Most writers have dreams of writing a bestselling novel. This is a great dream, but dreams don’t put money in the bank. This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t pursue the idea of writing novels. But it does mean that you might be wise to seek out other projects that can pay the bills while you’re writing your masterpiece. In this way you can get started as a professional writer.
Seeking Work in the Field of Writing
If you’re hoping to get paid to write, you’re going to have to seek out opportunities yourself. Until you’ve established yourself as a writer, you probably won’t have people coming to you and offering projects that actually pay. Remember to consider both online and offline opportunities.
Start locally, if you can. Approach newspapers and magazines in your area about writing pieces for a reasonable fee. If you’re interested in advertising, search for a copywriting position. These tend to pay fairly well, if you have the experience or education to take such a job. You might even want to offer your services to those who routinely give speeches, if you think you might enjoy speechwriting.
Opportunities to write online are available for anyone who chooses to look. Keep in mind that online pay rates haven’t quite caught up to print pay rates in most situations. Also, many sites that offer to pay you for writing are revenue share, such as Suite101 and Helium. Revenue share means that you write the articles, they’re posted to the website with ads placed alongside, and you get a percentage of the revenue. The upside to this model is that you continue to earn revenue for a long period of time, sometimes make a great deal of money on a single article. The downside is that it can take many months or even years to earn what you might get from an upfront pay site.
Upfront sites such as Demand Studios usually offer a set fee for each article and sometimes even revenue share opportunities. Other sides will offer to sell your articles, keeping a percentage of the sale price. One of these sites is Constant Content, though there are many others. Regardless of which site you choose, you can usually choose your own topic.
Ghostwriting and Its Benefits
Ghostwriting, or writing something for another person without getting the credit, is popular but not spoken of very often, probably because no writer wants to admit to hiring someone else to do the writing. There are many professionals out there who want to write and publish, but either don’t have the time or lack the necessary skills. Many laypeople also have great ideas for books or manuals but don’t have the ability to actually write it themselves.
One of the benefits of ghostwriting is the pay rate. Ghostwriting usually pays as well or better than other similar opportunities because you are being paid for more than just writing. You are being compensated for allowing someone else to put their name on your work and agreeing to keep silent about it. Most ghostwriting contracts include a privacy clause, so you can never actually take the credit. This is the downside. As a ghostwriter myself, it can sometimes be a little irritating to see someone else get the credit for my work. However, I am comforted by the fact that I made decent money writing it in the first place. Ghostwriting isn’t for everyone. If you really don’t like the idea of having someone else’s name on your work, don’t venture into the realm of ghostwriting.
When considering your options and decide what you should write, think about the knowledge you already have. If you’re passionate about a certain subject, write about that subject. But don’t give your writing away for free. It’s true that you can and might accept work that pays less if it offers you some exposure, but don’t write for nothing. Professionals get paid for their skills, and you should as well.
Woman’s fiction has become an incredibly popular genre in recent years. In fact, this genre has become so popular that it has its own section in most stores. Go to any bookstore and look at the bestsellers, and you’re sure to find at least a few women’s books. But writing these books is a little more difficult than reading them.
Romance and Woman’s Fiction
Romance has been a draw for women since the first romance novels were published. And romance is still very much a part of what many women want in a book. And so much of woman’s fiction does involve a certain amount of romance. However, woman’s fiction is not romantic fiction.
Romantic fiction tends to involve a ‘damsel in distress’ and other such plot points. In contrast, woman’s fiction puts the woman in control. She is the center of her own story. The man, if there is one in the story at all, only has a supporting role. His story is only detailed enough to further her story. In a romance, on the other hand, the man’s story would be as developed as the woman’s, sometimes more so.
The women featured in woman’s fiction are strong and independent, not requiring a man to save them. While romance often plays a large part in woman’s fiction, it is not necessarily the main point of the story. In addition, much of woman’s fiction is devoid of any romance at all.
