HOW do you become a good writer? And what are you writing write now?

Is there a formula, or a do's and don'ts list people should remember when writing their stories?

Do you have to have a good plot, or well written characters, or maybe be really descriptive about the setting that the reader feels that they are actually there?

I am asking because I have a story I want to tell, but hell, I'm not a writer! Sometimes when I write, it feels like I couldn't write my way out of a wet paper bag! I feel like giving up a lot of the time.

What I was thinking was - are there a lot of writers out there that do what William Shatner does?, i.e. he comes up with stories plot, and ideas, then gets a REAL writer to write his story because he suxxx!!! Is this what they call a "ghost writer?" And how many of these people can actually be considered "writers"?

Also, I was wondering what you guys are writing right now. I've only heard passing mention of some of your projects. For example, I know Diacanu is (was) writing Heck Backlash, which I enjoyed quite a lot, and I am interested in hearing about that space universe Cassandra has been on and off writing, but what about the rest of you? What are your projects, how are they going, and what struggles are you going thru with ideas, etc.

Maybe bouncing ideas off each other might help a bit.

There's no formula. Everyone works differently. Some people write a first draft and don't change a word until they're done, some people don't. Some people outline everything in painstaking detail, some people don't.

I think the only way to become a good writer is to write all the time. My breakthrough was when I realized that the worst writing on paper is better than the best writing in your head. It's not going to be good until it's bad, and a first draft doesn't have to be good. It just has to be done.

What am I writing now? I just finished a screenplay that I'm hoping will get me representation. I also write and produce a sketch comedy show here, so I wrote a new piece for that.

I don't know about "good", writer, but utterly absent any resources like, say, a school, or a mentor, or training of any sort, I've had to study TV, books, comics, movies, etc, to try to unwravel the clockwork guts of writing, so at the least I'm not a parrot mimicking the sounds of writing.
At least, that's what I'm aiming for.
It's probably all squeaks and pops on you people's end as far as I know.

I'd personally never introduce myself as a writer or nothin unless I had like 10 novels published, at least 5 of em bestsellers, and at least 2 of 'em movies.

Y'know, it's like how the black guy has to work twice as hard, I figure I gotta work at least octuple the times to be even real.

As for what I'm working on, well, NaNoWriMo, which is one scene told from several points of view as interconnected vignettes.

With that formula, it could be anything, but in this case, it's a vampire walking into a bar.

Then comes Heck 2, then a bunch of Heck/Torrentverse spinoff short stories.

Course, Heck2 is really about a spinoff character trying to find Heck, and he doesn't show up til the end, so don't hold your breath for Heck1 but more of it.

The biggest of the spinoff stories will be the origin story of the Volcano Guru which will have so much time travel, it'll make Torrent 2 look like a popup book.

Course, I technically shouldn't be talking, since I'm not a writer yet, but my name was mentioned, so I thought maybe you were anticipating an answer, so I wanted to be polite.

Pop click squeak?

All the experts agree the best method is--to write!

Depends.

The world would be a better place if Vonda McIntyre had adopted this tactic...

Precious little.

Speaking of worst writing on paper, I suppose I should get back to NaNoWriMo.

*Grumble, shiver, wipes away shame tear*

I'm working on (editing at this point) a paper describing some fossil arthropod trackways and discovering that no one really knows what they hell they are or why they call the what they call them.

I'm also doing the NaNoWriMo thing, a couple days behind because I had another fun and painful medical procedure done to me, which always throws me off wanting to do anything.

Other than that, most of my creativity this fall has been musical in nature. My lyrics kind of suck most of the time, but I always seem to get the songs stuck in my head, along with the funky guitar beats...


I don't have a method, really. I've been doodling around with my journal more this fall since I've been out of commission for work or riding my bicycle or running or anything like that--mostly random trains of thoughts. I find that writing more just feels good to me and makes me feel like I am getting somewhere. It also keeps me from getting too wrapped up in the writing style of whomever I happen to be reading currently.

As NAHTMMM says: write.

Y'know the old joke "How do you get to Carnegie Hall?"

Also, read. A lot. Who are your favorite writers? Reread their stuff and figure out how they do it. Not saying imitate them, but just get a feel for why their words slide so easily along the page and, say, a writer that you really hate makes reading a chore.

I went through a phase where Mamet was the playwright to end all playwrights (which he sort of is) so my writing at the time was just straight up mimicing. It was shameless. Which might be why I never finished the play I was writing at the time.

I think I'm finding my own style now. God knows if it's any good. But at least it's mine.

Damn! I'm halfway finished with my Fossil Arthropod Follies musical screenplay. I better get cracking before you lure away Gary Coleman, Ted Danson, Bea Arthur and all my other A List talent!

Practice practice practice.

As mentioned above, mimicry is great practice. Find a distinctive writer you like, read a book or story, and than try and emulate their style, their flow.

As for stories themselves, I'm a big believer in outlines. Ideally, you have the entire story told and all the characters in it before you begin writing. If you have that, or close to that, the writing becomes decidely easy, as you're simply filling in the blanks.

