Here’s the Dirt on “Don’t Be a Dummy” Month!
We have great news! FYW has partnered with Wiley Publishing to give away one copy of a writing-related “For Dummies” book per week in October starting Monday, October, 5th!
Here are the specific titles we are giving away:
Week One (October 5th-9th)- Blogging for Dummies
Week Two (October 12th-16th)- Self-Publishing for Dummies
Week Three-(October 19th-23rd) Copyediting & Proofreading for Dummies
Week Four (October 26th-30th)- Search Engine Optimization for Dummies
Here’s how this works:
We want to know the best writing tip you’ve ever received or the best writing lesson you’ve ever learned. Maybe it was something a professor told you or a lesson you had to learn the hard way. Whatever it is, we want to hear about it!
Since we will be giving away a different title each week, the contest will start at Midnight (CST) on the Monday of that week and run to 11:59pm (CST) Friday of that same week. Feel free to to enter as much as you want! This is NOT a random drawing, so make sure you’re sharing your best tips!
Winners will be chosen over the weekend and announced here every Monday starting October 12th so be sure to enter your real email address! Sorry, books can only be shipped to addresses in the US and Canada.
The best writing tip I’ve come across can be found in the film Finding Neverland. While the entire movie is a great lesson on writing, one particular moment stands out for me and always brings a sense of hope when feeling lost.
“I still have no idea what to write.” Peter said.
“Write about anything. Write about your family. Write about the talking whale.” Answered Barrie.
“What whale?”
“The one that’s trapped in your imagination and desperate to get out.”
From a screenwriting, blogging, and short story writing perspective, this single moment encourages both the act of freeing your mind to your imagination and the act of writing itself, which happens to be the cure to writer’s block.
So in essence, I feel the single tip to “write about anything” is the most powerful tip I’ve come across so far.
I used to sit down and just start writing but that never got me anywhere in particular. Then, one day someone told me: Never leave home not knowing where you want to go or you might get lost on the way.
That changed the way I approached writing.
“Show, don’t tell.”
It is a common phrase, but it has really influenced my writing. For example, I could tell you that it is the morning, but I would rather describe the view from my window, or I could say that Bob is angry, but it would be much more interesting to read if I described Bob’s body language and the tone of his voice.
It is a short phrase but hardly a simple one. I learned a lot about my own writing strengths and weaknesses from it, and with NaNoWriMo just weeks away that phrase is even more important to me. Fifty-thousand words in thirty days? Bring it on!
Best writing tip I recieved was from my high school drama teacher – Mr. Bowden (who is still teaching at Wilson High School in Long Beach CA) build your character! Know how they take their coffee, know what their favorite cartoon is, not just the basics, know everything about them, from the smallest detail.
Even your smallest character.
I’ve done it lots of different ways – from an interview prespective, to a dating service questionaire, to simply a long list of things like – favorite color, what is your favorite tea, favorite childhood game, etc. etc.
I like to practice this with blogging – how would this character respond to this blog post?
Writers Write!
“Keep writing.”
The first draft doesn’t have to be perfection. In fact, it shouldn’t be perfection. Agonizing over a sentence because it isn’t exactly right keeps you from finishing the rest of your story. Save the editing for after you’ve written everything else. If you expect your first draft to be the final copy then you are only hindering yourself.
Just keep writing and worry about nitpicking later.
I follow this Doctor’s advice:
“It has often been said
there’s so much to be read,
you never can cram
all those words in your head.
So the writer who breeds
more words than he needs
is making a chore
for the reader who reads.
That’s why my belief is
the briefer the brief is,
the greater the sigh
of the reader’s relief is.”
- Dr. Seuss
When I studied Journalism (Writing for the Media) in university, my instructor Frank Ritzinger said we should put our own house in order. He was speaking about investigative journalism: How can you write about the scandalous behavior of others if your own affairs are in disarray? So while he meant our own lives should be free of hypocrisy before we publicize wrong doings of others, I took it to mean also: How can we organize our thoughts to write clearly if our environment is messy and dirty?
So…. before I start writing the next big book in earnest, I go through my apartment, tackle any pockets of clutter and clear and clean surfaces. Everything in its place. I rearrange my resource library so I can find any reference I need for a chapter. My kitchen is organized, including the fridge and freezer.
Call it nesting if you will, I think the physical act of organizing one’s living/working space gives one’s brain time and inspiration to prepare mentally for the project ahead. I have a feeling I’m not alone in my desire to create harmony and peacefulness in preparation of a major project. Wasn’t it Georgia O’Keefe who had to arrange the contents of her drawers before she could paint?