Writing Women’s Fiction
The four essentials of novel writing are plot, characters, setting, and details. When it comes to writing women’s fiction, these things all have a common thread. The characters and plot will all support a tone of empowerment, specifically the empowerment of the women in the story. They are an affirmation of life from the woman’s point of view, though these books do not always have to end well.
When writing women’s fiction, you have to write for women. At least, you have to write for women if you hope to sell books to women. Women usually enjoy tales that evoke hope and fear, dreams and nightmares, fantasy and reality. The action in your tale can be drama instead of adventure, the relationships don’t have to be romantic in nature. Connect with the lives and hearts of women and you’ll be fast on your way toward writing women’s fiction.
You don’t have to be a woman to write for women. Some of the most successful writers of women’s fiction are men. Nicholas Sparks is a man, and his books, written primarily for women, have been incredibly successful. Some of his books, such as The Notebook, have been turned into feature films. If you can connect to the inner mind and heart of a woman, you can write women’s fiction, regardless of your own gender.
Woman’s fiction is a popular genre. It is frequently more popular than mystery, science fiction, and even fantasy. If you’re hoping to publish a book with broad appeal, the women’s fiction market just might be the place for you to start writing your first novel.
Collect some of the most celebrated novels of the past century and you’ll notice commonalities. The best of the best, feature realistic characters, engaging plots, believable worlds, and appropriate details. Together, these four things are the essential elements required for crafting a novel well worth the read.
The Characters of a Novel
Before you get into the details of your novel and before the entire plot is revealed, you’ll find yourself introducing characters — sometimes a great many characters. Each of these characters, at least the main characters, must have depth and breadth. Good characters usually have both motivation and emotion. There are some exceptions to this, but these are few and far between.
If you have a protagonist who simply wanders around, encountering two-dimensional characters, and really accomplishing nothing, you’ll end up with a novel that any reader will put down before the first chapter has elapsed. Your characters must have reasons for everything they do and they must react in reasonable ways to given situations and stimuli. This doesn’t mean they have to be predictable. But they do have to make a certain amount of sense.
The Plot of a Novel
Something has to happen in your novel. The things that happen come together to form the plot of your story. The core of your plot should be some type of conflict. If conflict is entirely lacking, your readers will quickly become bored and choose a different book, one that satisfies. Keep in mind that the conflict in your story doesn’t have to be violence. You can write an engaging story without having a single murder, crime, or battle. Many of the best stories are not about physical conflict at all.
But something has to be happening. Action and drama should be occurring, even if it’s only inside someone’s head, such as a personal crisis. While you’re crafting your plot, try to keep your readers guessing, especially if you’re writing a thriller or mystery. Keep readers turning pages, caught up in your story. But, like your characters, your plot has to make sense.
The World of a Novel
When creating the setting for your novel, you have two basic choices: use real places or make them up. Science fiction and fantasy writers often craft their own worlds to use as settings for their novels. Other genres occasionally do this as well. As fun as this is and as much freedom as it will give you as a reader, you still have to be careful. You have to make your readers believe your world could actually exist. In other words, you’ll have to suspend their disbelief. To do this, you’ll have to craft a world that is seamless and consistent.
Novels can also be set in the real world, and a great many are. Using familiar locations can be an excellent way of drawing your readers in and establishing the setting for your novel. You certainly don’t have to worry about convincing your readers that your world exists. In addition, many readers find that describing real locations is actually easier than making something up.
However, the problem with using real settings is that you have to get the details right. For example, if you’re writing about a character wandering around the Canadian prairies, you should do your research. Your character might find himself in Selkirk, Manitoba and see a giant statue of a trout. This will upset any reader familiar with the area. Why? Because it’s a catfish, not a trout.
The issue of detail becomes even more important when using popular locations such as Central Park or the Tower of London. You don’t necessarily have to visit all the locations you’re using in your book. You can gather a great deal of information from travel books and websites. However, if you get the opportunity to visit a location you might be using, take it. Your book will be the better for it.
