Renee Darcy
I have three pieces of advice for aspiring writers:
1) Write every day. Even if it's just a few words. When you're not writing, think about your characters, your plots and your stories. Think about the reasons for things, think about the little details that breathe life into a world or the little foibles that make the characters more human.
The first story you write won't be your best. The fifth story you write will be better. The tenth story you write will be better yet. Eventually, you'll have a whole bunch of stories, and you can pick your favorite, polish it up and send it out into the world. Then pick another.
2) Keep in mind that first drafts are not finished drafts. Don't agonize over word choice or let a difficult analogy stall your writing. Just put in a placeholder, and go back later - during editing and rewriting - to polish things up. The point of a first draft is to get that idea out onto paper, and then you can start panning for gold.
3) Writing is not a get-rich-quick scheme. Going from first draft to published novel is a time-consuming process. To become even moderately successful, you'll have to do it again and again. There are exceptions, but the most successful writers tend to be the most prolific. So if you don't fancy spending all your nights and weekends and free time working on the next story, or rewriting an older one, maybe you'll enjoy a different hobby more.
P.S. Here's a bonus bit of advice: believe in yourself. None of us is born with "writer" tattooed on our foreheads. It just takes practice, and will, and persistence. The writers who are published aren't a special breed of human - we're exactly the same as you - we're just the ones who were persistent and stubborn enough to keep at it, and believe that we can tell stories people will enjoy. You can, too!
1) Write every day. Even if it's just a few words. When you're not writing, think about your characters, your plots and your stories. Think about the reasons for things, think about the little details that breathe life into a world or the little foibles that make the characters more human.
The first story you write won't be your best. The fifth story you write will be better. The tenth story you write will be better yet. Eventually, you'll have a whole bunch of stories, and you can pick your favorite, polish it up and send it out into the world. Then pick another.
2) Keep in mind that first drafts are not finished drafts. Don't agonize over word choice or let a difficult analogy stall your writing. Just put in a placeholder, and go back later - during editing and rewriting - to polish things up. The point of a first draft is to get that idea out onto paper, and then you can start panning for gold.
3) Writing is not a get-rich-quick scheme. Going from first draft to published novel is a time-consuming process. To become even moderately successful, you'll have to do it again and again. There are exceptions, but the most successful writers tend to be the most prolific. So if you don't fancy spending all your nights and weekends and free time working on the next story, or rewriting an older one, maybe you'll enjoy a different hobby more.
P.S. Here's a bonus bit of advice: believe in yourself. None of us is born with "writer" tattooed on our foreheads. It just takes practice, and will, and persistence. The writers who are published aren't a special breed of human - we're exactly the same as you - we're just the ones who were persistent and stubborn enough to keep at it, and believe that we can tell stories people will enjoy. You can, too!
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