Write a Book, then Write It Again... And Again.

You have a story idea. Maybe something inspires, maybe you had this amazing dream. Maybe you just love a particular concept and have built upon it.

What are you going to do with it?

There are plenty of options. A screenplay, a comic book or strip, poetry, your alter ego, a novel. Maybe even inspiration for a painting. Still, most people do nothing.

Assuming you're a writer too, you went the fiction route (and probably the alter ego).

I believe I first attempted to write a book when I was seven or eight years old. My story wasn't bad in the premise. It reflected my own life, books I'd read, and recent news events.

Unfortunately my effort was abandoned for one major reason: I had no clue how to write. I believed that all paragraphs had to be exactly 4-6 sentences long. And I'd never heard of margins or the fact you could leave off dialogue tags.

When I discovered how to format, maybe a year or two later, my stories finally escaped being mere doodles on notebook paper and became words. (Notebook paper remains my favorite media.)

I won't pretend to have been a prodigy. My first efforts were probably much like everyone's. You should know the problems.

As I wrote my ideas began to develop and became better. They would change so quickly that often I would just have to start the story over. (They were innately long. I still struggle to write short stories. Or just finish a work at all.)

After that, there's actually not a lot. I wrote, and wrote, and wrote, and wrote, and wrote, and wrote. In between, I read mounds of books and drew character art. I never went to a workshop and my only book on writing was my grammar book. Other novels formed my style, etc.

Now, I consider myself born a story-weaver and dreamer, but I only call myself a writer because I've devoted myself to an unknown quantity of fiction. (I've probably passed the Million Words mark).

These past two and a half years, I've learned a lot about maturing my stories from the internet and Nanowrimo. Literary agents, other publishing people, and experienced creative writers have blogs that all have given me advice I desperately needed.

What remains is to create a polished manuscript and eventually find someone willing to publish it.

So how about you? Where have you come from as a writer?

P.S. This is my first attempt at this kind of writing post. Please feel free to give advice on where I have failed.

Thanks to Write a Better Novel for inspiring this post.

The other night I couldn't sleep at all. Which is pretty miserable, but it turned out for the better. I was wide awake at 6:00 a.m. and able to get up to write. (I have been sleeping past noon, as my dad works nights so I stay up with my mom.)
But anyway, it's nice to be working on The Restored again. Even more nice is to be able to blog something on here.
I have been working on a faerie story longhand, sacrificing my fountain ink pens for a noble cause. I just about thought I'd fallen in love with the blue one LOL.

Question: Do you like it when there's a prologue setting the story's conflict up, or do you prefer when it's explained later?

Still Learning

Recently, I reread some of my older writings.
In particular, two versions of a story since abandoned and two versions of a story in the making.
And I noticed something: I've gotten better.
My writing has come a very long way in just a few years, which makes me wonder what it will be be like five years from now.

But I did try and decide some things I could specifically improve. That was descriptions and pulling the plot together.
Still... it's nice to know I'm better than I was. I'd hate to be stuck in a rut.

POV Troubles

I don't really like first person anymore. At least when I'm struggling with the character. See, my character Meredith and I are having problems. I'm ready to blame it all on her, but I'll be bigger and admit it's partially my fault her character is not coming across on paper well.

It could have something to do with the fact I'm writing longhand. It's all kind of messy on binder paper, so I feel disorganized. Anyway, I just can't find a voice for her. It's very annoying. I think I'll give it a go on the computer if I can ever get the time. It's tempting to stop writing S.T. and work on Meredith instead (on the computer), but I can't let myself do that.

Off to face the sludge, S.D.

April 5th

So my brother an I supposedly have 19 pages. I'm not so sure about that, but if he says that each line is a page then...

We have short pages.

Anyway, I finally talked him out having the protagonist and SC swallowed alive by an elephant. And a gory scene where tigers kill a baby elephant. Pheww! I was Not looking forward to writing that.

But instead now, we have a scene where the MC falls into a fungi pit and meets the SC there. Okay, that works for me. It IS his story after all, and a conceivable idea.

However, I am still working on my own projects. That is, S.T. and another story called Meredith that gave me writer's cramp last night. I now remember why I like writing on the computer so much better thanks to Mer.

I need to get more sleep. But not for now. Right now, I believe I has a heart-wrenching explanation by my MC to write for S.T.

P.S. I have had my suspicions confirmed about scripts. It's a lot like writing an outline--very dry. I hate writing outlines. Synopses and outlines are my bane.

:)

I watched that TED talk by Elizabeth Gilbert on recommendation. It was great. Philosophically, I didn't agree with some of the particulars, but totally Understood. It was really nice to be reminded that the story was a collaborative effort. As far as creative genius in itself, I think it's something God created. I don't pretend to understand it. But I do know it's not simple like people try to make it out to be. It's some ineffable thing. It Exists in a way that makes writers and other artists look insane to the plebeians.

I was trying to explain it to my dad with this new material, but he wasn't understanding. Call it a force, a genii, a whatever, I know there's a complexity here. Unfortunately, he wasn't understanding, just inserting the "Moral of the Story."

I know God gave me Creativity. But could it be possible that Creativity is something in itself? Absolutely. Am I ever going to get anyone to understand that? Probably not.

Dare I say its centered in myself without going mad? I think I'll abstain.

2K

I reacked 2,003 wordso NaNoWriMo Suddeenly I'm asking myself, Where do I go from here? I've practiced so hard for the past year only to write sketally in form my story is suddenly reaching the middle of the beginning when I have the impression I could make I longer.