I recently downloaded a Kindle ebook written by mystery, thriller, and horror writer J.A. Konrath. It’s titled, “The Newbie´s Guide to Publishing." It's a huge book with over 370,000 words of writing advice, tips, tricks, and observations. That's more than 1100 pages. It's the biggest book on writing and publishing ever put together.
Joe Konrath has written over 100 books, and he says he earns most of his income from ebooks that are read on Kindle Unlimited, and he’s sold more than 25,000 copies of his self-published ebooks.
I've been reading this ebook and have come across some worthwhile advice about writing fiction that I thought every writer would find valuable.
I made a list of 40 tips and tricks about writing that I thought would be the most helpful. I've divided the list into 4 sets of 10 tips, and I'll publish each set over the next four weeks.
So here are the first 10 writing tips from J A Konrath:
1. When writing a book, have a set daily word count to reach (he aims to write between 3,500 and 4,000 words a day). Don't turn on the internet until you've written your first 1,000 words, while you have a short break. Reach your word count no matter what, even if you're tired, it's late, and you want to go to bed.
2. Be entertaining.
3. If you’re paralysed with fear that your book sucks, do the following:
▪ When in doubt, keep writing anyway.
▪ Tell your internal editor to shut up until you’ve reached the end.
▪ Remember that you’re often a poor judge of your own work.
4. “I’m an advocate of cutting everything non-essential to the story. It’s the Kill Your Darlings School of Writing. If it ain’t needed, trim it.”
5. “Make each chapter, each paragraph, each word essential.”
6. “Well-drawn characters are important in fiction. If a reader doesn’t care about the protagonist and antagonist, it doesn’t matter how many roller-coaster twists the plot has. As writers, it’s our duty to make our characters memorable.”
7. One of the best ways to motivate yourself to write is by preparing an outline. “Here's the thing; if you already have a template, you don't need motivation, and you don't get blocked. It's like painting by numbers. What an outline does is offer you a template. You simply need to fill in the colour.”
8. “In my books, I try to keep raising the stakes, constantly introduce conflict (both internal and external) . . . . Each scene has to have a point, a reason for existing. It has to fulfil some kind of purpose—reveal clues, enhance character, add suspense, raise tension, ratchet up the conflict.”
9. Your protagonist has to have a goal (or goals); that is, a dream or something that they desperately want. The plot centres on your protagonist’s attempts to achieve those goals. However, you need to make sure that your protagonist doesn’t achieve his or her goals until the very end, and maybe add a surprise twist in the end by thinking, "What would no one expect could happen next?"
In the meantime, torture your protagonist as much as you can. At every turn, ask yourself: “How can I make things worse for the protagonist?” (As another writer put it, chase your protagonist up a tree and then throw rocks at them.)
10. “Make sure the first chapter starts with action.”
... And there you have it. 10 ideas to make your writing great and the whole process simple.
I'll have 10 more for you next week.
