When you have deadlines, self-imposed or otherwise, working on anything but your WIP might seem like a bad idea if not a complete waste of time, but writing for fun can be extremely beneficial – to you as well as to your writing.
Writing for fun can include anything from a writing prompt to a brand new document where you just start writing and don’t stop until you’ve tired yourself out. Kind of like a child in a bouncy castle, but less energetic. More importantly, there’s no pressure to write well because you’re not ever going to show it to anyone! You can let go and write just because! How great is that?
If that’s not enough to convince you, let me try again-
I’ve said this several times on this blog already, but you’re not a machine. Chances are, if you continuously work on the same WIP without breaks, your mind will need a rest. You might feel like you should continue, but there’s only so much your mind can handle and forcing it to go on regardless is going to drive you into a deep pit very quickly. Now, you might not remember how to have fun, like me. But what if I told you that you can give yourself a much needed break from writing by writing?
Stay with me here.
Focusing on something different for a while gives your mind the break it’s earned, and it gets you away from your WIP for a bit – which means that, when you get back to it, you can see it from a distanced perspective.
What you write in that time can be the worst bit of embarrassing rubbish you’ll ever write – it doesn’t matter. In fact, that’s why you do it! To recharge, and go wild! You don’t even have to hang on to it if you don’t want to. I have a folder called The Trunk, where I keep everything I’ve written spontaneously which will likely never be read by another person. Or I hope not, anyway. You don’t want to see the abominations I’ve stashed away in there; the ones that put your 3am ideas to shame.
But sometimes, rarely, you find a gem. Sometimes you just start writing from nothing, and the nothing turns into something more. Something exciting. And before you know it you’ve got a 15K draft to come back to when you’re done with your current WIP (more on that next week… *ahem*).
Did I mention it’s fun to write without fear of being judged? Because it’s pretty fun!
Either way, writing just for yourself is a great way of recharging and giving your mind a rest. You’ll return to your WIP from a distanced standpoint, you’ll have untangled the knots that made it impossible to spot the paradoxes in your draft before, and hopefully you’ll have had fun doing it, too! Perhaps you’ll even have a new exciting WIP to come back to.
But that doesn’t matter. The only thing that does matter is to go nuts!
Have you tried writing just for yourself, only for the heck of it? How did it go, and would you recommend it to declutter your WIP-focused mind? If you haven’t- what’s holding you back? Make some tea, dunk a cookie, and let’s chat!
I don’t know about you, but I don’t believe in theory when it comes to creative subjects. Not to the same extend as with other subjects, like mathematics or quantum physics, anyway. Creative things, like painting or sculpting, are best learned by doing and making mistakes, and writing definitely fits that bill, too.
However, reading theory shouldn’t be dismissed entirely if you’re a writer. While I can’t speak for the painters or the sculptors amongst you out there, I can speak for myself – and I’m a writer who finds reading theory incredibly useful. Even entertaining at times.
I know, but bear with me.
The books which have taught me the most (and have made me laugh at times) are these:
There are plenty of theory books out there, but if you don’t know where to start then I hope that this short list can point you in the right direction.
The only other kind of theory reading every writer should do is to read everything. Not quite literally of course – but if you’ve read every single book ever written get in touch. We need to talk.
You can learn so much by reading other people’s books that it’s too valuable an experience to pass up. You learn what works for you, what doesn’t work for you, what you’re okay with despite every manual ever written telling you that it shouldn’t be done. It improves your own writing immensely. And who doesn’t love a good book?
Exactly.
But why should you read theory? Writing is an incredibly complex art form. If I live to be a hundred years old with one book written for every year that I’ve lived, I still wouldn’t know everything there is to know about writing. I still wouldn’t write the perfect book, and neither would you. And that’s perfectly fine, because something like writing can’t ever be perfected. There are too many genres out there, too many sub-genres, and far too many possibilities.
And yet I’d still pick up a good theory book when I’m one hundred years old, because I’ll always find something I haven’t considered before. This might be a writing technique to try, a writing prompt, a research idea, a new way to approach plotting my book, or something else I haven’t played with before.
Don’t think of reading theory as admitting that your writing is lacking. Think of it as a treasure cove full of useful information, which can only improve your writing. No matter how talented or experienced you are, you can always improve, so your current skill level doesn’t matter.
You should read theory because you might find a way to make your characters more believable.
You should read theory because you might learn a few tricks about world-building.
You should read theory because it might inspire you to try something new – which might then turn into your new favourite method.
You should read theory because your writing will profit from it.
Still not convinced? Pick up any of the four books above, and just read the first five pages. See what they can offer you.
