For composition, any way you can get the words down in some permanent format is OK. When you get ready to submit the work someplace, use standard manuscript format OR the format that is recommended by the place you are submitting to.

Rudyard Kipling noted that there are nine and ninety ways of writing tribal lays -- and every one of them is right! Many writers find that outlining the work is helpful, either in their heads or on paper. There are writers who begin at the beginning, go on to the middle, and then conclude with the end -- like a knitter knitting a sock. Margaret Mitchell (author of GONE WITH THE WIND) would write all the important scenes first, and then hook them up with connective narrative -- like a quilter constructing a patchwork quilt. Detective novelists frequently begin with the ending, and then work backwards to the beginning, like fashion designers starting out with a cool button or a roll of trim.

Brenda

Thanks Brenda, I just went to your website, I REALLY appreciate your input.

I get urges to write particular themes out of order, so I think I am like Margaret Mitchell!

You life sounds idylic.

Popi

Alexndra Stoddard has said that as a mother and a working woman, the only time she could write was early in the morning or late at night. She found she was too tired late at night, so she set her alarm for 4:30 a.m. and wrote for 2 hours every morning. If you want it bad enough, you can find the time.

As previously said, you have to find your own way of working to some extent. E.g. pen vs PC - I scribble down notes and ideas in a little book, but the moment it comes to 'proper' writing, it has to be typed. Apart from the ease of editing, I just find that the tidiness of a word-processed page helps maintain discipline.

The one piece of advice that helped me the most was to set a regular time for writing, preferably daily - even just one hour a day is better than setting aside a whole weekend now and then. Try and make it the same slot every day, and stick to it. I found that regular short periods of writing kept the flow going and prevented the dreaded writer's block.

I think the ending is as important, if not more critical, than the beginning. There are too many books around now where the writer start off with a great story, does an excellent job until about halfway through. Then it becomes obvious that he has no idea where he is headed. It can't be a soap opera that goes on for years if it has to be in book format.

Be sure to think your way through to a plausible ending. As you write, you may find that you want to change it. But at least, you will have a destination in mind.

Good Luck!

Here is my 2 cents worth: make an overall outline for the plot and characters of your novel. Write a page describing each character and his/her motivations.

Try to hook the reader in your first few sentences, certainly in the first chapter.

Try to write at least 2 hours a day, even if you tear up the pages later. Build it into your day as a discipline.

Don't worry about approaching this task in a linear style.

Use a small file of 3 x 5 cards to make brief notes, which you will hopefully expand later....

There really is no set formula; the ways writers accomplish their goals are as individual as they are.

Try to join a writers group. (Helpful to gain feedback, when you can read your chapter aloud before a small audience, informally, and receive encouragement.)

also, as you describe a character, be sure to jot down the description, blonde hair, blue eyes, short, etc. in your notebook or on a card. You don't want later to goof by mentioning "her raven locks and brown eyes." Look at each character in your mind's eye until you can remember everything you know about them. Personality, looks, long hair, short hair, likes and dislikes.... anything to make them real to the reader. If you can "see", then so can your reader.

Perhaps before you start, think out your main Characters, describe them to yourself....are they realistic?

Every writer is different, and so a new writer has to find his/her own way.

I find it impossible to begin without a character or two in hand, and the ending. This ending can be of the simplest: "...and they all die in misery" is a good one. The book doesn't often get there, either. Frequently the characters refuse to die at all, never mind in misery, and the book actually ends in a quite different place.

Brenda

I actually start blind, with no written plot notes, and not always knowing the ending - my plots are character-driven, and I enjoy allowing the characters to take the lead and make their own plot. Brenda's approach sounds similar, with characters 'refusing' to aim for her ending!

I do make detailed character notes which include background information about their personal and family history which may not ever make it into the novel directly.

As an educational writer, sometimes I need to include certain vocabulary words into the story-and that's often all I get-the list of words-and other than that, I have carte blanche (within age-appropriate boundaries, of course.) It's fun to play with them and see what direction they suggest. It amazing where 5 disparate words can take you!

excuse me for adding in a personal note here. It concerns my husband and his sister. I thought you might get a kick out of the story.

She imagined herself a writer. She wrote some good poems, but as a writer at the novel level, she lacked a great deal. Her first book (published by a vanity press) was a thinly disgused story about the family, herself, her parents and SIX siblings. Only the names were changed.

BUT, she only involved FIVE of her brothers and sisters. My husband was left completly out. Nothing was ever written that could be stretched to cover him. Weird!!

You're getting good advice here about how to go about writing. I am sure that you will do a better job than my sister in law. All she had to do was remember what happened as she was growing up, even then, she managed to forget her next to the youngest brother.

Thankyou everybody for your valuable input, I have some terrific ideas to go on with now.

Can I ask one more question....do authors draw entirely on their own experiences when they write books ?

Or do I need to get my imagination going ?

Many thanks, again.

Popi

Patricia Dunker, Professor of Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia, and a writer of many works of fiction, gives this advice:

"If you are not a great reader, you cannot write...because writing is built out of texts and language".

Adam

It is generally said that you should only write about what you know. Unfortunately, some writers - Erica Jong springs to mind - seem to interpret that to mean that they should write only autobiographical stuff! (By the way, Agnes, great story - you are obviously married to the Invisible Man)

You need to draw on your experience to understand how people are likely to behave; how they speak; what conflicts arise etc. If you have a personal story that you really need to write, then do that - but don't expect that it will necessarily be of interest to anyone else!

