Over the last year and half I have done many posts
illuminating aspects of writing and honing your skills as a storyteller. I thought today I would re-cap the sum of my
mini lessons up till now.
1. Write your
story. I don’t mean about you, I mean
tell the story that is rattling around in your head. Describe for us the world in your imagination.
Make your characters come alive to us
through your words. Let us feel their
passion, their pain, experience their plight, and let us celebrate in their
victories, as we live vicariously through them as we read your work.
2. Edit and proof the
many layers that make up your work.
There are about as many facets to good editing and proofing as there is
in writing the piece to begin with.
3. Learn when to
start and stop. School is out and this
isn’t a bloody book report. Maybe end a
chapter with a question, or at a high point in the action. Our goal is to make the reader not want to
put the book down. Our job as the
storyteller is to draw the reader into our imagination through the tempo, the
words, the personalities, the stress or elation, and entertain them up and
through the last page. You want them
dragging their feet as they near the end of the book because they don’t want it
to end.
4. That part of the
story that steps over the boundary of real to unreal that is the special
magical part of every book. Boldly jump
into that special pool with both feet.
Don’t describe the crap out of it, dance around it, run through it
screaming as a child playing Red Rover and bust right through it. That’s what the reader is here for. Don’t let this be the only special piece of
the work. I have read books where the
authors run through it, dance all over it before running through it again.
5. Take the reader
somewhere they have never been before.
This is your book from your imagination, dreamed up by the unique
individual that only you are. Nobody
else has had the same everything you have – you are unique, and so your story
should be also.
6. You’re just
spinning your wheels until you write and publish those first million
words. You have a long way to go. You are not going to get rich being a
writer. Most writers have been working
at this for years before they are published or before their books get
discovered. You may never sell more than
a couple hundred books!
Still here and reading?
Then you might have what it takes to be a writer. It is mostly solitary, unthankful work. That is why if you’re not writing for the
right reasons your just spinning your wheels.
If your goal is to write because you love writing, because you want to
share this story that is bursting to get out of you, and you don’t care if
anyone ever reads or buys a single copy, then you’re well on your way – finish the
bloody book and get it out here! There
is a world of readers out there.
Somebody will read it. Somebody
will love it. Some will hate it and you
for writing it. Welcome to being a
published author!
7. When it is hard
and you’re questioning your resolve, your story, thinking about bagging it ask
yourself some questions.
What would
you be doing otherwise?
Are you
typing on a typewriter with carbon paper?
Are you
writing it out long hand?
Will you
have to make each copy yourself to distribute the work?
8. When you finish it
and it has been edited and proofed, then self-publish it! This answers some elementary questions right
away.
Do people
like my work? Not everybody will! Can you take criticism without slitting your
wrists? The average grade in regards to
rating a book is a three. Honestly that’s
the best any of us can hope for. You
will get ones, twos, and threes. You may
get some fours and fives!! You won’t
know until you get it out there.
You want to
be traditionally published! So does
everybody, but there are draw backs. Are
you willing to sell the rights (literally) to your story? Don’t spend your life trying to get traditionally
published. You could waste years trying
to get noticed in a broken down not working system when in the mean time you
could be cranking out books and honing your skills so that later when they (publishers
and agents) want you, you have real bargaining power, not just your hat in your
hand and one untried and untested manuscript.
9. Have your work
Edited! It’s that important enough that
I have listed it twice. Do it right the
first time or you will be going back and doing it over and over again until you
get it right.
9 ½. Watch your
tempo. In the continuing efforts to be
better with each successive book the limits are being pushed to the maximum by
many authors. Reading fiction is for
enjoyment so be mindful of the reader and watch the tempo. Give them time to process what you’re doing
with the characters before you throw another cop car into a helicopter or blow
up the world!
10. FINISH THE
BOOK! Everybody wants to write a book
and millions more have an idea for one or started writing one. I started twenty different books over ten
years before I finally sat down and kept plugging away at the same one until I
finished it.
Three edits later and a new cover and “Whisper” isn’t that
bad. I pray it will always be the worst
book I ever write. I hope each one just
gets better than the last one. I am
halfway through the third edit of “No Rules Of Engagement” my second novel – it
is still out there for sale but the soon to be released 2012 Edition should
have almost everything fixed.
I have come to believe that every time you go through a book
there is something that could be tweaked, and depending on the school and
background in English what one person finds correct someone else will say is
wrong. English is not an absolute science;
it’s subjective, which is another problem writers must deal with.
Thanks for taking time to share with me. Keep an eye out for the re-release of “No
Rules Of Engagement” and the soon to be released “Leviathan Deterrent” the
sequel to “Whisper.”
Have a Great Day and writers get back to work, there are
readers looking for their next book right now!!
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