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stella41b -> RE: anyone ever written a piece of fiction that was published (3/30/2009 4:24:28 AM)
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Everybody has a book inside them, at least one. I'm just thinking what advice I can give as I'm just about to become published myself.
You see I don't write books, but plays, I have so far 15 of them which have been produced in 27 different countries worldwide.
I'd be careful about creative writing courses and to be honest if you can't find a decent one with openminded writers (and not every creative writing course I've found have openminded writers) but there are things which you can do which will help you write.
Oh the last thing you should do by the way is just sit down and write your book. I'm writing this advice from recent experience.. I've got close to 350 pages written on a book about modern theatre but... my publisher is telling me 150-200 pages.
Therefore seeing as I've yet to quite get the hang of writing a book I can give you advice based on what I know as a playwright.
1. Why write a book in the first place? So that it'll be read, right? By who? And why? The first thing you need to work out if you want to be a writer - doesn't matter if it's books, plays, screenplays, - you need to find and identify your audience or readers. Talk about your ideas with people, gauge their reactions. You might think you have a great idea for a novel, but can you find 50 or so people who agree with you?
2. Network, move around, gather contacts, make friends, try to find other people in the same situation as you, what are they doing?
3. Try and get hold of a writers and artists resource book called 'The market' (if they still do it) which is full of contacts, ideas and information on such stuff as format, copyright, etc.
4. If and when you do start writing protect yourself. Before you put anything out on the Internet print it out and mail it to someone or yourself. Copyright. Keep the original with the envelope.
5. When you feel ready that you want to start writing, start writing, but make sure to give yourself a framework. You say you want to write a novel, right? You know how many books are adapted for movies in Hollywood? Okay, how about doing all this in reverse? Instead of starting out with a book, how about developing your story into a movie script? A feature length movie script is around 120 pages first draft, and you're just writing scenes from your story, scene 1, scene 2, scene 3 etc with a location, setting and a narrative. If you like you can throw in bits of dialogue.
6. The above might seem like a crazy idea, but if you can manage to do that and get people to read it and give you their feedback, and you're happy with that, then you should find that you have a pretty detailed 'storyboard' or rough draft and have organized your story into a cohesive framework, getting people to read your story in much more detail. If you like you can even send it off to a movie producer as a script submission to get professional feedback.
I used to do the same thing. I once had a screenplay which I submitted repeatedly for almost 10 years all over the world. It would come back after 6-9 months with a rejection slip. I would just change it as advised and send it off again. It went through Hollywood three times. Got sent to Brazil. Australia. I think the last place I sent it was somewhere in India.
7. Then you can write your first draft. This is when it gets challenging. This is when you start dealing with publishers. This is where it gets tricky, because you're looking for someone not only who likes your work, but who will also want to invest in it, in the hope that they are going to make lots of money selling it. Half of the battle with a publisher is being able to come up with the goods. So many people have brilliant ideas for novels, but I'd suggest that there's millions of unfinished novels lurking in the dark recesses of people's hard drives and other places waiting to be finished before 'life' got in the way. You will get much further with a publisher if you not only send them a sample manuscript (in format) with synopsis and covering letter, but also a date in a letter when the entire book will be finished.
8. However before that you need to research publishers.. What do they publish? How often? Do they publish new work? Are they prepared to take risks? Are they interested in your work? Are they looking for it?
9. If you feel you're just getting nowhere with publishers you can also self-publish. There'sways to do this.
Whatever happens I wish you luck.
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