I wrote my first million words the easy way: I didn’t know the rules!

When I tell people I am a writer, I often hear that others have always wanted to write a book. That isn’t my story.

I began my first novel without setting out to write one. After purchasing a new computer in 1993, I started writing a story to teach one of my daughters about word processing. When I got up the next morning and read those five innocent pages, I decided I liked the story, and I stayed with it until the page count reached a hefty (and unpublishable) 500 pages!

As I created those pages (and hundreds since), I fell into a strong learning curve, absorbing every bit of advice I could find about my new career. Books on writing became the main tools for developing my craft.

I learned the following ten essential lessons through these studies, and by talking to other writers, agents and editors:

1. For an idea to become a book, it has to be written down. This sounds simple. But think about all the people who say they want to write a book. The basic difference between those people and an author is that the author had the guts to put a story down on paper.

While I wrote my first manuscript, I knew nothing about point of view or three-dimensional characterization (For a downloadable Character Chart that will help you develop three-dimensional characters, click here). But I did know I wanted to write for the inspirational market, so I read How to Write (and Sell) a Christian Novel: Proven & Practical Advice from a Best Selling Author by Gilbert Morris, written from an author’s perspective, and The Complete Guide to Writing & Selling the Christian Novel by Penelope J. Stokes, Ph.D. penned from an editor’s perspective though Ms. Stokes is also an accomplished novelist. These books discuss spiritual issues for Christian writers and their story characters while teaching time honored principles for crafting excellent fiction—timing, motivation, dialogue, characterization, editing, revising, and plot development—the same as can be found in other writing reference books.

The first book I studied in depth was The Complete Guide to Writing Fiction and Nonfiction and Getting it Published, by Pat Kubis and Bob Howland. When I read this book, point of view and many other concepts became clear. The section on plotting helped me add reversals, complications and catastrophesdefinite musts in fiction.

Having begun as a seat-of-the-pants writer, I searched many years for a plotting device to simplify my work. Today, I recommend The Snowflake Method for Writing a Novel by Randy Ingermanson. Randy’s generous website contains help for writers at all levels. http://www.rsingermanson.com/html/the_snowflake.html. And for more on plotting, check out Plot & Structure by James Scott Bell http://www.jamesscottbell.com/.

Whether you consider yourself a seat-of-the-pants plotter, or you choose to devise and follow a strict outline, you must learn the next lesson if you want your writing to become published.

2. Books are not written; they are rewritten. (For more information on this subject, see Slimming the Fat Cat on this Web site, which highlights ways to trim an oversized manuscript to sellable proportions.)

No one can emphasize this lesson enough. I thought I had a book, until I learned to reduce, rearrange, rethink, restructure, and reword. Then I learned to expand, condense, connect, eliminate, tighten, and prune. Use strong verbs; eliminate excess adjectives; remove the forms of “to be” wherever possible. All these things are essential to sellable writing.

Fortunately for me, I found Getting the Words Right: How to Rewrite, Edit & Revise by Theodore Cheney, and Self-Editing for Fiction Writers by Renni Browne and Dave King. Reading those two books, I realized that getting my story down on paper was the easy part. Revising it developed the real creativity, the real art.

The more I learned, the more I found rewriting a hard, but pleasurable experience. I also discovered an important pitfall to avoid, which is lesson number three.

3. Passages can become overworked. This one caught me off guard. I groomed the opening scene of my first chapter until I grew a big, fat “purple patch” of prose. That’s what Jack Bickham calls “a pretty but cumbersome and distracting effort to get at the finest detail, when presentation of such detail isn’t necessary” in his book, The 38 Most Common Fiction Writing Mistakes (And How to Avoid Them).

In aiming for a hook (the promise that something different is happening), I crammed my initial pages full of description, adjectives, and flowery language. By doing so, I lost any chance of hooking anyone, let alone a publisher.

My need to understand how to write a better hook lead me to seek yet more information. And on and on it went. Fortunately, books like The First Five Pages by Noah Lukeman exist.

As you can already tell, much of what I’ve discovered about writing came by applying lesson four.