What is your favourite theory book on writing? Which book has aided you the most, and maybe even still helps you today? Is there a book you keep referring to? Are you completely against reading theory and need a little more convincing? Grab a cookie and let’s chat!
Whether it’s a book you’re writing or an essay or a dissertation, chances are you don’t want to lose everything you’ve done to date (just imagine the horror!). Working in a university library I’ve seen far too many students who have lost all their progress because they don’t save their work regularly and when they do, they only save it in one place.
Losing all your progress is painful, stressful and immensely demotivating to put it mildly. If you’ve ever had the misfortune of being in that position you’ll know what I mean. If you’ve never been in that position, consider everything you’ve written so far and then imagine losing all of it without a chance in hell of getting it back. That’s not a hole you want to dig for yourself.
Don’t let this be you.
When you write something –anything-, no matter what it is, you want to have backups. One at the very least so that you’ll always have your work saved somewhere, even if you lose the copy saved to your desktop. I currently have my draft saved to the desktop, and have additional copies on two memory sticks – one of which I regularly take with me when I go somewhere, just in case the house burns down while I’m out (I’m paranoid that way). That makes for three copies in total! If I was to lose all of those at the same time now I’d probably take that as a hint from the universe that this book shouldn’t be published.
Losing all your progress is not a nice feeling, so be sensible, avoid disaster, and back up your work.
How many backups do you have? Have you ever lost all of your work – be it an essay, a draft for a book, a dissertation or something else – and couldn’t recover what you’d lost? Please feel free to share your experience below. And please, don’t hold back, we want people to be scared of this possibility.
I’ve had several people ask me recently whether I’ll be taking part in NaNoWriMo this year, so I thought I’ll answer your question here.
No, I will not take part in NaNoWriMo. Not because I don’t believe in it or anything like that, but because I know that 50K a month is a bit too ambitious for me. I’m already doing a NaNoWriMo thing every month anyway and try to write as much as I humanly can, so it being November would change very little for me. I know what I can achieve every week, and I won’t be able to squeeze in a lot more next month, either.
That doesn’t mean I don’t think it’s a good idea! If you can actually squeeze out an entire draft in one month then go you! Best of luck to you and your writing ambitions. Writing a draft isn’t easy, so if you can do it in just one month then all the more power to you.
One thing, though – don’t keep telling people that you’ll be writing a whole book in November. There’s a big difference between a finished book and the first draft, and you’re not doing yourself any favours by telling yourself that you’ll have a finished product by the end of November. I’m not saying this out of spite (as I’ve seen some people do) and don’t let this discourage you. What you’ll have by December is a first draft, and that’s nothing to scoff at! It’s a huge achievement, and once you have that you can work at it to make it into a great book! Even more so, you’ve managed it in a month! One month, people!It may not be a finished book, but it’s still something to be proud off! And it’s a pretty good foundation to boot!
So, if you’re participating in NaNoWriMo this year – best of luck to you!! Get those words written and that draft down! (and help yourselves to some cookies here and there to see you through the month)
“Discount the 1st thing that comes to mind. And the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th – get the obvious out of the way. Surprise yourself.” (Pixar’s 22 rules of writing, source)
This quote is perfect for my little blog, because – besides being very true – it’s also one of the best pieces of advice anyone has ever given me. I got this tip years ago when I was still writing my first failure of a book (maybe this doesn’t need saying but I didn’t implement it then) and it has stayed with me ever since. This isn’t the exact same quote I received, but it’s similar enough and says the same.
When you read, you want to be surprised. You love plot twists. So, when you’re the one doing the writing, you want to be able to surprise your readers in return. I know it can be tricky to do, but you shouldn’t write the obvious. Plot twists readers can see coming from page one aren’t plot twists, and make your book predictable and in the worst cases even boring. So, how do you avoid doing just that? You ignore the first three, four, five things you can think of, and then you go with the next one. The advice I was given even asked me to discount the first ten things that popped into my head. If it comes to your mind right away chances are your reader can smell it coming, too.
Now, don’t worry, I mean the good kind of procrastination! The kind which involves book research, gathering new book ideas, and cats! Procrastination can’t be bad when it involves all of the above, now, can it? (unless it’s solely cats with no research, although we could argue about that) Hence why it’s Productive Procrastination. Let me explain.
We’re all guilty of procrastinating. Don’t even try to deny it. Sometimes the words just don’t want to come, and you’re tempted to do your laundry instead. Or watch your favourite TV series for five hours straight. Now, I’m not saying you shouldn’t do the housework necessary to save your home from being a hoarder’s dream, but why not try to use your procrastination to your advantage?
