So You Want To Be A Writer?

‘Write from the heart’ or ‘Write what you know’ are pieces of advice often given (thrusted upon?) writers whether they have asked for advice or not.

Why is it that everyone that has ever read a book feels qualified to give advice on how a book should be written? That’s not how it goes.

Personally, the piece of advice I would give (if asked) would be to never take ‘No’ as the definitive and final answer.

No, self-publishing isn’t ‘real’ publishing.

No, you can’t get a publishing deal unless you have an agent.

No, writing about fairy pirates in a post-apocalyptic world will not make a good story.

How about thinking:

Yes, self-publishing is real, it’s a platform to get your work out to readers – maybe not many to begin with, but as you keep going, you’ll gain. Experience, skill, followers – all gains and all valuable.

Yes, you can get a publishing deal without an agent, but do you need a publishing deal?

There are pros and cons to every side of the scenario. The publisher will give you a percentage of the profits from your book (yes, I did say ‘percentage of the profits’). The publisher will NOT ‘do all the work’ to get your book promoted and into readers’ hands, you will be expected to do that. The publisher will not guarantee its success. ALSO, if your book bombs and they don’t make any money, they can (and will) ask you to return a portion of the advance they gave.

If you have a two book deal, they can also bury that second book, meaning they still own the rights to it, but you’ll never make any money from it, unless of course, you buy it back.

You will be expected to be at everyone’s beck and call – a book signing tour sounds so glamourous, doesn’t it? Trust me, it’s not. It’s meeting the public, answering the same questions time after time and pretending it’s the first time you’ve heard it. Signing your name over and over (if you’re lucky) or waiting around in a book store looking like a spare-part because no one showed up. Of course there are up-sides to that too. Your adoring public – enough said :D

Then, if your book sells really well, they will expect you to come up with another and another, year on year, on year. Creativity doesn’t always flow freely, especially under a deadline.

Then there’s the agent. With an agent you will agree to give a percentage of your royalties to them for getting you the deal. So, not only will you get a percentage of the book profits from the publisher rather than all of it, you’ll also have a contract to say you’ll also give your agent a percentage too. That big, juicy, delicious pie is getting smaller and smaller isn’t it?

Of course, having an agent and a publisher may mean you become the ‘next big thing’ and a percentage of a massive ‘JK Rowling-size’ pot is worth it all, but how often does that happen? Once a week? Monthly? Annually? Once in a lifetime? Possibly less than that.

The post-apocalyptic fairy-pirate queen sounds awesome! Do it.

Stop asking questions that can lead to the answer of ‘No’ and just write. Don’t listen to ‘No’ – tell yourself ‘YES!’

It’s your story, your world, your characters, and therefore, it’s up to YOU to make your readers fall in love with everything you’ve fallen in love with. What are you waiting for?

Write the story you want to read. Don’t keep trying to write things that will please someone else because you’ll end up pleasing no one. At least if you write your story for you, ONE person will be happy with it. That way, if your story does make you the next JK Rowling, you’ll be able to say you did it your way. If it doesn’t, then at least you’ve got a great story that you enjoy reading.

Now that I’ve told you about what happens once the book is published, how about a few tips on getting it to that stage?

Write, just write. Get it all out of your head and onto paper. It doesn’t matter if it’s hand-written in wax crayon, just as long as the story is out of your brain-box.

Once the story is down and you have a start, a middle and an end, you can then get it actually sorted out so someone will be able to read it.

Type it up.

Don’t have a computer? GET ONE!

Save your work, save it a LOT. Don’t spend fifteen hours straight without food or water, sitting on a commode so you don’t need to take a toilet break, only to have to computer overheat and crash, losing it all – ARRGH! Been there, done that (not the commode part, obviously, that’s just weird).

Edit your work. If you’re not great at spellering, or English, Grammar etc. don’t panic, but it is YOUR responsibility to get your whole story straight.

Don’t assume your reader knows your character like you do. You’ve lived with them inside your head for months, maybe years. The reader is just meeting them, take time to explain things, the character flaws that make him/her likeable or at least relatable. Your character will thank you for it.

If your character has a ‘thing’ where he goes through a certain ritual every morning, I mean, like Every. Single. Morning. Then it can be implied that he will go through it every morning, whether you describe it or not; especially after you’ve explained to your reader that that’s what he does. There really is no need to go over it every time you tell the reader he’s getting up. Just skip over it, the reader’s brain will fill it in… I promise.

Don’t treat your reader like a moron. If you write in a condescending manner, your reader will pick up on it and drop-kick your book out of the window before they finish – and then, just because you pissed them off by insulting their intelligence, they’ll write a shitty review. They will – I certainly would.

Unless you’re writing about a world where natural physics of THIS world don’t apply, then you can’t have your characters flying, breathing in water or walking through walls without a good reason. The reader will put your character into the world we know unless you tell them otherwise – Vital, exceptionally important, don’t forget that one.

Plot twists – please don’t have a massive plot twist that is impossible and improbable, just because you can. Your readers will feel cheated and will hate you for it – they will, they absolutely will. The same goes for murder-mystery, thriller-type books. If you’re expecting your readers to play detective, you have to allow them ALL the facts. It’s cheating if you keep one important fact from them just so you can have the smug feeling that no one guessed who the murderer was. Hide it, play it down, disguise it by all means, but it MUST be there.

Exceptional phrases or actions from your character – GREAT! Readers love those, but do NOT repeat them incessantly. A great, bushy moustache twitching when the Chief of Police gets angry is cool, but to have the whole police department (including the females) having the same moustache and the same anger-induced twitch (unless it’s a comedy) is not. It will get very old, very fast.

At the end of your story, when you’ve got all the vital elements down and the hero has been defeated and the heroine murdered horribly, before his very eyes, and you’re happy with your work, please, please PLEASE send it to an Editor.

I’m not joking. If you want to publish that book and you expect people to spend their hard-earned money on it, it has to be polished and believe me, it’s a very rare person who can be good at both writing and editing their own work. You see, the brain is egotistical. It looks at a piece of writing and it thinks “I wrote that. Wow, that’s good, it’s perfect.”

Your brain, like mine, will skip pieces that should be there that aren’t, because it’s there, in the brain. If it needs to be in there but isn’t, you’re cheating your readers and they won’t come back to you once they get disappointed by your writing. Send it to an Editor who will question you. An Editor that demands answers to the questions your story doesn’t answer is doing you a massive favour. If you can’t explain, then you need to take the work back and make sure it CAN be explained. If the question needs a little time for you to explain to your editor, it’s not clear enough in your story for a reader and therefore, you need to work on it a little more.

That’s NOT insulting your work, it’s being an Editor. That’s what you’re paying them for – and yes, a good Editor will need paying, and it will be worth it.

So, now I’ve torn down your self-esteem and made you want to go away and never write another word, one more thing…

If that’s how you feel, you were never a writer at all. If, on the other hand, you still want to write, then there really is hope for you.

Whether or not you believe what I’ve written, doesn’t matter; it’s your journey, not mine, but I do hope at least a little of this helps in some way.

It’s not EVERYTHING I’ve ever learned about writing, but it’s a start.

If you’ve got a book out – Trad-Pub, Indie or Self pubbed, let me know. Leave a comment with your links and we can make a start on getting each other’s work seen.

This post will help me to get to the SteemFest with any luck – still got travel to pay for yet ;)

Images from Pixabay.com