4. Read everything you can on writing. As a beginning writer, I didn’t know about workshops, conferences, or critique groups. I did what any determined entrepreneur does: I went to the bookstore to find out more about my craft.

Most writers attack bookstores by diving in and climbing through the shelves as if they were big zoos. I was no different. I discovered, in the reference section, several helpful books and magazines designed to empower me to rewrite what I already had begun.

I met Vickie Phelps, co-author of two writing books: Writing 101, a Handbook of Tips and Encouragement for Writers http://www.booklocker.com/books/661.html and How to Write for the Christian Marketplace http://www.writersweekly.com/books/65.html. Shortly thereafter, Vickie formed a critique group and I became a charter member. Vickie and I have been critique partners ever since.

I bought grammar books (my favorite is William Strunk, Jr. and E.B. White’s The Elements of Style, and I keep Webster;s NewWorld Guide to Punctuation—All the rules you need to know to punctuate correctly close at all times); writers’ market guides (published annually, Sally Stuart’s Christian Writers’ Market Guide http://www.stuartmarket.com/ and Writer’s Market from Writer’s Digest Books offer ideas, resources, and contact information to publishers and their manuscript needs); and, how-to books.

A comprehensive source for locating such reference tools is the Writer’s Digest Book Club—www.WritersDigestBookClub.com.

One of the most entertaining books I read is The Complete Guide to Writing Fiction by Conrad Barnaby and the staff of the Santa Barbara Writer’s Conference.

Several books on the craft I’d label as “best-ever.” My recommendations include The Plot Thickens by Noah Lukeman, Writing the Breakout Novel and accompanying workbook by Donald Maass, How to Grow a Novel and Stein on Writing by Sol Stein.

Most libraries carry reference materials and professional periodicals on writing such as:

• ByLine http://www.bylinemag.com/,
• Writer’s Digest http://www.writersdigest.com/, and
• The Writer http://www.writermag.com/wrt/.

I’ve found back issues at the used bookstore and my local library sometimes provides copies on the give-away table. I became a regular subscriber.

The American Christian Writers group http://www.ACwriters.com/ publishes The Christian Communicator magazine and Advanced Christian Writer newsletter.

Writing ezines are available online at the following Web sites: http://www.right-writing.com/, http://www.advancedfictionwriting.com/html/afwezine.html, and http://www.spiritledwriter.com/.

There’s no end to the materials available for honing a writer’s skills. With each book, newsletter, and article I digested, I applied new techniques to my manuscript. My personal reading habits changed along the way, too.

5. Read for pleasure---voraciously. This was not hard. Most writers love to read. A former pleasure became a contribution to my work. I had an excuse to indulge in the thing I loved most. Novels, newspapers, and magazine articles can teach you more about the craft.

I admit it. When I first started picking apart what I read to see how and why it worked, it stifled some of the enjoyment. Still, I continued asking questions: What keeps me reading this book? What keeps me turning the page? I tried to decide what caught my attention about a particular article as I thumbed through a magazine, and studied what enticed me to finish reading it.

Three novels I read dealt directly with a character’s personal writing careers:

• James Michner’s The Novel,
• Rene Gutteridge’s Ghost Writer http://www.renegutteridge.com/, and
• Angela Hunt’s The Proposal. (For an excellent article by Angela Hunt, see If You Want to Be a Writer http://www.christianbook.com/Christian/Books/cms_content/53722472?page=264&sp=1001)

Today, analyzing what I read is second nature. It no longer distracts me. I want to know; I want to learn.

6. Enroll in workshops. This is where you meet other writers, publishers, and editors.

You can find conference listings in professional writing magazines, on-line writing groups such as http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TheWritersView/ (a professional writers forum), and at Web sites like http://www.christianwritersinfo.net/conferences.htm, and http://www.stuartmarket.com/Conferences.html .

