Write and Publish Now

Writers Tips!

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Becoming a writer is a multi-level experience which involves not only a good story line and can even be, in the words of Paul Harvey, “The rest of the story” but also includes lots of determination. There are 5 top factors.

Excitement and questions – What do you look for when you read a book? Yes, that is part of your answer. Put yourself in the reader’s shoes! Don’t you want to be entertained, educated or both! Don’t you want the book to leave you with a good feeling? Just sit back and reflect after you have closed a cover. Do you appreciate the time spent; what you taken away;, what you have invested? Was it a book that you didn’t want to put down, one that drove you to read more, kept you on pins and needles… even until the author’s next release? Well, that’s the goal!
Ability – This is important, but not critical. You must find a way to communicate with your audience. It can be unique, take Dostoyevsky’s “Crime and Punishment”. The author explores the minds of young, bright people and the clock work of one that becomes insane. This Russian author’s uses of words are important but his images are most critical! If I were to grade his grammar, it could not even survive in “Bone Head English”. Of course, there are translation difficulties but my point is that his book is one of the best every written while his technical writing style leaves much to be desired. It’s the author’s dialog and the thought patterns of his characters that portray his mastery of the literary image. I can therefore recommend a superb way to see and feel this art: reading the different styles of great authors...then by copying and practicing those paths with your own short stories. Your next step, the novel, is only a cleverly snarled collection of short stories with a revelation of ideas towards some goal. Also note, it is necessary to build up your vocabulary. Jack London did this while shaving! He had a list of practice words taped to the bathroom mirror.
Connections to the media - Friends with a writing/publishing background are best but not essential in this modern era of instant success. Many books are published these days directly to the public through the internet and do catch the eyes of those in position to bring authors up to a new level of recognition/sales. Because there are such great volumes of new material on the market, the traditional publishers do all they can to keep up with the fantastic literature that is being developed on a daily basis. Those efforts require some filtering processes simply because many writers are not ready for the “big time”. Therefore, the mainstream will rely on agents to do this work for them and/or rely upon known authors where their risk is low concerning “flops”. The manuscripts that give the chance of a “millionth” sale is really what the “big boys” want. It is very clear that an author should “prove him/her self” and must bring to their table a known market. How to become the household word is something else, which takes time and patience…but it happens…and can happen to you if you believe in your ideas and honed your abilities. The real answer here is a question: “How do I prove myself?”…and finally can be answered with a second question, “How do I improve myself?”
20 years to the top - There has to be time limits on everything. If it would have taken Sir Edmund Hillary 20 years to climb Mt. Everest, he would have been a milestone marker in the shape of a popsicle instead of a hero and a British knight. To speed up your journey, just write a lot and get reviews by well known individuals/publications. Try to get your publications into anything… book stores, newspapers, magazines, to agents, and on to the internet. Something will hit for you. Remember: You’re only a crawling baby at this and it takes time to jump up and run.
Reflections and new ideas – The last part of this formula sounds too easy but, in fact, is the most difficult. It is your renewal, a continuous writing process. Too bad. Lawyers have to take review courses, doctors have to take lectures in updated procedures, and you, the writer, also has a stone going up the hill. It is known and therefore I casually restate that each of us has to keep improving our abilities up to the end. Please note, that “writers block” is only a temporary state of mind and perhaps a confession to one’s self, “I don’t want to do this anymore.” But be assured that you can always find a new subject to research, to explore, and develop along some less obvious path. There are literally billions of subjects and billions of titles to be seen…yours might just survive to be known as the words of Herodotus in the 21 St Century, or of a new Darwin, or even an is-breaking Dostoyevsky. What have you got to lose. Give it a shot! By the way, fact literature sells better than fiction, in the arena of the publishing monopolies. There you are mid-stream, a place where you just might first get noticed!!

W.A. Perry

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