Rachel Wood: ‘It's genuinely such a joy to write about two people falling in love’
BY Maya Fernandes
7th May 2026
In this interview Rachel Wood, author of the debut romantic comedy Annie Knows Everything, shares her advice for creating chemistry between your romantic leads.
‘A heroine finding a newfound sense of self and confidence is a very familiar journey in a rom-com. It struck me as funny to write a character who has the opposite problem.’
We caught up with Rachel to discuss her time studying with us, the inspiration behind her debut novel and her romance recommendations.
Annie Knows Everything has some similarities to Jane Austen’s Emma, especially with its know-it-all protagonist and matchmaking subplots. What first sparked the idea for Annie’s story, and how did you go about reimagining those classic influences for a contemporary audience?
Interestingly this isn’t what I set out to do at all – it was only in the later stages of the process, when I was trying to figure out how to pitch the book, that I found the Emma parallels. I was trying to describe Annie in a way that people would instantly understand, and just sort of instinctively felt that Emma Woodhouse was a quick and easy way for people to get the vibe – both characters are confident (maybe too confident) in their ability to get involved in things that are none of their business, but always with the best intentions at heart. So that’s actually where the Emma comparison came from! After that, all I had to do was dial it up a bit. If you’re a fan of Emma, like I am, there’s nods to the story. But equally, you don’t need to have read Emma to have a good time.
Annie is such a self-assured character, yet she’s also flawed in ways that make her feel very relatable. What did you enjoy most about writing her, and what were the challenges in making her a well-rounded character?
A heroine finding a newfound sense of self and confidence is a very familiar journey in a rom-com – she learns to speak up, to go after what she wants, to say yes or no to something. It struck me as funny to write a character who has the opposite problem – Annie is almost too confident. The challenge with Annie was to show that even though she didn’t necessarily care about her job, for example, she did really care about the people she worked with. When she’s meddling in her sister’s life, she’s doing it because she loves her, and she’s desperate to make sure she’s happy. I think to get on board with Annie, the reader needed to feel like her heart was in the right place, and to have a sense over the course of the book that Annie was going to eventually reckon with the fact that you can be right about something but also handle it in a way that’s wrong.
Many aspiring romance authors struggle with creating believable chemistry between their main characters. How did you approach developing the dynamic between Annie and Connor and making sure that their relationship evolved naturally on the page?
Their messenger chats in the novel really helped with that – I wrote a bunch of scenes where it was just the two of them talking to each other, and their vibe evolved naturally from there. Because Annie is such a firecracker, it felt to me like her perfect match would be someone who was a little more measured, and who could (occasionally) help her see reason, but who had a great sense of humour, and who would quietly delight in the ridiculousness of it all. Is there anything better than when you meet someone – not just romantically – and they instantly share your sense of humour? You can text them a joke or an observation and they volley it right back. That’s what started happening with Annie and Connor when I just let the two of them speak for themselves, without any other agenda in mind. Connor is smart enough to keep up with her, which makes it hard for her to get away with anything!
Do you have a favourite romance trope and if so, what do you love about it?
This will probably come as no surprise, considering the subject matter of Annie Knows Everything, but one of my favourites is workplace romance. We spend so much of our lives at work, and we’re coming into contact with people we’d never otherwise meet, and I love it in a romance when people are meant to be focused on something else – doing their jobs, for example!! – and instead are totally distracted by one another’s presence. In general, when it’s in the hands of a writer who’s really earning those moments, I’ve never met a trope I didn’t like. There’s only one bed at the inn?? Hand me that book.
Are there any recent romance novels or authors you’ve been particularly enjoying?
How long do you have? I love reading romance, or quite honestly, just reading about relationships in general, and I’m lucky in that through my day job (running the book shop Rare Birds in Edinburgh!), I get to read books a little early. Here’s some out this year that I’ve read so far: Cherry Baby by Rainbow Rowell, The Paris Match by Kate Clayborne, Emma Brodie’s Into The Blue, Bobby Palmer's Main Characters, Ana Kinsella’s Frida Slattery As Herself, Jem Calder’s I Want You to be Happy and Annabel Monaghan’s Dolly All The Time. Other authors I love, with books coming that I’m excited for: Tia Williams, Sarah Maclean, Sarra Manning, Mhairi McFarlane, Victoria Lavine, Rioghnach Robinson. I’m just warming up here. I could genuinely do this all day.
You studied with us on our online Writing Your Novel – Three Months course. How did your time with us shape your approach to writing?
I had just finished the first draft of what would become Annie Knows Everything when I did the Writing Your Novel course, and at the time I was really trying to figure the story out. So, to get feedback at that stage was amazing, because I could start to tease out what bits of the story people were connecting to and what bits were falling flat. Our tutor was Carolyn Jess-Cooke, whose books I LOVE and really admire, but whose work is also very different to mine. Her feedback, and some of the conversations we had during our sessions, really unlocked things for me as I was trying to shape this story into a novel, and then exercises like writing a one-page summary forced me to zoom out a little and realise what elements in the story were still missing (in my case: any sense of an ending!).
And finally, what’s next for your writing journey?
For the last little while I’ve been juggling two big projects: the screenplay for Annie Knows Everything, and the draft of my second book, which is another rom-com, out next year. I love this genre so much – it’s genuinely just such a joy to write about two people falling in love. So that’s what’s next for me: more on-page flirting, in any format.
Get your hands on a copy of Annie Knows Everything, out now from Zaffre (Bonnier).
Rachel was a student on our online Writing Your Novel – Three Months course in 2023.
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