Choose a topic you already know well. You won't have time to do much research and should already have the majority of the book in your head or at least at your fingertips. Writing is hard work and it's unlikely you'll be able to produce more than 4 type-written pages day after day, especially if you spend hours on research.
Writing has a beginning, middle, and an end. Some writers start at the end and then try to figure out how the story got there. Others like to start at the very beginning and work their way through to the end. And still others start with an idea that could be anywhere in the story. They just simply start.Start writing is the best advice any new writer can learn from an old pro. But, when they start talking to several old pros, they come to realize that there is no one way to begin. Each strategy works for each writer, so new writers may want to try several strategies until they find what works. But if you really want to hold a writer's imagination to the fire to get a definitive answer to how to write a book, then please read on.
What Kind of Book are You Writing? Most new authors start on their book writing and publishing adventure by reading a book and getting inspired. They don't think about the kind of book they're writing, or who would want to read it.There are basically two kinds of books: truth and lies, otherwise known as nonfiction and fiction (novels). Some hundred thousand books are published in English each year, both nonfiction and novels. You must know what kind of book you're writing before you start.
Plan for a weekly day off. Why are you writing, anyway? Surely not just for the sake of it. You want to improve the life of your family or share something with the world. Don't forget to connect with the people that matter to you or they may begin to resent your writing. Realize that writing the book is only the beginning. Getting it published will take at least as much time as the first draft of your manuscript, likely more. Don't let this discourage you. Just keep at it, a little at a time.
I've written 27 books which have been published by traditional publishers, plus I have written five books which I have published myself. Not one of these books has taken me more than two weeks to write. And, even though one of them is 12 years old, it still continues to sell well in seven different countries in five languages and is one of the most borrowed books in libraries (according to my PLR statistics). So, even though it only took two weeks to write, it can't be that bad!
Once I've got a reasonable collection of material, which might take days, weeks, or months to accumulate, I'll then go through it and start to put it in order. I'll use the list of questions I've written to help guide me in this and then I'll use the sorted piles of information to help me come up with chapter headings. This might take me a day, but by the end of that day I'll have a complete, detailed outline of my book - plus all the associated background information which will help me write it.Then I can start writing. To do this I often go away from home. In the past I used to hire a holiday cottage somewhere idyllic. Nowadays I go to my own holiday home down near Bognor Regis. But it means I can write without the distractions of the office. If you have a book of, say 30,000 words to write, that's only 5,000 words a day for six days. That's one chapter in the morning and one in the afternoon. Or, put it another way, you need to write around 750 words an hour - or one word every five seconds. Now that's not many is it?
[How to Write a Book & Become a Published Author - Brian Tracy]
Writing has a beginning, middle, and an end. Some writers start at the end and then try to figure out how the story got there. Others like to start at the very beginning and work their way through to the end. And still others start with an idea that could be anywhere in the story. They just simply start.Start writing is the best advice any new writer can learn from an old pro. But, when they start talking to several old pros, they come to realize that there is no one way to begin. Each strategy works for each writer, so new writers may want to try several strategies until they find what works. But if you really want to hold a writer's imagination to the fire to get a definitive answer to how to write a book, then please read on.
What Kind of Book are You Writing? Most new authors start on their book writing and publishing adventure by reading a book and getting inspired. They don't think about the kind of book they're writing, or who would want to read it.There are basically two kinds of books: truth and lies, otherwise known as nonfiction and fiction (novels). Some hundred thousand books are published in English each year, both nonfiction and novels. You must know what kind of book you're writing before you start.
Plan for a weekly day off. Why are you writing, anyway? Surely not just for the sake of it. You want to improve the life of your family or share something with the world. Don't forget to connect with the people that matter to you or they may begin to resent your writing. Realize that writing the book is only the beginning. Getting it published will take at least as much time as the first draft of your manuscript, likely more. Don't let this discourage you. Just keep at it, a little at a time.
I've written 27 books which have been published by traditional publishers, plus I have written five books which I have published myself. Not one of these books has taken me more than two weeks to write. And, even though one of them is 12 years old, it still continues to sell well in seven different countries in five languages and is one of the most borrowed books in libraries (according to my PLR statistics). So, even though it only took two weeks to write, it can't be that bad!
Once I've got a reasonable collection of material, which might take days, weeks, or months to accumulate, I'll then go through it and start to put it in order. I'll use the list of questions I've written to help guide me in this and then I'll use the sorted piles of information to help me come up with chapter headings. This might take me a day, but by the end of that day I'll have a complete, detailed outline of my book - plus all the associated background information which will help me write it.Then I can start writing. To do this I often go away from home. In the past I used to hire a holiday cottage somewhere idyllic. Nowadays I go to my own holiday home down near Bognor Regis. But it means I can write without the distractions of the office. If you have a book of, say 30,000 words to write, that's only 5,000 words a day for six days. That's one chapter in the morning and one in the afternoon. Or, put it another way, you need to write around 750 words an hour - or one word every five seconds. Now that's not many is it?
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