If you are setting your story in a place or a time you do not know-do your research. Basic mistakes of fact will annoy readers and put them off your story. But then when you know the area-street names, buildings, history...let your imagination people it. Start with character types you understand or can recognize, then let them tell you what they want to do. There aren't really any original plot lines-it's how you build on the cinderella story, or the murder, or the parent-child conflict, that will make your book original.

Popi, we must do both: draw from our own personal experiences as well as use our imaginations, ideally.

As someone said above, don't be surprised if your characters at some point take off in strange, unintended directions....Writing a novel is for me like living in 2 parallel universes. I have to get inside the minds and souls of my characters constantly, but they occasionally astonish me.

Popi, we must do both: draw from our own personal experiences as well as use our imaginations, ideally.

As someone said above, don't be surprised if your characters at some point take off in strange, unintended directions....Writing a novel is for me like living in 2 parallel universes. I have to get inside the minds and souls of my characters constantly, but they occasionally astonish me.

Popi, I'm going to mention two books I found interesting and fun. Children's lit. may not be what you're writing, but both books offer insights into the process of successful authors. The first is "The ABC's of Writing for Children, compiled by Elizabeth Koehler-Pentacoff. The second is From Inspiration to Publication; How to succeed as a Children's Writer:Advice from 15 award winning writers, editors Pamela Glass Kelly, and Mary Spelman.

You may be interested in what Francine Prose has to say about writing and reading: Reading and Writing

cjoseph, thanks for providing that link - her new book sounds fantastic. I recently read an interesting essay by Francine Prose called, 'Learning from Chekhov'. If you can track it down, it is a worthwhile read.

Adam

"They Wrote the Book" Edited by Helen Windrath.

I am reading this book, its good for beginner writers, to see how published writers approach writing.

Although people will offer you rules and advice, Kipling realy was right. You must find your own way. Every rule that we will propound, some quite notable writer has defied with grand success.

Even the research rule: Mary Renault would settle down and write a novel about ancient Greece deliberately without cracking open a single research text. Then, after the first draft was done, she'd research it down to the bone. She said that if she researched it first the story would suffer.

There are writers who keep voluminous notes and travel to all the sites of the work before they begin. There are writers who have NEVER been to the venue of their best work. (Edgar Rice Burroughs never went to Africa, SF writer Isaac Asimov could not bear to fly in planes, and you can take it to the bank that Jules Verne was never twenty thousand leagues under the sea.) There are writers who write with pencils, with pens, on laptops, and with Palms. I know of one writer with a disability, who dictates her work to a computer fitted out with voice-recognition software.

There are so many variations, that it is almost impossible to generate rules. If the only way you can write is to engrave the words with a stainless-steel burin onto the side panels of late-model GM cars, go for it.

Brenda

Thanks for that advice Brenda.

I must admit I was beginning to think that I had to do lots of research for my book...like go, for instance, to the actual town where I want to have my artist living, to get a feel for the place. Its impossible for me to do this, mind you !

I am such a tactile, "feely" person..and what inspires me about writing my book is getting those "feelings" into word, that will then "paint" a picture of the feeling, or emotion and hopefully that will be conveyed to the reader. Does that make sense ? So for me, I think it is important to go to the place I am writing about...but I can see that that will greatly restrict my storyline.

I saw a film the other day that had great beauty, passion, anger, emotion in the story, so I am using that as a portal to my story. Funnily enough, the setting of the film is in an area where I imagine my book is set. Its really about passion for the subject, I spose. So I guess, in that case, I couldnt go to the town where "my" artist lives...I can imagine what it is like there by watching the film.

I fully understand your point about writer's developing their own method of approach to writing.

It is certainly okay to go and visit the venue of your book, if you are able to do so. It is just not a necessity -- not even especially important. Otherwise all those books set in the past, in the future, on Mars, in a galaxy far far away, in the core of a Hollow Earth, or in Middle Earth could never have been written. I would certainly not spend time, energy or money on research travel unless I had plenty of all three to spare.

Research can be a pitfall -- you can spend so much time researching that you never write the thing. I was in Athens once, staying in a B&B. A guy was also staying there, who was writing a novel about the Trojan War. He had been traveling around Greece and the Mediterranean for a number of years, and was only just now thinking of crossing over to Turkey to see the site of Troy. I could tell that this was going to be a long-drawn-out process, and indeed I have never seen his novel on the shelf.

Brenda

It also depends on how much the setting is going to be one of the characters in the story. If the story could just as easily take place in "AnyCity" as in New York City, place identiy is not such as issue. But if you are setting your story in a real place, and you are going to call it by it's real name, a good map and a visit to the Chamber of Commerce (or of that ilk) website should cover your initial research-and a history of the city, a book of photographs or a good tourist book will help you get the individual feel of the place and keep locations straight. You don't want to put a park on the site of a famous art museum by accident. Readers will notice and be sidetracked. Of course it may suit your story better to start with a real place in your mind, and rename and adapt it as your characters dictate-draw your own map as you go so you don't move the park to the river after you have put it behind the art museum! A good editor will catch these inconsistencies, but it is helpful to avoid them in the first place.

Another "classic" re creative writing that many have found helpful is Natalie Goldberg's "Writing Down the Bones." This work often comes up at the writers conferences I've attended.