The Details of a Novel
It is often the details of character, plot, and setting that make the difference between a book that becomes a bestseller and one that puts readers to sleep. It is usually best if these details emerge naturally while you’re writing, though it is certainly possible to go back later and insert them. When you do add detail later, however, be sure that it’s consistent with the rest of your story. If it’s not, change the details to better suit your tale.
Regardless of when these details are written, it is important that they look like they belong. If you have a simple plot, the details should remain fairly simple. A more complex plot will naturally lend itself to fuller details. Descriptive writing is an art, one that parallels creative writing. Use this art to enhance your novel, not bore your readers.
The one thing you have to beware of is keeping up with your own details. I have, and very recently, read a book where the color of the hair of the main character changed halfway through the book (and not because it was dyed). It was a good book, but obviously the author wasn’t paying attention to their own story, because this wasn’t the only detail relating to characters and plot that was suddenly altered mid-story.
If you’re writing a novel, you need to pay attention to your own details. If you’ve been talking about how jet-black a character’s hair is, don’t tell me in the next chapter than he has a head of golden wheat. By the same token, don’t have someone shoot the antagonist if that someone only ever carried a sword. It doesn’t make sense and it will put your readers off. The devil really is in the details, at least when writing a novel.
The most essential elements of writing a good novel are characters, plot, setting, and those pesky little details. There is much more to it than that, but master these four things and you’ll be well on your way towards writing your first novel.
Mystery fiction can sometimes be difficult to define. It is often confused with crime fiction or even thriller fiction, and indeed a book can be mystery, thriller, and crime all in one. However, mystery fiction does have certain defining characteristics that set it apart. These same characteristics can make the mystery genre difficult to write.
The Characteristics of a Mystery Novel
Simply put, a mystery novel is one that contains an element of mystery. Very often, it is a story where a detective, professional or not, attempts to solve a crime that is committed at the very beginning of the novel. In some cases, this crime is committed before the novel begins. Regardless, the emphasis of a mystery novel is on the puzzle presented and finding a logical solution to that puzzle.
Mystery novels do not necessarily have to revolve around crime drama, however. It is entirely possible to create mystery fiction that does not involve crime at all. Supernatural mysteries, for example, are often about solving a supernatural mystery and do not involve a crime element. Mystery fiction is primarily about the mystery, not about the other elements that may be present.
Writing a Mystery
Mystery fiction is all about engaging the reader from the first page. The novel should start with the discovery of a mystery, but nothing should be given away. You don’t want your readers to know exactly where the novel is going or how it’s going to get there. Give your readers just enough information to hook them with the first scene. If you do this well, your audience with be eager to keep reading, to find the solution to the puzzle.
The key to mystery fiction is the keep the reader legitimately confused without being ridiculous. You don’t want to bore your readers by giving away too much too soon. You want to put them in the shoes of your protagonist, allowing them to solve the mystery as it unfolds. If they figure it out by the end of the first chapter, you’ve lost the opportunity to create a truly engaging mystery novel.
Mystery is always tricky. You have to leave enough clues that the puzzle can be solved while hoping that the reader misses the clues or forgets them before the end of the novel. A large cast of characters can help, though a beautiful mystery novel can be created with only a few. However you choose to operate, the goal is to surprise the reader at the very end. But you also have to make sure you’ve left enough clues that your readers can be back through the book and pick them out.
Like most books, you’ll want yours to catch and keep the reader. One of the best ways of doing this is by using your chapters effectively. Use each chapter to solve a small problem or piece of the puzzle and your readers will remain engaged until the very end. Of course, this may mean that you run out of problems well before the end of the book. In this case, use your chapters to solve one problem and create another. This process is great fun for the writer and complicates your story just enough to keep your readers confused.
Writing mystery novels is fun and exciting, lending itself well to the bits and pieces approach to writing. However, creating the perfect “whodunit” does take practice and patience. Don’t expect to have your novel finished in a week. Explore the various permutations your plot might take and have fun.
