How to be a Writer

            You write. It’s as simple as that.

            When I tell people I'm an author, they often look at me in shock and say something along the lines of, “You wrote a book!? Wasn't that hard?”

            My answer is, “Yes, I wrote a book. Actually, I wrote three and am currently working on a fourth.” As to how hard it was... only the first one was, and even then it wasn't all that challenging – the most difficult part was gaining the confidence to actually do it.

            I first decided I wanted to be an author when I was somewhere around the age of twelve – at least, that’s when I started to write my first novel. It was a disaster. Not because I wasn't any good, no, but because at the time I was attempting to emulate my latest favourite author: Brian Jacques. When you write a book about warrior woodland creatures, it’s a bit obvious that it’s a rip-off. When I became aware of this, I started a new book and learning my own style.

            The new book was good, but it had one major flaw – the protagonist had no weaknesses. Oh, I did my best to give him some, but it was a very futile attempt. This, coupled with my difficulties writing descriptions, caused me to give up on my goal.

            I still wrote now and then. On occasion I even took a shot at starting up another book, but the thing that really set me on the road to writing again was when I chose to take a high school Writers’ Craft course when I was eighteen. I was assigned a short story project and, as I wrote it, I realized there was far more potential for the story. It was then read aloud to my class for criticism, but they all got so lost in the story that they forgot they were supposed to be doing work. Then a number of my classmates asked when I was writing the rest.

            You’d think that would be the kick I needed to get writing, right? Wrong. I still lacked the confidence in my writing – sure, I could write something short, but a whole book? That seemed like an impossibility! Over the next few years I wrote bits and pieces here and there, but never sat down to write seriously. I lacked the confidence.

            It wasn't until January of 2010, when I was dating Colleen, that I started seriously writing. I made a deal with her – I would write my book if she would help me when I got stuck. That’s all I needed. So, I started writing. Not just sitting down to write every now and then, but every day. If I wasn't working on the book itself, I was working on background information, developing the world I was writing in further and further.

By the end of July, I had finished the book. Well... okay, it had several locations where [INSERT DESCRIPTION HERE] was written, but other than that... I had written a book! It was such an exhilarating feeling! After that, Colleen went through it, then I read and edited the whole thing, followed by sending it off to my parents for editing and I started writing the next book.

            So, it took me a long time to get there, but I learned a lot in the process. The most important thing, though, was the confidence. I knew I had done it before, so I could do it again! So I did, and this time the book was better and had far fewer [INSERT DESCRIPTION HERE]s. The same was true for the third book. It was a bit of a revelation for me that “practice makes perfect” applied to creative writing.

            In conclusion, if you want to write a book but aren't sure if you can, here is my advice:

-Go for it!

-Write a little every day, even if it’s only a sentence.

-Believe in yourself, or find someone else to believe in you for you.

-Don’t read it until you’re done unless you’re going back to check on details. Many authors will tell you that they don’t like what they write. This is because you are your own worst critic. You see things that only you can see because you were the one who put the words there in the first place. But! Leave those words sitting long enough (say, long enough to finish writing the book) and you’ll forget that you wrote them in the first place. I can’t tell you the number of times I've read something and been amazed that I was the one who had typed it! All those little things that you were picky about will still be there, but if they still need to be fixed, they can be fixed later. By that time, the book is already complete, so it’s too late to give up on it.

Happy writing!

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.