What to do if you decide to write a book

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

One gets the impression that now more business books are written than fiction books. Many people who have a story to tell, have work experience, have knowledge and a vision of “how it should be”. What to do when you decide to write your own book and this is not a romance about love and adventure?

I will say right away: like the author of the original post, I am not a writer, but I write and read a lot, and therefore I share many of his views on the process of creating books and generally new interesting content.

First advice: do not tell anyone that you are going to write a book (or even have already begun to write it) … Very often, just after making a list of tasks or getting ready to do something, people rush to notify all their friends and acquaintances that, "I am going to become a writer." If you fail - and in 90% of cases you won't succeed the first time - then you will be condemned and discussed behind your back, you hardly need it.

Tip two: writing a book and the process of promoting it to publishers is not an easy stage, and therefore, during all the work and all the negotiations, you will have the feeling that your book is almost a genius. Moreover, even the worst author has a concrete belief that his book is a real treasure for the publisher. Do not raise the bar for yourself and for those around you, try to look at things soberly.

Tip three: it may not be too late to change your mind … For example, getting involved in a project, becoming a columnist, starting a startup - finding yourself a lot of other activities in which the likelihood of making substantial money is much higher than writing a book. Very rarely even works of art become bestsellers; business or niche books, and even from novice authors, almost never become commercially successful. So if you are writing a book to make money, this option disappears immediately.

Tip four: despite the first three tips, you should still try your hand and take up the book if you have such a desire. If the book seems like an oversized project to you, start writing. But don't go into freelance journalism or writing a few big, good stories a couple of times a year. Even if you sell them to publications like The New York Times or The Atlantic, you cannot secure your financial independence. In general, do not take up writing and journalism if your goal is to make money. There is an extremely narrow circle of people who make a living from books or articles (creations like “Harry Potter” and “50 shades of gray”, as well as numerous waste paper “Daria-Dontsova-style” - this is an exception to the rule, not a rule).

Tip # 5: forget that writers are admired … They are envied, criticized, many “colleagues in the shop” wash their bones and say that “such and such is sheer mediocrity,” but they are underestimated geniuses. Noise and talk, popularity and attempts to “make a name for themselves” - this is not why people start writing books. At least - those books that are not disgusting and boring to read. Many aspiring authors “write on the table” or send out manuscripts to everyone in the hope that someone will notice them and make them a millionaire. Neither one nor the other brings you results in the current moment: neither financial nor moral.

Next tip: listen to reasonable criticism, to constructive, seek advice and opinion not from amateurs or even your friends, but to people who have more professional and life experience than you. And do not pay attention to the “haters” and know-it-alls, which are full of them on the Internet (and there are quite a few of them in offline life). Distinguish criticism from publishers, editors, and reviewers from the flood of mud that your acquaintances and strangers generate.

Remember to work on bugs, over the author's style and presentation accessibility. Appreciate your editor's work: very often he gets an extremely "raw" text from you, in which you do not notice many errors. Your editor corrects shortcomings and "flaws", helps to create a stylistically coherent, competent and easy-to-read text. Yes, editors are often too harsh and harsh; but it is the result of their work that ultimately determines how successful the book will be.

The success of a good book lies in the skill of the author not complain to readers or show them the story "from the outside", but to make the reader feel himself in your place, “in your skin” … Nobody cares about your difficult childhood, the divorce of your parents and the fact that at school you were a fat, ugly child with glasses. But if the difficulties you have experienced are shown in such a way that the reader learns from them lessons and important emotional or moral aspects for himself, imbued with what is happening as if it were with him, then this will be a successful book.

Suppose you took into account all the advice given, wrote your first book or a series of articles, published them and even attracted the attention of the audience. And here you still start to think that you are “in the shadows” … And this shadow is cast by more eminent and "promoted" authors. It's time to remember that the fruits of their "creativity" and popularity are the result of hard work, a heap of mistakes and a life that "raped" them (or they her) both literally and figuratively. Should you be jealous of someone else's success if you don't know its true value?

Becoming a good writer or writing an interesting book is not an easy task.… Here, not everything depends on hard work, diligence and regular "training": you can even sit for 8 hours every day with a laptop, paper, pen and voice recorder - and still you will end up with something dull and colorless that no one wants to read. The desire to write a book does not always coincide with the capabilities and talent.… But it is still necessary to make efforts and improve. Anyone who wants to write the first book in his life should read a lot, write even more, try himself in different styles and genres, listen to the world around him. The main thing is to throw in the trash all those "must" and "deserve / not deserve attention", which so often suffer from aspiring authors.

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