Hi Andrea,
I really like this tip. From my experience, I know that I need a clear head to get off to a good start. If I am surrounded (or distracted) by clutter, I am not as focused or productive.
BUT, don’t allow the cleaning process to take you away from what you want to do, WRITE!
The best tip….was for non-fiction articles…but I was told to remove the first paragraph after I’m all done…and almost always, it works. I don’t need that paragraph!
Great tips, so far! It’s definitely going to be hard to choose! :-) Thanks for sharing.
This is along the lines of the “don’t suck” advice but I always thought this tip was profound, and brought to us by Seinfeld, one of the greatest TV shows of all time..
“”
JERRY: Well, just shape them – change them. You’re a writer.
ELAINE: Yes! I’m a writer.
JERRY: Make them interesting.
ELAINE: Interesting! Of course! People love interesting writing!
“”
People really do love interesting writing…
Best writing tip is the one I adapt from Joker’s philosophy of life:
“I just… do.”
I turn it into: “I just… write.”
Too often writers come up with silly reasoning, including the cliche “writer’s block.” I think writer’s block never exists. It is only one’s own excuse to avoid writing, while in fact, if you want to write, just write.
If writing is putting your thoughts into words, it means anyone can write anything anytime. After all, it is so much harder to not think than to think. About anything.
To continue the housecleaning analogy, but with a cautionary note … in “Your Life as Story,” author Tristine Rainer references an essay by Janet Malcolm in which Malcolm compares housecleaning to writing. Rainer concludes, ” But, as Malcolm goes on to realize, if you hang on to everything, you will never write. The angst of ruthless selection creates the visceral nausea and resistance that every writer knows. The fear of making the choices—right or wrong—is ‘the fear felt by the writer who cannot risk beginning to write..’”
“Write what you know.” I have heard that from writer colleagues and creative writing teachers.
And if you “don’t know,” there no substitute for sound research and interviewing skills.
But knowing isn’t everything. From the perspective of an avid reader, it really comes down to the authenticity of the writer’s voice. Artifice distracts, authenticity engages and entralls.
I’d like to share another tip … sort of an expansion upon “writing about everything” and “writing about the talking whale.”
One night while at the local bookshop, I was wandering through the upper level with a steaming hot chocolate and found that by reading the inside jacket or back cover of a book from each section, including fantasy, sci-fi, history, children, fiction, and beyond, I was able to disconnect from reality, get a good sense of storytelling no matter the genre, and get a quick does of inspiration.
I made my way back to my notebook in the cafe and scribbled down idea after idea in effort to keep up with my imagination, which seemed to be overflowing in every direction like it once did when I was a child.
I didn’t necessarily hear about this tip from anyone, but it worked for me that night in the bookshop so perhaps it’ll work for you, too.
Read the inside jacket or back cover of a book from each section before sitting down to write … it might just be what your imagination needs to break free from reality.
“Don’t get it right, get it written.” –Ally Carter
The mantra of Write Club, our writing group in Anchorage where I used to live, and the best way to sum up the way I feel about watching talented writers agonize until they run out of energy to actually get anything done.
Supportive to this was the fact that, a couple of years ago, when I started reviewing material that I’d written for NaNoWriMo many months into the following year, it struck me that in an overall sense, I didn’t write very much worse when I was writing fast and doing everything I could to keep the words appearing on the left side of my cursor than when I was slowly considering every phrase. That is to say, both situations called for a lot of revision and refinement after the fact. Only, when I committed myself to writing a substantial count of words and stuck to that, I actually ended up with something TO revise and refine, whereas in the situation where I was trying to make it all as good as possible the first time through, I more often than not ended up with next to nothing.
I vote for this tip! :)
I knew from an early age that I wanted to be a writer, but In the back of my mind I kept hearing a voice telling me that my writing wasn’t good enough. I was intimidated by who I thought were the really good writers. When I went back and read some of the stuff I had written in those early days I cringed with embarrassment. As a result, most of that writing ended up in the garbage can. Eventually, I stopped writing altogether.
One day I picked up a book on how to write an engaging plot. The very first chapter talked about the “big lie” that we writers tell ourselves. Good writing is a skill you’re born with. Something that cannot be learned. I believed that real writers come by their talent naturally and words just flowed out onto the page for them. It’s a lie. A person can learn how to write. The truth, the author said, is that the craft can be taught. With patience and practice I could learn to be a great writer.
This advice gave me tremendous confidence. I resolved to take my own writing seriously again and learn everything I could to be a good writer. I began by writing at least one little scrap of something every day. For better or worse I vowed NOT to throw any of it away. Once the dam of self doubt was broken the words began to flow. Confidence is a powerful writing tool.
