Young Writers Society

1.) The topic of you're novel has to be something that YOU are interested in. If you write about romance, but you are way more into those bone-chilling thrillers, stop the romance novel, and write the thriller. Or better yet, combine them!

2.) Write about what you read about. Like me, for instance. I love reading murder mystery, suspense novels. That's why I write about those genres, because I enjoy them.

3.) Don't plan ahead. I swear, this has to be one of the biggest mistakes people make when they write. It works out much better, if you let everything fall into place. If you need to go back in your novel, and add something, nothing is stopping you. It's a good thing to do.

4.) You be the judge. It's your novel, your ideas, your creation. When you think it's done, it's done. When you think that it needs more detail, add it. You should get complete control over your novel.

5.) Don't stress it! Don't rush it! Do not have a fit over it. Seriously, it's not life or death, take a few days break. There is nothing worse for the mind than pressure, and anxiety. You'll just confuse yourself. You Do Not want that to happen. You must never rush your writing, it will be finished when it's ready. If you rush it, it will end up being a dud, because you didn't give it time.

There are probably many more tips, but I'm just too lazy. I'll post some more, another time.

I don't agree with 3...

I just finished Nanowrimo (Okay, the novel is about 1 day from being done!!!) and I made a whole outline for my story, and it did not harm me at all.

I think what you should say instead is, You can write outlines but outlines and planning are not the final words. Planning and outlining, depending on the person, is the best thing you can do for yourself, even if its done in the smallest way. knowing a general direction while writing may create a purpose, somewhere to get to, and when you don't know what comes next, rather than spending weeks worrying, you have somewhere to look.

But, like you were getting at, this planning is not the final say. You can change anything in the process of writing, even the biggest things, like the MCs lover NOT dying, it just takes a lot of rewriting.

And for Number 5, It is life and death! Pour moi...And Nano objects to the 'give it time' saying. I think you should give it time, but there is a difference between procrastination or laziness, and not letting yourself stress out. I'll take it from Nano, the best thing to force out is your first draft. Everything else, its up to you.

Either way, its nice advice for novel newbies or anyone, really.

Ah yes, some nice practical advice. *Thumbs up*
I agree with Claudette that planning is a good idea for a lot of people. I sometimes wish I'd done more planning for my novel; I wouldn't have had to write it almost backwards. But I take comfort in the fact that Tolkein wrote the same way.

One more piece of advice I would add: Be prepared to take criticism. You've got to have thick skin when it comes to your writing, or you won't get anywhere. Some of the critisism will be good and helpful, and some of it will be bad and destructive. You must be prepared to take both kinds and distinguish between the two.

Those are my "words of wisdom" of the day. Thank you.

I definitely agree with Number One. I know I have a tendency to think about if people are going to like my writing or not, and spend way too much time obsessing over it. When I just write, and write for me, and write something that I would want to read, that I would pick up somewhere or find on the Internet and really, truly enjoy, that's when I win them over.

So while you have to watch yourself and make sure you don't get lazy, it's always important to write about what you love.

I agree with 4 and 5. But my characters run free and take charge while I watch chaos wash over everything I've written.

I partially agree with you on point three. If I try and plan the novel out, I never get anyway. I find I work much better if I only have a rough idea of where I want to go - although, before each chapter, I sit down and think about what I (roughly) want to happen.

But of course, different things work for different people. Some work much better with a good plan all worked out for them.

5.) Don't stress it! Don't rush it! Do not have a fit over it. Seriously, it's not life or death, take a few days break. There is nothing worse for the mind than pressure, and anxiety. You'll just confuse yourself. You Do Not want that to happen. You must never rush your writing, it will be finished when it's ready. If you rush it, it will end up being a dud, because you didn't give it time.

You, my friend, should try NaNoWriMo.

Seriously. Maybe this works for some people, but for me, if I'm not constantly pushing, I'll never get anything done. Really. Deadlines are so helpful, and really help you to get things accomplished and words written.

I think for three it just depends on the person. Loads of people like to plan and it helps them, but others don't. So I think what you have to do is find out what suits you and then insert that in the number three rule space.

