Now, I've been babbling about writing a novel since forever! I've been purchasing all kinds of courses and books to learn how to do it. Many years ago, I had two short stories published in major Danish magazines, but I've never written more than 60 pages of a novel. Never!
Why not?
Lack of believe in my abilities to do it… Lack of time… Lack of structure… Lack of… Oh, I just ran out of excuses.
And now, all of a sudden, I'm making progress in this area. Why?
I think I can thank two persons for that: Tiffany Dow and Michelle Spiva.
This is why, and this is what I've been writing today...
I Can't Say No to a Challenge, but more Importantly...
When I'm comitted, I'm committed.
Tiffany Dow came up with a Kindle Challenge: Write a page a day.
I can write a non-fiction book in a few hours, so in order to make this a real challenge for me, I decided to finally write my fiction book.
And I wrote it on Tiffany's blog.
And I repeated it here.
How can I back out now? It's much too late! The whole world knows about it! (Yeah, I know -- nobody probably care, but I do. I made a public promise, and I'm going to stick to it!)
This is why a challenge is so awesome! It makes you stick to the task you woved to do.
You can still join -- we're only on day three. Nobody is watching over your shoulder to check your homework, but it's a chance and a commitment for yourself.
Tiff even helps you get started… She's made a video explaining how you can find a topic to write about, and how to do the outline for your book.
But that's for non-fiction.
If you want to write fiction, like me, this time, you probably need more support, like I did.
Good Fiction Fast and Creative Writing for Kindle
Back in the 90's, I started to go for my dream more seriously.
Since I was a little girl, I've written stories. But highschool killed my imagination. In Denmark, all we seemed to be doing in the Danish lessons were to compare texts or to read and critisize texts, written by other authors.
No creative writing at all.
I only learnt one smart thing in Danish class during these three years and that was the importance of starting with an outline. It wasn't the teachers who made me realize that. It was one late evening, when I suddenly discovered that we had a written exercise to do to the morning after.
So I wrote the outline, and directly after I wrote the essay. Job done, and I got a nice grade from it.
Even though I felt that highschool had killed my imagination, I kept my dream about becoming a writer. A real writer, that is, which in my head is somebody who writes fiction.
So I joined courses, and I bought books. I have so many books about how to write novels and short stories and stuff, (Stephen King's "On Writing" is among the better ones) and yet -- all I managed to do was to write a few short stories and two have two of them published.
Then a while back, I heard about Michelle Spiva and her course "Good Fiction Fast". Fortunately, I took action right away, because shortly after, her course wasn't available no more. It's back online now, and you can get it here: malka.im/e/GFF
A few days ago, she released her second course, where she goes into details with what she taught in GFF. This one is called "Creative Writing for Kindle".
If you want to write fiction, get them both. Even if you've never written fiction before in your life.
Writing the Outline for my Novella
I make it easy for myself. My goal is not to write a novel (many, many words), but a novella (fewe words, but longer than a short-story). That way, I'm not stressing myself. If my novella ends up as a novel -- fine! If not -- fine, too!
Good Fiction Fast taught me a genius way to write the outline. Michelle Spiva teaches you how to use the W to make sure that you get the ups and down, crisis and quiet moments right.
And one of the points I've always been missing was to get from idea and the starting scene to actually outline the whole story from start to end.
And yet, thanks to Michelle, this is what I just did!
Instead of writing a page today, I decided to do what Michelle teaches and start with the outline.
I must confess that I got that idea, because I needed to read what I wrote yesterday, because I didn't remember how far I'd gotten. That made me realise that she says you DON'T have to waste time by re-reading earlier writings, when you have it all pinned out.
So that was my way of completing the challenge today. Now I know exactly where to go next, what to write about, etc. And I'll just write… I will NOT edit. Editing comes later.
Thanks Tiff and Michelle!
Oh, by the way, I received an email last night from a guy who works 12 hours a day -- EVERY day! And he said he would join me in this Kindle challenge.
If he can do it, so can you. Please join! It's so much fun, and at the end of a month, you will have a book to show the world.
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
I’m in on the Kindle publishing challenge too. Good luck on your project!
I’ve always wondered about outlines for fiction. I don’t have much experience writing stories, but I’ve always heard about writers who start their story with a plan, or at least a very definite idea of where the plot should go, then ended up going another direction entirely because either a better idea came along, or the characters revolted and took matters into their own hands. What happens then?
Thanks for your comment, and good luck with the challenge. It’s good to hear from someone else who’s in.
Yes, from what I’ve heard it’s rather normal that a story doesn’t completely follow the plot. This is a good thing, because it often means that the characters in the story took on their own life and changed the story along the way.
Stephen King never has a plot, he says (or writes – in “On Writing”).
He just sits down and writes, and the characters start to gain life.
While I love his characters, the ends of his stories are not always totally successful, I think. Especially his trilogy “It” disappointed me a lot. If he’d had a plot, he might have been able to twist the story in a different direction earlier on, so that it didn’t have to end with a giant space octopus (or was it spider?).
Are you writing fiction or non-fiction for this Kindle challenge?
Mine is nonfiction. But I toy with the idea of writing fiction, too. Every now and then a scene, a character, or the beginning of a story idea pops into my head. Right now, all I want to do is finish something.
I agree with you about Stephen King. When it comes to characters and setting up a scene, he’s a fantastic writer. But his endings have had a way of disappointing me too. I like his writing when he’s being a bit subtle and playing up the psychological fears. When things just feel *wrong* in ways you almost can’t always explain. But when he gets to the big finales and pulls out all the stops, it doesn’t always come out right.
An example from The Shining: Topiaries that may or may not be moving around and screwing with your head can be disturbing. But if one of those bushes unquestionably comes to life and gnaws on someone’s head, it becomes a bit silly. But then that could just be my own weird preferences as a reader kicking in.