Someone is always asking me for advice on how to write. I’ve written a quick list on some basic writing tips that can help you along in your journey. These are some guidelines that have helped me. Feel free to add your own hints and tips at the end. We can always use new ideas. Thank you.
(P.S. These tips/hints are in no particular order)
• Always use a dictionary, a thesaurus and if need be a rhyming dictionary. They all help us spell properly as well as build up our vocabulary. I’ve heard some writers say it’s like cheating to use these items. I say, see how you feel if you go to a mechanic and he tells you it would be cheating if he used his tools to work on your vehicle.
• Learn how to properly space your work out. Thatmeansdon’thaveanentirestoryorpoeminonegiganticorlongparagraph. As the reader, no one wants to read a never-ending sentence. Just like no one wants to hold a conversation with a person who doesn’t know when to stop talking. Give your story a moment to breathe between sentences and events within it self.
• Make smooth transitions from one event to the next within your work. As a reader, no one likes to read that they are in one place one minute and without notice they find themselves in a different place within the story. As writers, we’ll leave our readers feeling lost, confused and disconnected from our characters. Build a bridge that is going to carry your readers safely over from one side of your story/poem to the next.
• Proofread and use spell check. This isn’t back in the 1980’s or years before where we had very limited access to a computer and you just had to be a good speller. We all have access to some of the best technology money can buy and it each affords us the spell check function. Use it with everything you write. How can you convince someone your story/poem is ahsum when you can’t even spell awesome?
• Read your story/poem out loud. That’s right, hear what you’ve written. If you find yourself stumbling over words and finding it difficult to be able to get through your own piece, how do you think your reader is going to feel when they read it? Take time out to read your work out loud. This will show you when you need to emphasize within your work or where it needs to be relaxed. This also gets you in touch and in tuned with your characters.
• Get someone to read your work. Get an intelligent, trusted friend (or two) to read what you’ve written and give you feedback. Don’t get someone who you know will agree and like whatever you’ve written because that doesn’t help you to grow as a writer. Get someone who is going to give you honest feedback that is going to challenge you, as well as help you grow. A ‘yes-man’ is not needed when you are trying to get your work read by the public.
• Research, research, research. Research before, during and after what you write. Don’t write a story or poem that has your character on the internet and your story is set back in 1975.
• Read. Yes, you have to read the work of other great writers, writers from other genres as well as the genre that you’re writing in. You can’t call yourself a true mystery writer and yet you don’t read the books of other great writers in that same group. This also gives you a chance to find out who some of the best of the best are from early years to the most recent. You may find many different styles that you may want to include in your work as well throughout your writing career.
Remember, to always represent yourself through your work the best way you can. Keep in mind, sometimes the only way a person knows you as a writer is through something they may have read that’s been passed on, that they have purchased or something that has been posted anywhere on the internet. You want to have the best reputation out here as a writer so don’t sell yourself cheap and don’t try to make your readers and fans accept cheap.
I hope this has helped. Remember if you have some tips of your own please list them. We’d love to hear from you. Thank you.
Erotically Speaking,
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