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/lit/ - Literature

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19528405 No.19528405 [Reply] [Original]

Give me a piece of advice on writing you wish you knew when you started

>> No.19528407

That no one on /lit/ writes.

>> No.19528409

Don't take writing advice from strangers on the internet.

>> No.19528488

>>19528405
Bibisco is wonderful for writing a novel.
I’ve been using it for about 6 months.

https://bibisco.com/

It helps me keep the timeline, location, etc, neat and tidy.

At this rate though I won’t finish until 2023.

>> No.19528606
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19528606

Everything below is a cliche but is only a cliche because it is true

>Build a writing habit and write everyday. Even 300 words a day is over 100,000 words a year. Find what time works for you and make it sacred each day. For me it is an hour and a half first thing in the morning before work.
>Read more good literature. And then try to work out why it is good, or if you dislike it, try to work out why.
>Read widely as well. Don't constrict yourself to one genre or time period. Read Homer, Dostoevsky, and Hemingway.
>Don't pay too much attention to vitriol on this board. Authors people were blowing their load over five years ago are now hated, and authors that were hated are now loved. Obviously avoid anything that is clearly trash, but read authors like Vonnegut to make up your own mind. Even if you do dislike them, you will at least know why.
>The first page is the hardest. It will not be how you want it to be no matter how many times you rewrite it. Get it to 80% good and then move on. You will be in a much better place to polish it once you have written the rest of the book.
>When you are sitting at your desk and a sudden wave of self-criticism passes through you and you get the desparate urge to open a browser/pick up your phone/leave the room, just sit there and observe the feeling. Don't fight it. Let it pass through you. It will pass even if it takes five or ten minutes. And then you can carry on.
>Black coffee and Japanese Jazz gets me in the zone better than anything else.
>Pay attention to the place your ideas come from. I don't know whether it's my subconscious or something beyond me, but sometimes when I'm walking or in the flow of my work something takes over and gives me a word or a sentence or even a page of writing where I don't have to think about it analytically and it just comes. Learn to look out for that voice and listen to it. When it gives you something away from your keyboard write it down. I have a note on my phone full of stuff like that.
>The best ideas often come whilst walking.

>> No.19528847

Bump, some good posts so far