Writing is good for the soul. When life is getting stressful and you need a place to share your feelings, writing is perfect. A good book is something we all enjoy now and again, but have you ever been reading a book and wished that you could write your own?
Today we want to show you how writing your own novel is truly within reach, and our tips will help guide your process to creating a fiction book of your own.
Take Inspiration from others
When you sit down to write a book it can be difficult to come up with ideas or figure out your own writing style. This is why using the best book apps to read books and gain some inspiration can be a great idea. It is important to know that taking inspiration from another author is not plagiarism, as long as you bring their style of flavor to your own ideas you can make something really amazing.
Let ideas strike any time
The most important thing about writing a book is allowing ideas to come to you at any time. Writing is a difficult thing and you may go weeks without having a great idea, but when you are listening to a song; in the shower; or doing chores the idea may strike. When you get an idea always write it down and come back to it later before you forget!
Always keep a notepad on hand
Following on from the last point, always keep a notepad handy when you are writing a book. You never know when amazing ideas are going to strike and you must be prepared to note them down. Even if the idea seems insignificant at the time, write it down and come back to it. A lot of the time you’ll be able to mold ideas into your story or save them for a different book later down the line.
Build characters
Story is the overarching narrative of a book and is important, however, your characters are the heart and soul of a novel. When creating book characters you need to think of how they will be perceived by the reader. Will your readers want to support and follow the character’s story? Are your readers supposed to hate a character? Take some time to write a list of different main characters and side characters for your story. Against the main characters, you’ll want a visual description, personality, and story arc. With side characters, you simply need visual, personality, and their relationship to the main characters.
Think about relationships
Relationship is a crucial part of a book. The basis of story beats will depend on the relationship your characters have with each other, such as friends, romantically involved, family, or enemy. Consider how all of your characters fit together. If you are writing a fantasy-style book with many different families and history; drawing a family tree can be incredibly helpful and will give you something to refer to as you write.
Create your own fantasy world… or real world
Once you have created characters for your book, creating a world for them to live in is next. There are two ways you can go with this; either pick a real-world location or create your own.
If you are using a real location you should take time to research it. For example, if your book is set in London, you will want to pick a part of London and know what parks, pubs, cafes, and locations are in this area so that you can use them during your book.
If you are building your own world, get out a pen and paper and draw something out. If you consider GRRM’s Westeros as an example, it has a huge map with cities, towns, villages, and other locations that he refers to throughout the book. As your characters are traveling, it can be so helpful to have a map like this to show where you are moving in real-time. Make your world feel real and allow people to believe they are there when they read the book.
Break it down
Writing a book can be a daunting task, and after the initial planning phases, you may sit down at your computer and feel overwhelmed. Sometimes, the best way to write a book is to plan chapters, as well as scenes within chapters, and write one at a time. In OneNote, you can create a book, chapters, and pages that can include different scenes. Let’s say in chapter 1 your main character will leave their home and head on a journey.
You can break this down into 3 smaller scenes:
- Character wakes up feeling nervous and apprehensive about something
- Character decides to pack up their things and leave home
- Character is faced with the outside world for the first time, something happens
As you can see, adding more detail and breaking a chapter down is easier for you to follow as well as less daunting. You could write each of these sections in a few hours, using a page or two for each.
You don’t have to write in order!
When breaking down your book into smaller sections, there is one more thing that is important to know: you don’t have to write from chapter 1 until the end. Although it is natural to write chronologically, it can sometimes leave you with writer’s block if you reach a section where not much is happening. If this happens to you, skip to an action-packed chapter and write that instead. It is better for you to write sections as they come to you and then edit them together later than spend weeks stuck on one section of your book.
Have fun
The most important thing to remember when writing a book is to have fun. This is your pet project, your baby, and you have the power to change the story in any way you want. If you don’t like a scene, change it! If you want to skip to something more fun, do it! Allow your mind to guide you and have fun.
Mocha Girl Alysia
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