I used to always write as a child because I had a lot of ideas and I enjoyed it. However, when I got to late secondary school age and discussed my “career options” with my teachers and suggested I wanted to write for a living they, to put it simply, said it was too hard. They informed me that I would be writing endless articles I would hate for very little money and would never be able to break into the world of fiction.
Disheartened, I stopped writing for a while after that. It wasn’t until something traumatic in my life happened that I picked up my pen and reignited my love for writing. It made me realise, you shouldn’t write because you have to write, you should write because you want to; because you have a story that you need to tell.
I would say write where and when you write best. Identify the place and type of environment where your creative juices flow best and stick to it. E.g. if music gets you going, then let your writing muse groove along with it. =)
The hardest part for me is to break into that clean sheet of paper or blank computer screen. So when I’m stuck for words, I start free-writing. I write anything that comes into my head. Sometimes, it relates to the topic I’m supposed to write about. Other times, it’s completely off-subject. I don’t worry about correcting typos, I just keep typing. Once I’ve got some words down, I can edit, polish – or completely rewrite – depending on how it looks.
This is a technique I was taught at the start of my OU Creative Writing course. It’s like a pianist playing their scales – it loosens the mental fingers and gets the creativity flowing. After that, the real stuff comes more easily.
Ian Mcfadyen a great Aussie comedy writer gave me a great tip. When you develop a character and write dialogue, have an actor in mind and have their picture in front of you. It does not matter if that actor does not end up being involved, it helps you with visualisation and thinking about that person delivering the lines. When I used this technique to rewrite a script the results were amazing and the dialogue just flowed out.
The best writing advice I ever got was not to think too much. It’s okay to leave blank spaces in the first go around.
I would sit down and try to plan out everything, visualize everything, edit everything blah blah blah until I would freeze like a PC trying to do so much at once. Nothing was actually getting done. I’d come to a scene and get bogged down in the description or worse, not have any way in mind to get to the next scene I’d want to write.
And the writing would just stop. Most times, I’d never get back to that project! The answer was to just leave a blank space or a line of text, and move on. The goal should be to get to the end! “Done is better than perfect” someone just twittered this morning.
This may seem obvious to lots of folks, but it was a big stumbling block for me. I am still trying to establish the habit of leaving blanks, but it has already helped so much.
Since this advice came to me relatively recently
…I am still getting into the habit, but it has already helped so much.
My trick is to always make the last sentence of the last paragraph of a chapter really strong and intriguing. A way to drive the reader rushing to the next chapter.
Inspire yourself from your daily newspaper. Each “faits divers” has it’s own story. It’s left to you to tell it.
Don’t “Marry the Fly”.
This little piece of advice was introduced to me by an English Comp. professor several years back and it is still one the foremost questions in my mind as write and re-write. She warned against getting caught up in one particular detail and going off topic thereby loosing your reader and derailing your story. She taught that, while details are important, becoming overly obsessed with any particular one would cause your story to stray from its intended direction and your reader would be lost in the process. The flow of the story would become interrupted causing your reader to become disoriented and likely lead them to lose trust in your abilities as a story teller. No matter how good you are at writing, she would say, if you marry the fly, you’ve betrayed both your story and your reader.
Writing is no different than a marriage. When you go into a marriage, you make a commitment of loyalty to that other person. In the same way, when you write a story, you make a commitment to your reader very early on telling (showing) him/her what the story is about. If you marry that fly, you’ve committed an act of adultery against your reader. Once you’ve been unfaithful to your reader, it can be difficult to regain their trust again, if at all.
Once I understood the gravity of that one little phrase, “Marry the Fly”, I knew then and there that I had to insure that I never became a two-timing writer who ran around on his story and his reader with that seductive temptress known simply as the Fly. Sure, I’ve been known to flirt around with her on occasion, but I always try to keep her at bay with two simple questions: “Am I marrying the fly?” I think as I write, and “Have I married the fly?” I think as I proofread.
Three tips:
1) Write “this is a story about” and then keep going. When you’re finished, erase that first phrase. This helps when you’re having trouble getting started.
2) This is similar to Christopher’s tip (above). Go to a library or bookstore, pull a classic book or a bestseller off the shelf, and read the first few sentences. See how the author pulls you in and paints a picture that makes you want to keep reading.
3) Write something silly. Don’t edit, don’t try to be serious, just be goofy. After a paragraph or two, you’ll be “loosened up.”
Fulcanelli, who wrote Les Mysteres des Cathedrales (about alchemy) said to “beware of false dawns…” He describes an alchemist who thinks he has finally created gold and the elixir of life to find out that the next day that he still has base metal and probably a bad smell in his lab.