I think it's also important to remember that editing will come later. So when you're first writing, write. Don't over-worry about word choices or clunky sentences. Keep writing. The story is the most important thing in the first draft. Tightening the writing comes later.

Take these two pieces of advice together: An outline and a clear awareness of a first draft -- and you should never have writer's block, since you know the story you're writing, and you won't let any temporary mental roadblock stop you.

Finally, and I got this from Henry Miller, is if you're really going to write, do so methodically. Try to write at the same time every day (perferably morning) and for the same amount of time every day. Miller was a big proponent of stopping when your alotted time was up, in order to avoid burn out. And really, 2-4 hours of writing a day is usually more than enough.

I've always wanted to really outline a story first. Scary though. I typically write until a story comes out, usually the characters tend to make their own problems they need to resolve, without my help. But this is from all the short plays I've written (they were comedy, of course) rather than novels. Mostly I have a problem writing dialogue, which, for someone with a history of theatre you would think would be the easiest thing, but I always tend to fall back on either grosssly satirical characters or physical humor. I think the world has lost a lot of respect for physical humor in plays.

There's something that always got me--at the local (HS) one-act play competition, ours was always the school that had no adult directors, no adults telling us what to do, and we always wrote our own material, whichc none of the other schools did (and they had BUDGETS too!). The result being that the students loved us, but we were so off the wall and so deliciously dirty about our methods that the judges scored us horribly low. So is it art if your intended audience eats you up but the people who are supposed to know what 'art' is say you're crap?

I like the Miller idea of writing as a schedule--I think I'll try that today, because most of my NaNoWriMo stuff was written while I was still in bed in the morning. 'Course it's not morning now. Maybe I'll try an outline too, trin, you're full of ideas!

I tend to work off of plots rather than outlines. Comic book style, if you will.

Tho for short stories the plot is usually just in my head and not written down.

Sometimes all I have is one scene. Then I need to figure out how to get there and what happens afterwards.

For NaNoWriMo I'm writing a novel called "Golden Years", which takes place in 2025 - ten years after twelve people with godlike powers conquered the world.

It's the middle book of a trilogy I've been working on.

More than anything, I think writing is personal. So my approach may do nothing for you or could even discourage you. Then again: if you're a bad writer, you should be discouraged. So just do what you feel is right.


Still, nobody can get around actually reading and writing when they want to be a writer. Learn to recognise crap when you read it, and you'll recognise it in your own writing. Learn to recognise good writing and you can try to imitate it - for practice only. I think imitation can be a great exercise for some writers, just like it is in the visual arts. if you write a sentence in a style not your own, you taste it, you learn to recognise the feel of it, you'll recognise it's a puzzle to fit the words in just right. It's probably like motorcycle maintenance: you'll know when it sounds right.
What makes a good writer great? Who knows? You should have asked a good or a great writer instead. My money is still on talent. But talent without practice doesn't get you anywhere.


As for getting a ghost-writer, I think you'd either need a great story, a lot of money, or fame like Shatner has. If you want to do it yourself, then yes: a decent story, decent characters and decent descriptions are all a must for a good book. How elaborate each of these should be, depends on you. However, a good book is not a requirement to get published, these days.

One thing: keep in mind you've got more than one book to write. Don't spend your entire life on one book or one chapter. It's not supposed to be perfect. And don't wait on inspiration either. What Trinity wrote about Miller could work for me. At first I only wanted to write when I had 'inspiration'. Though those moments are great, the resulting prose was not always so great. For me, inspiratation is mostly about ideas. So I have to force myself to sit down and write, even though I don't immediately know what to write. Rereading what I wrote the day before helps, if I can manage not to tear it up and just continue - or make a few changes and then continue.

Interesting question about outlines.

My first two novels had no outline, because I didn't need one to get where I was going. In fact, all I jotted down in terms of notes were a few details about each of the main characters, and a timeline.

Timelines are essential for me, because I don't write linear narratives. Characters, like RL people, are shaped by the events they experience, so if a character had a traumatic experience as a child, that needs to be worked into the narrative to explain why that character is behaving in a certain way as an adult.

The second novel (the first one's still in a box in the back of a closet) sold on the basis of the work itself. Don't know how much my editor actually read on the first pass (in those days you'd send the entire ms., and they'd read three chapters at random - usually first, last, and something from the middle - to get a feel for whether this was worth buying), but he liked it enough to buy a second novel from me based on a two-page outline. Not a word of text, just a two-page outline.

Thereafter, though, as the industry changed, the standard became Three Chapters and an Outline in order to sell anything (unless you're Terry Pratchett, but that's a separate story), and I've been working from outlines of various lengths ever since - not because I need them, but because my editors do.

What's particularly of interest to me is that I'm currently working on an original novel without an outline. Why? Because I'm not pitching this to New York. I've got the concept and the three main characters in my head, and I have a fair idea where I'm going with them, so for the first time in nearly 30 years, I'm just going to write, then present the completed work fait accompli.

Should be fun.

Yay!!

