Indie Publishing Guide Tip #2: Write as much as possible, even if it's bad
One day, my sixth grade teacher, Mrs. MacDonald, gave the class an assignment to write a story. She didn't care what the story was about, just as long as we wrote one. Maybe I was inspired by of all of the things that happened to me a few months before that, but I knew I was going to write a murder mystery, and I knew I was going name my characters after the other kids in my class. Grant Hill (yes, the former NBA player) was in my class, and I described the character I based on him as a "three-time loser." I had no idea what it meant at the time, but Mrs. MacDonald laughed when I read the story out loud to the class, and I liked being able to get somebody to respond to something I created. From that moment I knew what I wanted to do with my life.
Of course, the gauntlet that is middle school intervened, and I didn't try to write another story until I was sixteen. It was pretty bad, but I wasn't discouraged for some reason. I suppose I already knew it was going to take a long time. (I tell the story of that in an interview with Mercedes Fox. You can read it here: https://mercedesfoxbooks.com/meet-aut...)
I kept hacking away at storytelling throughout college. I was never really happy with what I wrote but that didn't stop me. I aimed for longer and longer pieces, things I intended to be novels but which I could never complete. They were a combination of fantasy and comedy, Tolkien meets Tom Robbins, only with squirrels and talking forks instead of elves and dwarves. In my early twenties I got deeply into H.P. Lovecraft, which is why, I suppose, the first novel length manuscript I ever completed was a wildly unsuccessful weird tale set in Fredericksburg, VA. It was about massive worms and homegrown superheroes and some kind of Illuminati plotting the end of the world. It was terrible. My boss at the time read it. That was nice of her.
At that point, none of the what I'd written, none of the stories I'd slaved over, amounted to very much in terms of published work (let alone paid work), they did give me something even more invaluable: practice, time, and experience. Malcolm Gladwell, in his book, Outliers, estimates that human beings need 10,000 of practice at something to be able to master it.
My point is this: the best way to become a good writer is to write. And write and write and write. Some of it will be good, some terrible, but that shouldn't stop you.
Next up: Persistence
Are you a fan of horror or post-apocalyptic fiction? Join my email list and receive a free short story, audio book, and theme song for "Beta":
A monster terrorizes an isolated village in the mountains of Eastern Europe, draining the blood of its victims, leaving them frozen in the snow. The villagers hunt wolves, decapitate “vampires,” but the murders continue. As each new body is found, the residents grow more and more paranoid. Who will be next? Will it ever end?
Sign up here!
www.jamesnoll.net
--JN
Of course, the gauntlet that is middle school intervened, and I didn't try to write another story until I was sixteen. It was pretty bad, but I wasn't discouraged for some reason. I suppose I already knew it was going to take a long time. (I tell the story of that in an interview with Mercedes Fox. You can read it here: https://mercedesfoxbooks.com/meet-aut...)
I kept hacking away at storytelling throughout college. I was never really happy with what I wrote but that didn't stop me. I aimed for longer and longer pieces, things I intended to be novels but which I could never complete. They were a combination of fantasy and comedy, Tolkien meets Tom Robbins, only with squirrels and talking forks instead of elves and dwarves. In my early twenties I got deeply into H.P. Lovecraft, which is why, I suppose, the first novel length manuscript I ever completed was a wildly unsuccessful weird tale set in Fredericksburg, VA. It was about massive worms and homegrown superheroes and some kind of Illuminati plotting the end of the world. It was terrible. My boss at the time read it. That was nice of her.
At that point, none of the what I'd written, none of the stories I'd slaved over, amounted to very much in terms of published work (let alone paid work), they did give me something even more invaluable: practice, time, and experience. Malcolm Gladwell, in his book, Outliers, estimates that human beings need 10,000 of practice at something to be able to master it.
My point is this: the best way to become a good writer is to write. And write and write and write. Some of it will be good, some terrible, but that shouldn't stop you.
Next up: Persistence
Are you a fan of horror or post-apocalyptic fiction? Join my email list and receive a free short story, audio book, and theme song for "Beta":
A monster terrorizes an isolated village in the mountains of Eastern Europe, draining the blood of its victims, leaving them frozen in the snow. The villagers hunt wolves, decapitate “vampires,” but the murders continue. As each new body is found, the residents grow more and more paranoid. Who will be next? Will it ever end?
Sign up here!
www.jamesnoll.net
--JN
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