I partially don't agree with number five. Because pushing yourself really does help you get a lot done. It just also means that you will probably die an early death because of stress. But seeing as I'm not a big fan of an early stress-related death, I agree with you more than I don't.

But you can rush for NaNoWriMo! You can do anything you like for NaNoWriMo.

I think some people might take 'don't rush it' too far. I slacked about 3 whole years writing whenever the spirit moved me (and it's amazing how little it does, unless it invigorates me to sleep late and drink Irish-style coffee) until my brother volunteered to read my first 'chapter' and edited it most professionally--that is, told me it was crap. He said anyone can keep a journal for four years of what stupid things go on in your head and it doesn't make you a writer, which is true. Anyway now I'm half working and half slacking, I've put off the climax in order to revise chapters 1-9, and I'm trying to get through one chapter a week. In 3rd or fourth draft, I think this time frame is pretty good, so you can try it but it's different for everyone.

Some things I've learned include:

1) Don't show the rough draft to your mother. hell, don't show her any draft for that matter. Wait till Mr. Random House Editor pays you an advance and send her a free copy for Mother's Day.

2) Subscribe to Writer's Digest.

3) Good storytelling isn't nessecarily Faulkner and Tolstoy. It's J.K. Rowling. it's Max Payne, it's Metal Gear Solid, it's Final Fantasy VII, it's Blazing Saddles, it's Little Green Men and Thank You For Smoking, it's The Count of Montecristo, and I left some stuff out. Good stories are just that, and you know one when you find one. Learn from books, but other disciplines will teach you something.

4) As in above, write the book you want to read--but can't find on the shelves.

5) Too much Nutella may cause hives.

6) Talk to someone. I was puzzling over my whole novel once because it seemed like a web of pointless complications that didn't mean anything. I had a call from a friend who lives in town who couldn't run a CD right or something and I went to help out. While I was fixing the computer, the friend (who knew I was writing a lot from my mother) asked me where the book was headed. Interestingly enough, when you talk, the story is clearer because you naturally focus on the important parts of character, setting, plot, action. When I shut down the computer I realized it wasn't so complicated at all; I ran back home and wrote a more-or-less synopsis that was basically a transcript of what I told my friend.

7) Get it done, for chrissakes. Then learn to kitesurf, do stupid things with friends, enter a martial arts competition, download music illegally--just get away from writing. This is called just rewards. If you can, eat a donut. It'll feel great. You'll work it off during Volume 2.

I cannot help but get ahead of myself when writing. i usually know whats going to happen for the next 20 or 30 pages.
but then i start writing and i find that the characters do have a life of there own and the story can go in a differetn direction. but what drives me to keep writing more is that i want to get to those next 20 pages.
planing ahead does have its uses, but i agrea that you musnt let it limit you in your writing

I wouldn't say I partially disagree with number five. I just disagree in general. Everyone's different, but I'm the type of person that finds that when you leave a story for too long, it can turn sour. Procrastinating can give you a lot of time for thought, and if you're like me, thought at a very early stage of a story can butcher it.

But I am one of the people that does usually need a plan, so I do try to plan pretty far. On one of my stories that was supposed to be some sort of horror, my character took over and made it into a sort of Science Fiction. With a lot of gore, I'll admit. :p

And before anyone says anything, I realsie this is a really old topic lol. It was just interesting.

Well, I definately agree with number 4. For me, (with the few pieces I finish) I always become really critical and judgemental and in the end, they turn out better than the first writing.

I think number 2 is also very true and 5 as well but there is some definate controvercy over 3.

Its more of an opion than anything else but I do agree. Some writers plan everything out in detail and others are more spontainous and don't plan. In the end, its more over ones preferance on how they write than a fact.

They are still good tips though.

I'm going to try a new tactic with the novel I'm going to start over the summer (hopefuly): I'm going to plan out a bit at the beginning, a bit somewhere in the middle, and a bit at the end, and nothing in between. I'm going to let my characters run the show for a while (while still having some amount of structure in the plot), and see if it works better than my unsucsessful attempts at writing books in the past. I guess that means I don't really agree with #3, as I am doing a good bit of planning. But too much isn't good either, then you have no room to let your characters make the story, not you alone.