Sunday Times bestselling author. Beth taught me to think and feel differently about writing historical fiction, viewing the past as a landscape genuinely inhabited by the characters of history rather than a mere series of events.

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