I just write whatever idea intrigues me. Currently, I'm working on my Dragon's Era / Chronicles of Fel story, trying to find the best format to tell them in.
I'm also working on a story for the upcoming December writing contest on here, but I'm afraid I can't divulge that information.
Recently, I'd been writing another story about a guy who meets up with his college ex, now a stripper to support herself while she tries to get published. It was about him manipulating her back into a relationship with him, but I didn't seem to be getting anywhere good with it, so I've tabled it for now.

Yup.

Yup.

This is where I disagree with you violently.

That's precisely the problem. Do the ground work on the characters, absolutely. Have a sketch of where you want the story to go, etc but don't over do it. Nothing sucks the life out of a story quicker than reducing it down to 'filling in the blanks.' It eliminates spontiniety and life, it becomes paints by numbers and it reads like it.

This suggests to me you're a woman. I'm not 100% sure obviously, but the statistics are in that favour. Why? Well most male writers (something like 80-90%) are adjust as you go kind of people (I'm one of those) Get it right, then move on to the next bit (though because of my screenplay background, that doesn't mean linear. I tend to write books out of sequence).

Women tend to be go gangbusters for the finish and edit afterwards kind of people.

Which ever way you work, there's going to be an editor and a sub and a copy editor coming your way from the publisher anyway, no matter what you do. And if it's a screenplay, a bunch of producers, a development producer and some actors fighting over their line count.

Again, so long as you don't over think it and suck the life out of the finished thing.

Sure. And pigs will fly. Write when it suits you, not when it suits Miller.

I have 2 times I like to write. My most creative is between 11 o'clock at night and 3 am and between 5 am and 10am. You'll notice they're both either when I'm about to go to bed, or just got up (never both one after the other, obviously that would be insane.) Both times are quiet, and I'm a firm believer that both times are still intimately contected to the brain's dream state.

But really, do what works for you.

I used to write with the TV, the radio and a CD player going all at once. Now I'm older I find I have to work in silence. Just know yourself and what makes you tick. Know when you work best and don't fight it because Miller said so.

Bingo. The only reason I ever write them is for them, and Producers.

I am in a (terrific) writing group that meets Mondays at a local coffee shop for support, critiques, mocking if you don't bring pages, etc. I find the deadline and the community are both tremendous helps. And it keeps me on my chapter-a-week schedule. Anyone else?

Same here. Wifey and I started a group like that, only we meet once a month for coffee, once a month for breakfast, and twice a month for critiques...

Dunno. Sounds too much like group therapy to me. Guess it really depends on the group. Some of them are vicious and just exist to tear each other down. I have a friend who's been rewriting the same short story for over a decade. She keeps reading it to her group and they all sit around ripping it to shreds, then she goes home and rewrites it, brings it in for another reading, rinse, repeat. Scary...

But then, I'm the anomaly. One two-credit creative writing course in undergrad, no stays at fancy-shmancy writers' colonies, just me and a stack of looseleaf and a handful of cheap Bic pens at the kitchen table for the first few years. I didn't know any better.

Eh. It's not so, well, Kumbayaish (I say that as one who actually likes the song) as all that. It does mean that you get mocked if you don't bring a chapter, or at least pages, for a while, but it's nice to have someone catch the spelling and continuity errors, praise the good stuff, etc.

I tend to agree.

What I got most out of my creativ writing major were two things:
The knowledge that yes, I can actually finish a story when I get started on it, and a gem of wisdom from my senior seminar professor: "Writing is only a few steps above porn. So don't worry about it being fancy. Make it dirty and sordid."

But aside from that...I am a harsh enough critic of my own stuff anyway. I don't need to meet with people to tell me things I usually already know need fixing.

I should also add that the level of conversation and wit in the group would keep me coming even if I never wrote another word.

^Ah, well, there is that. In fact, I've had this dream of setting up a kind of coffeehouse gig of bright, funny people who meet somewhere, say, one evening a week or for weekend brunch, but it never seems to happen.

I have some friends who have a sort of Salon (that's what we call it, anyway) that meets at a pub on a more or less monthly basis for terrific conversation on a variety of topics ranging from art and politics to philosophy and baseball. There is also some sharing of creative projects (ones own or a favorite) and loads of book recommendations. It's one of the nights my wife and I most look forward to. There are around 12 people who participate regularly, although we seldom have more than 6 or 8 at any one salon. Keeps things fresh.

The show I produce is a bit like a salon. Every Friday night a group of actors and writers come to a theatre in Santa Monica at 10 to do a show at 11. The writers cast the actors and the first 15 scripts that show up are in the show. They can be anything from comedy sketches to songs to monologues to performance pieces. The only rules are they have to be short, original and can't damage the space. There's something really exciting about writing a sketch and putting it on stage in front of a paying audience an hour later.

There's some really amazing talent there, and I'm working on a film project with some of them that's by far the coolest thing I've ever worked on.

That DOES sound terrific. I'd love to see it! Next time I travel that way. Mine is pure action/adventure scripted drama. But on the plus side, we're doing three hours instead of a usual one for a pilot, so I have high hopes. We will see!

The Salon here in Atlanta is merely a social event, but the idea is to remind us to be involved, creative, informed, reading, and exploring.