Creative Writing Tips — Read

Rule number two read.  Even the best authors started with what they knew.  They read lots of literature, books, journals, poems, short stories – everything.  Do the same thing.  The more things you read the more styles of writing you expose yourself to the more experienced you will be when you sit down it write yourself.   Don’t simple speed read.  Take your time with it.  Look at how the author uses language to convey their stories.  Are they simple or long winded, detailed or sparse simple or elegant?  Read everything including crabby books.  The least enjoyable books are probably the best for writers to read.  If you as a reader are not interested in the book you will be more likely to spot the problems and less likely to make the same mistakes.

Finally, for bonus points, write a little elementary style book report.  It might sound childish but analyzing a novel will help you come to terms with the pros and cons.   If you take the time to sit down and ask yourself, “how does this make me feel,”and put it in your own words you will be better for it.  Highlight the problems and praise the good points.  More so try to explain to others or yourself why the piece was good or bad.  The more you write the better you get.

Creative Writing Tips — Outlines

Make an outline.  Outlines get groans from every writer in every type of writing.  Experienced writers often think they are too skilled for outlines. Organizing your thoughts helps make a piece of literature inventively less scary.  Architects don’t build a building from scratch they need blueprints.  Why should a writer be any different?  Your outline is not prisms.  It won’t define confine your creativity and it won’t make writing any more difficult.  It is more like guidelines then actual rules.  An outline can give you a clear path to follow while you write.  Also point out potentially huge plot holes early on.  If it does not make sense as an outline something is off.  You need to tinker with it a bit before you actually start the real grunt work of writing.  If your ideas change half way through writing your story fix the outline to fit the alterations.  When revising your outline, make sure there are no new plot holes.  If you reach one while doing the tough job of writing you might fall and get stuck.

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