Advice to New Writers

Source: mzbworks

The main way to get started as a writer is to write: apply the seat of the pants firmly to the seat of the chair and just get down to it. Having a thousand good ideas in your head is no good; you have to get them on paper. Just sit down and do it.

There is no magic secret; writing is like everything else; ten percent inspiration or talent, and ninety percent hard work. Persistence; keeping at it till you get there.

A thousand pages sounds like a lot. But write three pages a day and a year from now you will have a book.

There are a few things you have to learn that is learn to type. You do not need a computer, or a thousand dollars worth of word processing equipment, but you should beg, borrow, or steal a typewriter. No editor will read a manuscript that does not look professional

Professional training. Forget the creative writing classes in school or college; if the writer is a good-selling professional he should be selling, not teaching, and if he is not, he has nothing to teach you. On the other hand, don't go for extensive mail order writing courses. Stay out of amateur writing workshops where amateurs sit around and read their failures to each other. Twenty times zero is still zero. Never listen to criticism from anyone unless they can sign a check. Never mind what your best friend, or your aunt, or your English teacher thinks. Trust only professional criticism and read a couple of good books on technique.

When you finish your book, wrap it up, and send it to an editor who publishes that kind of book. Agents? You do not need one till you have a good track record of sales; in fact, most reputable agents will not touch you till you have sold a lot of work. The kind of agent a beginner can get, you are better off without.