Profiles

Flirtation. Sordid affairs. Hilarious misunderstandings. If you want to escape your mundane life then these are what you can expect from an Adele Parks novel, well, these indulgences and a good dose of feel-good reality. 

Adele has published seven top-ten best sellers, including Playing Away and Husbands, she is an active promoter of adult literacy and she is a mother - a pretty fantastic juggling act. 

But once upon a time she was a typical student studying English at the University of Leicester, with no idea of what lay before her.

Studying at the University of Leicester

Most students have no time to write their essays - in between waking up with half a burger hanging out of their mouths and planning their next social event - however Adele managed to combine all of these with writing a novella:

"I look back at that work now and know it is naive and a little indulgent but that doesn't make it invalid. It was a useful practice exercise."

Whilst university experiences are usually too painfully embarrassing to share, some of Adele's novels reflect her time at Leicester:

"Inevitably parts of me are in all my books and my university years were important to me and so do seep into story lines.

"Many of my closest friends were made whilst I was an undergraduate and as my books often discuss friendship, my experiences tend to surface through those characters.

"Still Thinking of You is my novel which most definitively discusses university life and some of the long term consequences of decisions made at that time."

Quick Reads

Adele has used her success to encourage and promote adult literacy, maintaining the role as a spokesperson for World Book Day for the past three years:

"This year my contribution to world book day was that I wrote a 'Quick Read.'

"Quick Reads are short, inexpensive books (£1.99) written by well-known authors and figures in the UK especially for adults who find reading tough or simply want a short, fast read by a best-selling writer; that is to say people who have forgotten or never had the habit of reading.

"I wrote a book called Happy Families. Like my other novels Happy Families discusses the perennial issues I discuss in some of my other novels, motherhood, second chances, fidelity.

"The Quick Reads initiative is now in its third year; it’s a major collaboration between authors, publishers, the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills, the BBC and many more. 

"Central to the government's Skills for Life Strategy, Quick Reads has successfully helped over 13,000 organisations to encourage their staff to benefit from the joys of reading."

Tell Me Something

Her next project promises to be as charming and hopeful as its predecessors, offering an insight into the world of domestic complexity:

"The first is ticked off, now she's bagged dark and sexy Roberto, the second is proving harder to achieve.

"It's partially about a woman's ferocious hunger for a baby but it's also about how we all chase dreams, often at the expense of living life as it really is in all its glory and goriness."

Adele's Advice

Adele's success is an inspiration for any writer, particularly for Leicester Uni's next big thing!

Any budding author would do well to take Adele's advice:

"Write every day; you have to be disciplined, as well as determined. Develop a thick skin and believe in your work."