Writing Advice
Be a reader.
Read widely and read a lot. Reading gets story structure, characterisation and plot into your brain along with the essential mechanics of spelling, grammar, punctuation and paragraphing. If you want to be seen as a professional writer you absolutely must get those pesky rules right. Like any rule they can be broken – but only if you know what you’re doing and why.
The next thing to do is to write and keep writing. Take notice of the books you love. Read them several times to work out how the author has achieved the effects you enjoy. It’s a good idea to to read books and articles on the craft of writing. There are excellent blogs about all aspects of writing and publishing. One of the best and most useful is a weekly blog compiled by Maureen Crisp with links to information about writing and publishing from around the world.
Like any skill you are wanting to perfect, writing demands practice, reworking and time. Give yourself a break between writing the first draft and going back to work on crafting it into a fine gem. Time away from it will help you see it more clearly.
Most important of all: have fun and enjoy creating something where there was nothing before.
How do you get ideas for a story?
Here’s one way: write a noun on the page, for example: girl, boy, dog, parrot, house, car. Now start asking: What if . . .? So if your word is dog you could ask: What if it’s lost? What if it saves somebody’s life? What if it steals steak from the butcher? What if it has a litter of puppies? When you’ve thought of as many what ifs as you can (8 or ten is good) choose the one you think will make a good story. I would choose saving a life. Then I’d ask more questions: Whose life does the dog save? What is the emergency? How does it save the person? Does the dog put itself in danger to save the person? What happens at the end?
It’s a good idea to take the time to think about your story.
How does it start? What’s going to happen in the middle? How will it end? When you’ve got that in your head, you can start writing – but remember, you don’t have to get it perfect in the first draft. I often have to delete the first few paragraphs (or pages sometimes). The main thing is to get stuck in and start writing. Once you’ve written the first draft it’s easier to see where the real beginning is. It’s a good idea to finish the first draft then put it away and don’t look at it until the next day, or the next week. If you can leave it that long it doesn’t feel like hard work to do the editing and make your story shine.