Q&A for How to Write a Book

Focus on spreading the word! When you first publish a book, it's easy to think that everyone's going to want to know about it and be interested in it. But then, you realize that you're fighting for a little bit of attention in this great space of information we have nowadays. Word of mouth makes a tremendous impact—it builds slowly, and with good books, it can really make a difference.

There are a lot of different ways to write a book and everyone has their own particular way of doing it. Some people get their idea in the shower or when they're driving to work. Other people are more conscious and deliberate and look for story ideas in the newspaper or a prompt. Once you get a story idea, you have to decide whether you need to write it. Is it something you can't not write? Then, you write it.

Having a community of other writers really helps. They encourage you and keep you accountable and maybe in the future give feedback or networking help. You can get things published because people introduce you to other people who are editors or agents. As for writing the book, the main way is like the famous quote by William Faulkner: "Writing is 99% perspiration, 1% inspiration."

Decide on your idea and show up to write every day in a determined fashion. Having a goal and a deadline helps by putting pressure on your writing. Once you get to the publication step, you'll have to revise and get feedback from others and your editors, which is a long journey. You can, of course, self-publish your book, which is usually the easiest way.

It doesn't matter. It can be the author, publisher, a friend, or someone paid to make it. The important thing is that it looks appealing and makes the book marketable.

Get a friend or family member to read the chapter and ask what they think would be a good name for the chapter. Think to yourself: what is the chapter about? What significant thing happens in the chapter? Is there any small line of the chapter you particularly love that you might be able to turn into a chapter title?

You have to type the book into the computer manually. It is tedious, but the end result is glorious.

Think of the genres with which you are familiar. What types of stories do you enjoy? Most writers prefer to write stories they'd like to read themselves.

Brainstorm. Write the book first, then an idea might pop up. Make sure it connects to the story, for example, don't give a romance title to a horror book. Read further: How to Come Up with a Good Book Title .

One option is to base your story on a real event. Or, you can look at photos or movies and other books for inspiration. Another approach is to stop worrying about the plot and form it as you write. About a quarter of the way in, stop and reformulate the plot from what your writing has inspired you with, then reshape as needed.

Plan out ahead of time what the story will be for each book. Make sure the series is going somewhere. Like in Harry Potter, the story keeps on building until the showdown between Voldemort and Harry.

It happens. Keep notes of your brainstorming and workings, so that if you ever really had to, you can show the inner workings of how you go to the story. The reality is that humanity builds upon the stories, legends and histories we are all taught from a young age, along with cultural tales intended to keep us acculturated. This tends to seep in deeply, so there are bound to be similarities in many stories we tell, it is only when we deliberately copy another writer's exact plot, characters and motivations that originality gets breached. If it does happen, get a lawyer well versed in intellectual property and don't be bullied by people who make more noise than offering proof.

Just start making your chapters more detailed like if you were saying that your main character was traveling on horseback to a town three days away, show more about the journey.

It depends on the publisher, but many publishers require you to submit a manuscript in a specific format. That generally means typing and formatting it on a computer, then either printing it out to give/send to the publisher or submitting it online. So it's safest it you type it on a computer.

As long as it fits the characters' emotions or the situation, it's fine to use curse words in books intended for your age group. Anyway, you're the author and it's totally up to you what kind of language you want to use.

Kill off a few main characters. Get readers really attached to the character(s), then kill them off. After that, write a about how life goes on without them. Foreshadowing their deaths makes the readers even sadder, because they refuse to accept their deaths and will learn to love the character(s) and/or get emotionally attached to them. They will forget all about the foreshadowing of their death(s), and when the character(s) die, the disappointment will be intense.

Brainstorm for a while and write down anything that comes to mind. Then, try to pick the main ideas of your book. Once you have main ideas, try to organize them in logically based on the kind of book you want to write.

Writer's block is the condition of being unable to think of what to write or how to proceed with writing.

Put a more adult-oriented picture on the front and put an 18+ warning inside on the first page of your book. Make sure it looks too long for children to read so parents won't buy it for them. You can ask for it to be placed in the mature section at book stores.

Choose a place in your life where you would like to start, and go from there. Write it as if you were living it. For more ideas, read How to Write a Biography .

Well, something I usually do is try to see why I'm stuck. Is it just a lack of ideas, or is it something else? What happened before you started writing this chapter? If you're stuck because of something you've already written, change it. If it's just a lack of ideas, try to relax for a bit. Ask friends or family to read a part of your book (or all of it if you want them to) and ask them how they would want the story to continue. You could also figure out where you want the story to end up, start writing from there and go backwards.

A good starting sentence for any book would be something that hooks a reader in - like in one of my personal favorites, "Story Thieves" by James Riley, it says: "Owen wanted to scream at the horror before him." But you have to come up with your own idea. You can't use a starting sentence that has already been used for another book. It has to be related to your story, and it has to be in your own style.

Just reread what you already wrote. Try to clear your mind and take yourself back to that original train of thought. If you still can't remember the idea, then ditch it. Come up with something new.

It depends on what you mean by "based on." If you mean that you just had an idea from the music video and have come up with your own story, then that would be fine. But if you are using the events from the music video as part of the story, or using characters/real people from the music video as characters, you may be violating copyrights or trademarks.

Yes! Novellas are shorter books, but they are more common in the romance genre. You can really write any length of book that you like, but if it's very short, it will be harder to get it published by a traditional publishing company. This article can give you some more information: How to Write a Short Novel .

Just keep writing. Even if you think your story is bad, you can always change it later. The more you write, the better your stories will become. Keep in mind that you cannot please everyone!

You can partner up with someone and cowrite the book using each others strengths. You can also can find a perspective that matches your needs (ex. if you don't like to write formally, write it from an eight-year-old's perspective, or write a short story or poem instead of a long novel). You can tell your ideas as stories instead of writing them as books and finally you're probably going to need to write something down at some point, so maybe just suck it up, be patient and write it.

Yes, but it would be very difficult and messy. You should try to plan at least a few elements of your story, like the main characters and the primary conflict. You may also want to have a friend or family member read through each chapter as you finish it to ensure that you don't have any plot holes.

That would be a great way to get an example of how things are done! You could pick up many tips by reading books by some of the top authors.

You could, although if you have already picked the names and revise later, you'll have to change the name completely.