There are many excellent conferences, but I heartily recommend four from experience:

• The Colorado Christian Writers Conference http://www.writehisanswer.com/Colorado/index.html
• Mount Hermon Christian Writer’s Conference http://www.mounthermon.org/writers/
• The American Christian Fiction Writers Conference http://www.americanchristianfictionwriters.com/.
• ACFW Conferences http://www.ACwriters.com/ hosted by American Christian Writers. These one-day conferences, held annually in various locations around the United States, are a less intensive and inexpensive way to get started.

Before you sign up for a conference, be sure to read the information provided online and/or in printed brochures to discover how to schedule one-on-one meetings with editors and agents and how to get your writing samples critiqued. Find out which editors and publishing houses will be represented, then study their guidelines to determine if your writing matches their needs. Scholarship applications are often available upon request.

While attending workshops taught by professionals in the industry you’ll learn how to craft words and become published. Be assertive. Ask questions. Buy books at the book table. Chat with editors over meals. Ask other writers how they write. And take copious notes.

When you get home, correspond with those editors, authors, editors, and presenters to thank them for the gift they offered you. Then, get busy writing and applying what you learned.

7. Set a daily schedule to write. Write every day, and set specific goals. How many words do you want to write in a session? How many pages do you want to see spin off your printer? How many pages will you edit with a highlighter and pencil today? How much time will you devote to reading about writing so you’ll be better prepared tomorrow?

Some writers let the answering machine pick up all their calls. And they only check their e-mail at specified times of the day. I admit I don’t always achieve such a strict level of discipline.

The lack of human contact you experience while writing can make you feel isolated. So can trying to explain what you do with your time while you pound away at the computer keys.

8. Most people will not understand what you do (including your spouse and friends). It’s wonderful if you can find other writers to commiserate with; seek them out. Ask a bookstore manager if there are any local writers groups in your area. Many writing friends exist in cyberspace, connected by e-mail, writing groups, and blogs.

For an interesting look at Writing in Obscurity, check out this article by Mary DeMuth http://spiritledwriter.com/march2004/musings.html

Whether you find support or not, look the world in the eye and say without flinching, “I am a writer,” which leads me to the last two lessons I’ve learned.

9. Part of being a legitimate writer is collecting rejection slips. (The average person doesn’t understand this one either.) You must learn how to circulate your work. Perhaps you will be able to slipcover a sofa with your rejection slips, perhaps only a small ottoman. But you will receive enough, if you are determined, to cover something.

This is how the writer becomes a professional. It requires deductive market research. Published guides, such as the Writer’s Market and the Christian Writers’ Market Guide, can direct you to the right editors, agents, and publishers. Learn to write successful proposals, synopses, and query letters, then point them at the best possible targets

Then repeat this process until you reach your goals .

Three sources I found helpful for learning the fundamentals are How to Write Attention Grabbing Query & Cover Letters by John Wood, The Writer’s Digest Guide to Manuscript Formats by Dian Dincin Buchman & Seli Groves, and a Writer’s Digest pamphlet called, Getting Published: What Every Writer Needs to Know.

From experience, I can say it’s best to keep writing while waiting for a publisher’s response. That way you can have another manuscript ready to send out if the response isn’t positive for your initial submission.

The last lesson is crucial; you must stamp it on your heart.

10. I am a writer, published or not. Do not lose the vision for even a moment, because there is a wolf inside writers that threatens to get loose now and then. It growls in a vicious whisper, “If you were really a writer someone would buy your work.” It tells you that real writers could not have had this hard a time getting the words right. It mocks your dreams.

Kick that wolf. And then send it away. Remember that being a writer means you will regularly cycle through these ten lessons: You have to get it on paper for it to be a book; for it to be published, it has to be rewritten. And the third and the fourth . . . and so the cycle begins again. 

It’s a challenging and exhilarating journey to become a writer of excellence. And though the journey is fraught with ups and downs, it is worthwhile, and victories do come.  When they don’t come right away, the best thing to remember is a quote my writer friend, Paula Moldenhauer (http://www.soulscents.us) always shares:

 “Sometimes, courage is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying . . . ‘I will try again tomorrow.’”

Ten Lessons for New Writers from Pamela Dowd: