How to write a book

How to write a book

Step 1.Pour yourself a glass of wine.Step 2.Contemplate what your story is about.Think of a title.• Harry meets Sally

Create a log-line: (what the hell is a log-line?).{see tips at http://wizardsforauthors.com/log-line-tips/ }• A beautiful woman seeks romance and finds a dark side.

Realize that everything above is probably wrong, except for the wine. Before you’ve submitted your manuscript, you’ll change everything multiple times. So don’t try for perfection, just write something down. You’re a writer! Lie!

How to write a bookStep 3.If you’ve completed step 2, have a sip of wine. Good job.Think about the leading characters, the protagonist(s):• Harry, a handsome fellow• Sally, a beautiful womanIf you have Cheetaah for Writers, use Character Wizard to document your characters, otherwise use a spreadsheet.

How to write a bookStep 4.Lets create a skeleton manuscript. If you have Cheetaah for Writers, use Novel Wizard to just do it. If not, format a Word document according to the Chicago Manual of Style or Writers Market format guide lines.

How to write a bookStep 5.Create an outline.But first, have another sip of wine.1. Some writers abhor an outline and refuse to do it. Some

say their characters have a mind of their own.2. Others can’t write without an outline and adhere to it to

the bitter end.3. Some use the outline as a rough guide and modify it as

they go. Nothing is frozen in concrete.I recommend that you follow the third choice. If you have Cheetaah, you can use the Plot Wizard to create your outline. We will show you how.

Enter a description of the first scene (or first chapter) depending on how much detail you wish in your outline.

How to write a bookStep 5a.Continue making your outline.When you need to create a new chapter, at the end of your last paragraph of text, press the enter key ONCE. This will put you at the beginning of a new empty paragraph. Click New Chapter. You will now be at the beginning of the next chapter. The Wizard will insert the correct chapter number.If you’re using Plot Wizard, note that the scene point text can be hidden. As you add new chapters, or insert chapters between existing chapters, the Wizard keeps everything in order, renumbering chapters as you go along.At first you might only have three chapters: beginning, middle, and end. As you write your chapters, you can insert new chapters, and all the subsequent chapters will automatically renumber, and your outline will adjust accordingly.Once you’ve completed your first pass at an outline, use the Plot Wizard’s Create Outline Doc. Save it and print it.As you develop your manuscript and modify the scene points, you can use Create Outline Doc. for an update.

Outline created by Plot Wizard

How to write a book

Step 6.Have another sip of wine.Begin with the first scene.• Don’t start with a Prologue. It’s usually a lazy author’s info

dump that many readers skip anyway.• Don’t start with the weather or “It was a dark and stormy

night.”• Start in medias res, in the midst of things, in the action, in

the conflict. Don’t start with a travelogue with the trees and ocean. Start with the action.

• Don’t tell us backstory. Wait until chapter three.Try to get the first paragraph, the first page, to jump out. Let it provide INTRO, the Irresistible Need To Read On.While you may not get the first page perfect on the first pass, you will get it perfect before an agent accepts it for consideration. For more information on how to write a great novel, see the recommended books at http://wizardsforauthors.com/books/Now, don’t buy them and put them in the bookcase. You must do more than read them, you must study them.

How to write a book

Step 7.Write the rest of your novel.This is a first draft. • Don’t worry about minor grammar or spelling mistakes.• Get the story down.• Do worry about characterization.

• Your hero/heroine can’t be boring or a jerk• Your antagonist can’t be boring.

• Do worry about the story plot.• Ensure threads and subplots are carried through• Use red herrings, disinformation, where appropriate.• Every scene must move the story forward.• No scene should be filler, backstory only, or info dump.• The should be dramatic tension on every page. (There is no

such thing as too much tension)

• Update your outline. Review the outline. Is it a good story? Will the reader care? Is the tension? Is there INTRO?

How to write a book

Step 8You’ve finished the first draft! Aren’t you proud?

Before reading the next few lines, drink both glasses of champagne.

• Ernest Hemingway said, “First drafts are shit!” He rewrote the ending to A Farwell to Arms 39 times.

• Sol Stein, editor to many famous writers, said he never saw a first draft that was publishable.

If you thought you could clean up the spelling and a few commas before shipping it off to the literary agent, you’re mistaken. There’s still a lot of work to be done.

Writing is rewriting and rewriting and rewriting.Now, wipe the tears away, and do the following.Put the manuscript away for a couple of weeks. Take a vacation from writing.

How to write a book

Did you enjoy the vacation?Now comes the rewrite, the self-editing.First: Developmental Editing• Developmental Editing is a significant structuring or

restructuring of a manuscript's discourse.• You can do it through a GOOD critique group, hire

someone, or do it yourself.• Developmental editors offer specific suggestions about the

core intentions and goals of the book, the underlying premise, the story, character development, use of dialogue and sensory description, the polish, narrative voice, pacing, style, language. They don’t do grammar and spelling.

• You must be willing to kill your darlings, that is, those wonderful scenes you love, but don’t really move the story forward. You must chop, move, change. The result may be so changed that it doesn’t resemble the original first draft.

• We recommend Writing the Blockbuster Novel by Albert Zuckermen as a guide to this type of editing.

How to write a book

SecondLine and Copy EditingWhen you’re finalized the story in the previous steps, you need to clean up the manuscript. Here you check for grammar, word usage, format, spelling, legal issues, etc.

If you’re using Cheetaah, you can engage Grammar Wizard. However, before doing so, use Burster Wizard to burst your contiguous manuscript into separate chapter-files. Run Grammar Wizard on the first chapter. Make corrections as needed, and instruct the Wizard to skip anything you know you don’t have a problem with. For example, if you’re sure you don’t confuse can and may, indicate that in an early chapter, and the Wizard won’t flag it thereafter.Even after you’ve made all the corrections you can find, you need to have someone else review your work, for our eyes only see the words in our head, not the words on the paper.

How to write a book

Finally.Have another sip of wine.

You’re ready to market your book.

You now must spend a considerable amount of effort in preparing your submission package you will send to literary agents, publisher editors, and the like. Again, writing is rewriting. Expect to rewrite your submission package until it’s perfect.

While marketing is beyond the scope of this presentation, don’t fail to spend the time and effort here.

So many writers spend a year writing their manuscript, and ten minutes on the query letter, synopsis, log-line, blurb, and proposal.