Things I wish they’d told me about being a writer

1-You will see the world in a way that others will find extremely disturbing. To others an ice pick is for breaking up ice, to me, it's a potential weapon for my main character in Hell to Pay to use on the most vulnerable part of her attacker's anatomy.

 

Sadly, I don't earn as much as this guy. I wish.

 

2-Non-writers think you earn way much more than you do. That you're in Stephen King's league and if you're not they think your writing can't be that good. Well, it's easy to make money writing. No, sadly it's not.

3-When you try and build a platform for yourself to promote your work, you may attract unwanted attention. See Sinister side of Facebook post.

4-You'll have a deathly pale pallor from all those hours sitting in the near dark, crouched over a laptop/scribbling away. People will keep saying, 'Are you ill?'

5-You'll develop a belly from all that sitting down writing. There's no time for exercise unless it involves walking the dog. Well, he listens to you outlining possible plots (with his ears plugging up his lug holed).

6-People will think you're being rude when you don't acknowledge them, when you're really preoccupied with working out how your character can get away with killing someone.

 

Kick-starting Your Writing

Call it writer's block, call it hitting a brick wall. Whatever you call it, it's every writer's nightmare when the words won't come and writing anything is an effort.

We've all been there, but how do you dig yourself out of the hole you're in?

 

Here are some things I do you might find useful:

1. Stop at a question - is your character pregnant/dead/the killer/in a building that's about to collapse - leave your character on a cliff-hanger and you will want to know how that question is answered.

2. Leave your character in peril. They could be facing a gunman, about to fall down a cliff, be in a stolen car escaping from the cops.

3. Suggest characters are not who or what they seem to be. For example, the police come to protect your family in peril, but it becomes clear they are not the police.  This is a good plot move as it leaves a question - if they're not the police who are they and what's their motive.

4. Follow Stephen King's advice. Think about what should logically happen next. For instance, I have a character who's been manhandled into a van by 2 thugs and taken to a deserted location. She's saved when one of them turns out to be an undercover cop. My character didn't see it coming and to be honest, neither did I.

5. Write something ese. It doesn't matter what it is. This can get you writing again.

6. Watch something funny. You might find laughing inspires you.

7. Do some unusual research. I knew that I wanted my Kirsty character to jump out of a cake but when I tried to write it, it was dreadful. I did the research and it really helped me with the writing.

8. Ban yourself from writing anything at all for one day. There is nothing more guaranteed to make you want to do than telling yourself you can't.

Increasing the word count of your novel

I’m currently scribbling away trying to bring the word count of my novella How Kirsty Gets Her Kicks up by about 17,000 words. At first it seemed like an arduous task.

How do you expand on a high octane thriller, without dragging the pace down to snail level? 

Then I had a few Eureka moments. Hopefully they may be of some help to you if you find your word count is too short -

1-Think what could I have done differently in that scene to add an extra twist?  For instance, what if instead of escaping she’d fallen at the last moment? What if she saw someone or something she shouldn’t have?  Trip your character up and let them find a way out. 

2-Use Stephen King’s advice and think ‘what should happen next’ and do the opposite of what you’ve done. This may take you down a whole new story arc. 

3-Could you introduce a new character? Someone who could shake things up a bit? I did just that and it took my book down a different road.

4-Have a blast from the past. Does someone, or something come back to haunt your character? A previous crime or misdeed, an abusive parent or partner, someone who should be dead (possibly because your character killed them)? Be as creative as possible without making completely unrealistic.

5- Expand on a subplot. Have you really gone as far as you could with that plot, or did you abandon it too soon in favour of your main one? 

Things not to do –

1-Change abbreviations like he’s and she’d to he is and she had. This sounds clumsy, not to mention too wordy. 

2-Pad out with tonnes of description. There’s nothing more liable to put readers off than two pages describing one tree. What makes you skip a page will make you reader skip too. Every word needs to earn its place. 

3-Come up with something that simply doesn’t fit just for the sake of it. This could be a character who died coming back to life or acting completely out of character. Anything you write has to be realistic and not pie in the sky or too contrived.