Well, this should be fairly simple. Grab a piece of paper, a pencil, and a big eraser. Shut off all distractions – turn off the TV, the cell phone, and shut the windows if you live on a noisy street. Put a “Do not disturb” sign on the door, unless you have small children. If you have small children, the fastest, guaranteed way to be disturbed is to post a “Do not disturb” sign on the door, or to take an important phone call. So don’t do that. Alternatively, you may work well in a quiet, natural setting – say, next to a babbling brook. Or a busy diner where the coffee cup is bottomless. Plunk yourself down in a comfortable desk chair, dingy table for one, park bench, beach blanket, or tree stump, and apply the pointy end of the pencil to the paper. Move your hands to form the words that begin to tumble from your brain. It is quite all right to write like you speak; if you stutter, that’s what editing is for. Start at the beginning and keep going until you get to the end. Use the eraser as needed. Don’t be shy – the eraser is what keeps us from looking like blathering fools.
Anyone can write a book.
Not everyone can write a good book, a great book, or a bestselling book. Frankly, those labels are like the ones we apply to each other; it isn’t always in our control, what other people think of us.
Recipe for Writing a Book
- A solid grasp of the language in which you’ll be writing, because editors will never see a very poorly written manuscript and readers will not work as hard as they’d have to to read a poorly written book.
- A compelling story or useful content that readers are hungry for.
- Paper, pencil, and eraser – or a PC and word processing software (preferably Microsoft Word or something capable of producing .doc format files, because this is an industry standard format).
- If you use MS Word, a grasp of how to create and use a template.
- A plan for getting the book published: print it or convert it to PDF and give it away to your friends; self-publish it as a printed book or ebook; submit it to a traditional publisher for publication.
Research. Daydream. Research some more. Take good notes. Daydream some more. Do not spend your life stuck on this step – at some point, the book does have to be written.
Outline or mind-map the structure, timeline, and pacing of the book.
Write the first draft. It is normal for this first draft to suck like a black hole. Just keep slogging away; writers never quit. If you really, truly have a book inside you, demanding to be written, nothing is going to stop you.
Celebrate having written. Contrary to some popular literary fantasies and urban legends, booze doesn’t boost creativity. This is the only point in the process where it’s appropriate, in my opinion – but who wants to argue with Hemingway and Poe?
Revise the first draft until you get it right. This can take weeks or years – up to you. If you think you can shortcut this step, consider using a pen name. Sure, if a publisher buys the rights to your book, they’ll edit some more. Possibly, they will edit out things you’re very attached to and change other parts so they’re not recognizable without dental records, but they won’t consider buying your book if it’s just sloppy and poorly written. Unless you’re already a celebrity – like Sarah Palin.
If submitting your manuscript to a publisher, carefully read and follow their submission guidelines to the letter. They are written to weed out amateurs and people too stubborn to do what’s asked of them. Ours is not to argue or balk or insist on doing things our way – if the publisher says “Use Courier 12pt” we use Courier 12pt. If this causes you 10 minutes of mentally railing against illogical, arbitrary rules and requirements, then self-publish.
If self publishing, learn about book design, cover art, marketing, sales… or hire a small team of professional editors, graphic artists, book designers – at which point, maybe you should also publish books written by others!
Is your book going to be an eBook, paperback, or hard cover book? What are its dimensions? A good place to learn the minimum requirements for producing your own book is CreateSpace. But before you turn that self-published book live and offer it for sale, ask yourself: Does the cover art look compelling enough to entice a reader to pick it up off the shelf for a closer look? Is the content well edited – have all the rough edges from the first draft been sanded away and polished off?
Make sure that you understand applicable copyright law – and the various rights that can be lost, assigned, or sold to others (separately or together). More importantly, be sure that nothing in your book infringes on the rights of others, or constitutes libel.
Promote your book. Sell it. This is an important step, regardless of how it’s published. Most writers just want to get on with the next book, and the idea of self-promotion is terrifying, probably because so many of us are introverts.
There are many books available on all aspects of writing. I’m going to close on that note, since this little “how to” is arguably about as useful this Wikihow article on how to run a small hotel or guesthouse.
You can see that it is both simple – or, as Tom Clancy once told me, “Just write the damned book” – and complex, if you want to write a good book and understand the process of getting it published. There are enough books to fill several library shelves on “how to write a book,” but in the end, it comes down to the (not so) simple act of writing it.
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