The Art of Writing

I thought for many years that I would like to become a writer. I have not always known just what I had to do to become a writer of short stories and novels. I think I might start by trying to put everything into perspective. If you want to specialize in something you need to prepare for it. If you want to be a chef you go to culinary school. Take your exams and pass them, and then take your resume to the finer restaurants. If you have graduated from a good school, and have references from your instructors, you will have no problem finding a career in the restaurant business making a very comfortable living.

I like to play with hair; I have even tried to cut mine before. I cut my daughter's hair too and we both looked like we took a machete to our heads. Why-because I have no training in that area. I have no reference in which to create a hair style. I cannot take someone's head or my own for that matter and cut the hair into a style that complements the facial features and bone structure. There is a science to cutting hair. I have to learn it, and if I don't I might as well be floundering around in the dark.

If you want to be a mechanic, you need to go to a trade school or technical college to learn how. You get your diploma and you can work anywhere and soon be making top dollar. If you train on specialty cars, you can name your price. My friend is a mechanic and he works on Lamborghinis. He will be retiring from the dealership soon to open his own shop.

You may wonder-what all this has to do with writing. If you want to be a writer you have to know the rules of language before you ever put pen to paper. I went to college to study business, but while there I took two courses in Business English, which involved writing. I learned the rules of punctuation, and how to write term papers. The experience I got in college gave me the ability to write articles for Associated Content. However I would like to do something more than write articles. I want to be a short story writer, and a novelist. I have no experience.. so what must I do? Most people who write novels for the book industry have a college degree in English. It is important to get a firm foundation for your chosen career.

How do you write a book?

Before you actually write a book, you need to come up with an idea for your story. This idea is called a "prompt", which you can get from an idea, a dream, or a situation that is going on in yours or someone else's life. When you receive your prompt, you want to spend time only on your idea for the book without any other distractions. You might want to lock yourself in your den for a few days, with a do not disturb sign on your door. Just kidding, but you might really need to do it too.

You are going to need to write an outline for each chapter and the conclusion. You need to mentally create your characters before the book is ever started. Each character has his or her personality, as well as a past, present and future. You will have to create conflict within the storyline. Certain characters will have to have conflict, and you will also have to create conflict and empathy between the reader and the characters, or your book will never be read by anyone. So you have a lot of work to do. You may really need to segregate yourself from family and friends while you are in this creative stage of writing. So first, create the basic outline of how you want the story to go. You can do this by hand, or on the computer. Once the outline is done, you may want to rest for a while and enjoy life a little. You want to make sure your friends and family still remember your name.

Now that you have rested for a while it is time to get back to work. It is time to decide who the characters are. Who is the protagonist (leading character, hero, or heroine), and who is the antagonist (the villain, or adversary of the leading character). This is the main part of your character's development. Now you start developing your outline. Read it over and over. You might want to make notations of things you want to add to develop your scenes. You might want to tweak your scenes, take lines out and add others to smooth out all the rough edges of your story line. You want it to flow, to where you can try to guess what is going to happen next. Even if you are writing a fantasy, you want your characters to be believable, and this can be difficult.

Now after the second writing marathon, it is time to rest before the first draft of the story. You will be doing a lot of writing. You have written the first general outline, then the second outline where you developed your characters personalities and conflicts. But now it is time to start writing the book. You may not be satisfied with your story until you have had three rewrites. You will never get it right the first time. You may spend up to 300 to 400 hours up to this point before the final draft is written. Once you have written your final draft your manuscript is finished.

How do I market my book and find a publisher?

Now the easy part of your work is finished and you have graduated onto the hard part. Nothing is easy here, but you have work to do now. You need to find an agent, who will search for a publisher for you, or you can do what I did and find a publisher on your own. However, finding a publisher may not be easy. It might be worth the 15% you would have saved and get yourself an agent to do this work for you. The time you would save by not having to locate a publisher yourself, you could be working on your next book.

It may be difficult to find an agent, because there are millions of writers who want agents. There are a lot more writers than there are agents, so this is not going to be easy. You have got to make some calls, you might even need to pound the pavement... but you need to do the work. An agent can pick and choose what clients he/she is willing to represent. An agent may have up to 80 or 90 manuscripts to look over in a day. Yours is going to have to be good and catch his/her eye in the very beginning. An agent can tell within the first 10 pages if your beloved book will be marketable. The agent may like it, or then again, he/she may hate it and it and file it in the waste basket. Submit your work in the format requested by the prospective agent's guidelines. You may be asked to just email your manuscript to the agency, or you may be asked to save it to a CD and mail it to them. You will want to send out many copies to many different agencies, because you will probably get a lot of rejections. Don't take it personally. This is business. Hopefully within 3 months you will have found an agent for your book, and within 6 months you will have your publisher.

Let's assume you now have a publisher. I published myself for my second book. Now your work is just beginning. You will probably have to do most of the PR on your book. The publisher's job is to get your book into print, but the marketing is up to you. You are going to have to set up book signings, that means you need together up people to come and look at your book. Hopefully they will buy the book and you can sign it. These book signings are usually hosted by your town library. You start in the town where you live because you are known there. Once you get a following in your home town, you branch out to book stores, county fairs and so on. It isn't easy to get known.

Your aim here is to sell books. You want your name to be known and associated with your book. You want someone to see your book on the bookstore shelf and open it. You want that person to take your book to the clerk to be rung up. Something every aspiring writer should understand, is your book has no value until it becomes a marketable. It has to be published into book form, and then it has to be purchased. Once a sale has been made, your book has become a product.

You may want to submit your book to libraries and bookstores. If you are into writing to make a lot of money fast, you are in it for the wrong reason. It isn't a fast process, and you may never sell a lot of books. It is a gamble you have to be willing to take. Many authors have better luck selling their books on their own websites, and directing potential book buyers to your website. You might also ask if you can market your product in a store or mall. I know someone who does just that and does well financially.

If you really want to write a book, do your homework. Get the education you need if you don't already have it. Be best buddies with someone who can mentor you, and teach you the ropes. My friend and publisher, Robert C. Hathorn, who published my first book of poetry, taught me much of what I know now. Now after I have written my second book of poetry, I have made another friend who is mentoring me in the art of writing fiction, which is a brand new venue for me. I don't have an agent, I published myself with a self-publishing company called Lulu. I have learned a lot in this process, and I hope this article inspires some new writers to never lose faith and give up.

Sources:

Robert C. Hathorn, Publisher of Alluring Verses Publishing Company, Atlanta Georgia

Carol Roach, M.Ed, BA, Publisher, Author

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