I keep reiterating “beware false dawns” to myself as I write different drafts of stories. If I felt that what I write is brilliant as I am writing it (sometimes I even cry over what I write, I think it’s so good), invariably I will hate it the next day. Often it will sound cute and/or labored and/or boring. If I can like but not love what I write, the draft usually is more coherent, suspenseful and not wordy.
I’ve been getting loads of great tips from Gabrielle Carey, author of Puberty Blues:
Don’t censor yourself while writing. Just keep going. Let the writing take you on a journey.
AND
Be disciplined. Block out an amount of time each day that you spend simply writing, in your ideal environment (e.g. quiet study, park, even on a long commute train ride). You could sit there in your scheduled writing time for 5 hours and only get something written in the last 20minutes, but it’s still worth it, because you got something.
AND
(this may be harsh) If someone is reading your work and “doesn’t get” a bit, it’s 99% likely that you, as the writer, need to change it. As much as you’d like to explain to them why they’re wrong.
FINALLY
Read! Critically, that is, even though it might seem like taking the fun out of the books, but read them as a writer, not as just another reader.
When creating characters, if you simultaneously hate them because they represent something you don’t like about yourself AND love them because they embody what you would like to be–chances are you created a good character.
Do you expect to be a great golfer if you hit the course once a year? Does it seem likely that you will learn a language if you practice once every few months? THEN how can you expect to be a good writer if you don’t write consistently? You eat without thinking about it because you do it everyday—several times a day. You know you are serious about your writing when you write as often as you eat—or at least everyday.
Carry a little notebook or voice recorder with you. Record your observations, thoughts and ideas. Then review it often.
I think the best writing tip I have ever recieved was: write once and edit a thousand times!
You will have your best piece after many edits!
Mary Caliendo
I think that my second best writing tip has got to be:
Get a tough skin- for all those rejections that we all have!
An unknown quote of ‘He who feared he would not succeed sat still.’ Took this as if you want to succeed, keep persevering with the writing, regardless of the obstacles.
Write with a knife. You cut the fat from meat when you cook it, so do the same to your writing. Kill fancy words, too-long sentences and unnecessary paragraphs.
Take a journal with you when you travel to take note of people,
places, food, etc. that make an impression on you. You will build an
inventory of characters and locales from which you can draw from in
the future. It is surprising how much your memory retains, just from a
few recorded details. And it is a great way to get inspired.
Never leave the house without a writing utencil and paper. Invest in a tiny $0.99 notebook to fit in your purse or coat pocket so that whenever an idea comes to mind you can jot it down. Relying on memory alone doesn’t always work.
…I don’t know why that picture keeps showing up for me. That’s not me, but a celeb I use for a role-playing site. I have no idea why it keeps showing up here. :| Just thought I’d point that out. x.x
Hi Jamie!
Are you referring to the picture that shows up every time you comment? At some point you may have used it somewhere and so now it’s associated with your email address. If you go to Gravatar.com you can upload a new one so we can see the real you. :)
Best,
Michelle
If your passion is writing then I believe this quotable tip from Mark Twain says it all:
Write without pay until somebody offers to pay.
My first college paper was an eye opener. I learned you should learn the rules, know the rules, but more importantly, know when to throw the rules out and write what feels right. Corny, but it’s served me well all these years.
Read, read, read. Feed your imagination. Get inspired by another author, a description in a profile or interview, or a discovery in a science magazine.
Call on your empathy to write. The ability to feel intense emotions as others feel them and to respond to stimuli as others respond is key to getting under the reader’s skin and into their head and heart.
Read what you’ve written aloud, not only to yourself but to others. Hearing it is the closet you can get to how a reader will experience your writing, and alerts you to nuance and punctuation improvements that enhance the reader’s enjoyment.
Nuance – understanding slight but critical differences in usage – comes naturally to many writers but can be developed by any dedicated writer. You often learn how to write with nuance by reading to look for it.
Avoid the temptation to edit as you write. Instead, set a goal of one page, or five, or 20, before you sit back and assess what you’ve done. Once you’ve done that, save the original and develop an edited version. Always save every version; you may like an older version better at some point, and it’s always worthwhile to look back and see how you and your story have grown.
Add “people-listening” skills to your “people-watching” abilities. There are real and fictional stories happening all around you, every time you’re at the mall, the farmers market, the doctor’s office, church. Watch, listen and learn.
Also, proofread everything several times, so you don’t write: “Hearing it is the closet you can get to how a reader will experience your writing…” when you meant to write “Hearing it is the closest you can get to how a reader will experience your writing …” ;)