There are many ways you can do this. There are countless articles to read and videos to watch on the internet (and, yes, cats), but chances are you have a favourite way of procrastinating productively. Mine is Pinterest.
Procrastination, you say? Organize, you say? Source
There are a lot of posts related to creative writing on Pinterest. Whether it’s quotes, how-to’s on map building, advice on creating strong villains, tips for beating procrastination (ironically) – it’s all there. And because I can relate it to writing my book, it’s a better way to waste an hour than hanging up the laundry to dry really slowly. Or doing something else entirely unrelated, like wasting away in front of the TV for five hours.
Just because you’re not writing your book doesn’t mean you can’t do any work on it at all. There’s so much more to writing one than the actual writing part, and procrastination will try to get in the way. So, instead of letting it, use it to your advantage instead. The best part is that your mind stays focused on your book, so while you do all this productive procrastination you might even suddenly solve a problem you’ve been struggling with for a while!
Finally, even if you don’t procrastinate in a productive way, you still give your mind a break, and having one of those occasionally can’t hurt. As long as the breaks don’t become longer than the actual writing sessions.
If you would like to procrastinate together on Pinterest, you can find me here.
How do you procrastinate? Have you found any productive ways of doing it you could share?
“The first draft is just you telling yourself the story.” (Truman Capote)
This is an important reminder that your first draft can, and will, be crap. More importantly, it’s a reminder that it’s okay for your first draft to be crap. I know I did this when I first started writing – I paid too much attention to everything already rather than just getting the words out. I kept losing the thread because I kept fixing little mistakes here and there like spelling, and finally lost motivation because I felt like the story wasn’t going anywhere.
The true work does not start until the edit. Save all those spelling errors, grammar issues and potential plot holes for later. First, you need to know the story yourself and that’s what the first draft is there for. Get the words out, then start combing through them.
Creating your characters is one of the most important aspects when writing a book. They need to be convincing, feel real, and your readers need to care about them to become emotionally invested in the story you want to tell.
But how do you go about it? People swear on all different kinds of methods. Some people don’t plan their characters much at all and rely on their characters to tell them everything while others plan every last detail, but this doesn’t work for everyone. There is no true sure-fire way, but below are a few points to help you.
I’ve put together a list of things I bare in mind when creating a character. Please remember that this is not meant to be professional advice, but simply the way I go about doing this. If you feel like I have left anything important out, please add your methods in the comments below for a more complete list.
Never mind being a 100 year old virgin, like the same human cravings don’t apply to him and he only exists for Bella. A very long time before even knowing she exists. Romantic, eh? No. Source
1) Flaws and Strengths
Chances are you want your characters to be credible and seem like real people rather than obviously fictional characters, and to achieve that they need to have flaws. Nobody is perfect, not even your good main character. In fact, main characters who are infallible and can’t do any wrong, ever, are boring to read about and you don’t want that. Likewise they need strengths. Something they are good at. I have yet to meet a person who fails miserably at everything – even if you think that you do, you don’t. Everyone has something they are good at, so your character should have that something, too.
2) Unique traits.
I read once that every character needs to be unique enough for the reader to know who’s talking without it mentioning names. Now, I don’t know about you, but I’ve read quite a few books where not every character has had a unique way of talking. Personally I think it comes across as trying a little too hard if every character has a different accent. Having said that, people have speech habits, so at least some of your characters should do, too. That can be an accent, finishing every other sentence by saying ‘right?’, or using nicknames for people only this one character uses. For example, one of mine usually refers to other guys as ‘lad’ or ‘boy’, while he refers to women as ‘lass’ or ‘girl’. He’s got a Scottish accent in my mind as well but because I suck at writing accents, this is all he gets. While this may not be necessary for all of your characters, it definitely helps make them more believable.
If you’re stuck, think about your own friends and family. Chances are not everyone you know has a speech habit, but some of them will do and you can draw from that.
3) Playing favourites.
Everyone has favourites. Favourite colour, favourite food, favourite people. Even if these things never get mentioned, it still helps to figure out what they are. Why? Because it makes your characters seem more like real people to you. That’s a good thing, remember? Before we can make them believable to our readers, they have to be believable to us. Equally, having favourite people will effect how your characters react to the people they talk to. They are not likely to get along beautifully with everyone they meet.
Which brings me to…
4) Past experiences.
