Advice to Writers

People often ask me, either in interviews or at book-signings, what advice I'd give to "aspiring writers." I always reply that I'd give the same advice to any writer, no matter what their stage of professional development.

There are three "rules" to writing:

1. Read

Read a lot. Reading is how you develop critical judgment as a writer. It's also one way--and quite possibly the best way--of learning technique.

People often say to me, "But how do I know that what I'm writing is any good?"

Bearing in mind that "good" is not necessarily the same thing as "salable"--you know that your own writing is good, in the same way that you know whether any book is "good." Is it interesting? Do you want to know what happens next? Or are you bored, and keep saying to yourself, "What's the matter with this person, why can't they spell?"

There are, of course, lots of different kinds of "good." There are books that may be written with a minimum of skill, but the story and characters are so interesting that it doesn't matter. There are books that are written with great beauty of phrase and lyricism of word--in which Not One Damn Thing happens (literary critics are particularly fond of this kind of book).

Ergo, what you--you, personally--think is a "good" book may not be what someone else thinks is a good book--but there's no reason why your critical judgement cannot be developed to recognize quality of any kind. Beyond that, the reader's personal preferences come into play, and everyone knows that there's no accounting for tastes!

2. Write!

The only way to learn to write is to...er...write. This is a Truly Awful thing to realize, but I'm afraid it's so. You can read all the How-to books in the world, attend zillions of workshops and seminars and classes, do tons of research--and none of it counts for anything, unless you get words on paper.

And if you are getting words on paper, none of the rest of it is important. (This is not to say that How-to books or classes are in any way detrimental; they're very helpful to some people, at some points in their development. It's just that such things are subsidiary, and not in any way essential to learning to write. Writing is.)

Writing is as much a process of self-discovery as it is anything else. To be successful, you need to know first what you want to write, and secondly, how to write it. Reading is one way of determining what you really want to write.

If you think you want to write highly literary fiction, but you find yourself gravitating toward gory mysteries, your subconscious is undoubtedly telling you something (there are such things as literary mysteries, after all). If you like historical fiction, but tend to put down any book that doesn't contain a strong romantic element--maybe you should look into historical romances, even if you've never read one before.Conversely, if there are certain types of books that you can't force yourself to finish--don't try. Writing is a labor of love--there certainly are no guarantees of publication, still less of fame and fortune--so you'd better love what you write, or you won't get far.There are as many different ways of writing--that is, of going about the business of getting words on paper--as there are writers. This is basically a process of playing mind-games with yourself. There are no hard-and-fast rules, though there are a lot of commonly useful techniques. However, remember that there is no "rule" you can't break (except for my three!).

And Gabaldon's Rule NumberThree is:

3. Don't Stop.

Writing is largely a matter of persistence. No matter how bad you are to start with, if you keep doing it, you will get better. No guarantees that you'll get good enough to publish, but you will definitely get better. And who knows? You might be very good to start with--some people are.

Common Misapprehensions About What a Writer Does

I was donating platelets at the blood bank a year or two ago, with various of the technicians all standing round chatting to me (the procedure takes 90 minutes, and once they have you properly punctured, there's not much for them to do, but they can't leave, in case you pass out or the machine goes berserk and won't give your blood back (both of which have happened to me on previous occasions)).

One of the phlebotomists politely asked, "Do you have to write your own books, or do you just come up with the ideas, and then somebody else writes them?"

At this, my remaining blood shot up into my brain, but I replied with equal politeness that no, I unfortunately had to write the books myself. I mention this because there does seem to be a common notion that it's the ideas that are the important part of writing a book. Every single writer I know has had the experience of having someone come up to them at a conference or book-signing, to say that they (the person) has a great idea for a book--either a wonderful plot idea, or a terrific story (usually something that happened to the person or someone in his family). Their proposal is that they'll tell the writer this terrific idea or story, the writer will "put it on paper," and they'll split the profits from the resulting best-seller.

Well. [cough]

I'm sorry, but it doesn't work that way. Ideas are the easy part. Every single writer I know has more ideas than he or she could possibly write down, if they lived to be older than Methusaleh. They don't really need any more.

People quite often write to me, explaining that they have this marvelous story, and I am (they think) just the person to write it. I have to reply (politely) that at the rate I write, it normally takes me 2-3 years to finish a book, and I have several books under contract at present--plus a good many more warming up out in the wings. Why would I abandon my own stories to write theirs?

If you think that you have a good story, or a story you want told--then try writing it. It's your story, and no one can tell it like you can. It may or may not end up being a salable story, but publication is really not the only point of writing (though I grant you, it's nice). A lot of people are convinced that they can't write, so someone else has to tell this story for them. To which I can only reply that nobody KNOWS they can write a book, until they try it and see.