Everyone has a history. Your character doesn’t begin his existence the moment the book starts. He will have had a life before that, too. Those experiences are very important since they’ll shape his views and reactions. For example, my main character Rachael has been a homeless orphan in a town which doesn’t want her all her life. Would you believe me if I wrote her as someone trusting with glossy hair and a great figure? Of course you wouldn’t, because that’s unrealistic. Rachael is extremely suspicious of everyone, malnourished and could do with a long, hot bath. A bit like a stray dog. You wouldn’t expect a stray dog which has been kicked in the face and shot once to happily come running to you just because you smile at it, right? Past experiences are important, and fictional characters need to have them.
5) They’re not mind-readers.
Unless they are, of course. Ignore this bit if they are. However, chances are they’re not, so it’s unrealistic for character B to know what character A has just decided in a different town. This might seem pretty obvious but I’ve seen it happen, and it’s always good to go over your basics every once in a while. So when you write this huge, important plot twist your villain came up with remember that your main character has no idea what’s happening. If they end up walking into a trap, let them. Equally, if you write chapter twenty-eight from Anna’s perspective, it makes no sense to read what Justin is thinking because Anna can’t know. (Unless she’s a genuine mind-reader)
6) Relationships.
Most people have families, so – yes, you’ve guessed it! – your character needs to have some form of social web as well. Even my homeless orphan had parents once! If you make your characters out to be stand-alone people with no relations at all I won’t believe you, and neither will your readers.
People have urges! They have ambitions! It might sound romantic that Edward waited for 100 years before having sex just to wait for his one true soul mate, but come on. No. People aren’t wired that way.
You might be tempted to create the perfect character for your main person, but please consider whether they are realistic. Keeping Edward in High School for 100 years specifically so that he and Bella can meet there by accident isn’t very believable. I don’t know what your memories of High School are but I was quite happy to be done with it. People can achieve all sorts of things when they are immortal. Sitting your GCSE’s again isn’t likely to be one of them.
8) Even superheroes get scared.
As we’ve already established, nobody is perfect. Everyone has a weakness, and everyone is scared of something. Most people aren’t going to walk into a suicide mission without at least considering their odds once. Most people are scared of death, terrified even. Having a hero without that fear might seem appealing, but it’ll make it difficult for your readers to relate to him.
9) Redeemable qualities.
You know those villains you want to hate but can’t? This isn’t necessary, there are loads of truly evil characters around, but personally I love antagonists I have mixed feelings about.
My favourite stories are the ones where I can’t just sit back and hate the evil antagonist from the bottom of my heart. This comes back to past experiences in point four – chances are the bad guys are the way they are because something made them that way. They weren’t born wanting to see the world suffer. Show your readers what that something is. It’ll make them all the more believable – and that’s what we wanted all along.
How do you go about creating your characters? What’s important to you when you do so, and how detailed are your descriptions? Let me know with a comment for a more complete list.
“If you’re going to be a writer, the first essential is just to write. Do not wait for an idea. Start writing something and the ideas will come. You have to turn the faucet on before the water starts to flow.” (Louis L’Amour)
A friend sent me this quote a couple of days ago, and it’s very fitting for this blog, wouldn’t you say? I know I’ve said this before, but it can’t be stressed enough that in order to be a writer, you need to actually write something. A little every day wherever possible. I know a few people who want to be a writer but haven’t written anything in months or longer. It’s the equivalent to saying you really want a job without actually looking for one.
Likewise I know a few people who say they do want to write a book but they haven’t got enough life experience yet – and these people are the same age as me! By the time you become a teenager you’ve already experienced just about every emotion known to man. You’ll have felt love (save falling in love yourself, maybe), loss, joy, sadness, terror, achievement, disappointment – life won’t give you much more than this besides more of the same. If you want to be a writer, don’t stall saying you haven’t experienced life enough yet. Sit down and write. Practice makes perfect, non?
When you have deadlines, self-imposed or otherwise, working on anything but your WIP might seem like a bad idea if not a complete waste of time, but writing for fun can be extremely beneficial – to you as well as to your writing.
If that’s not enough to convince you, let me try again-
What you write in that time can be the worst bit of embarrassing rubbish you’ll ever write – it doesn’t matter. In fact, that’s why you do it! To recharge, and go wild! You don’t even have to hang on to it if you don’t want to. I have a folder called The Trunk, where I keep everything I’ve written spontaneously which will likely never be read by another person. Or I hope not, anyway. You don’t want to see the abominations I’ve stashed away in there; the ones that put your 3am ideas to shame.
Either way, writing just for yourself is a great way of recharging and giving your mind a rest. You’ll return to your WIP from a distanced standpoint, you’ll have untangled the knots that made it impossible to spot the paradoxes in your draft before, and hopefully you’ll have had fun doing it, too! Perhaps you’ll even have a new exciting WIP to come back to.
Cookie Break 