Amateur To Published: The Fiction Writer's Guide To Publishing

3 - Become A Better Writer

Of course no one is a perfect writer, and you're never going to write the perfect book. However, if you want to improve your chances of selling your book, then you need to make it as well-written as you can. For that to happen, you'll need to improve your writing skills.

Here's how:

STEP 1: READ! READ! READ!

To become a better writer you must know what good writing looks like and the only way to do that is to read. Reading is the easiest way to build your vocabulary, learn basic storytelling skills, discover popular themes, find new ideas or learn ways to restructure done ideas into something fresh and exciting.

Read widely; poetry to prose, short stories to novels, and across different genres. Don't just read to be entertained. Read to learn - that means reading with a critical eye. If you find books that impress you, record what made you keep turning the pages, then duplicate it in your writing. Conversely, note down the books that made you wince. What was so bad about these books? Analyze your own writing to see if you're making the same mistake.

STEP 2: WRITE! WRITE! WRITE!

It's been said that before you're good enough to publish, you should've written at least a million words or ten books. That word count is debatable, but the underlying message is that to be a good writer you must write frequently. The more you write, the better you become at writing.

Make a habit out of writing stories even if you're not great at story-telling yet. If you combine it with reading quality fiction, then with time you'll notice your writing improve as will your readers.

STEP 3: ABSORB OTHER STORYTELLING MEDIA

Books aren't the only way to find good stories. Many writers get their creative ideas from song lyrics, episodes of their favorite shows, movies etc. Cultivating eclectic tastes in film, TV, video games, graphic novels, music etc can influence the kind of stories you tell, give you new ideas, new storytelling techniques and help your writing stand out from other writers.

STEP 4: UPDATE YOUR SPAG (Spelling, Grammar & Punctuation)

If ever there was a way to turn off readers from your book (other than having a god-awful story), it's to have multiple SPAG errors. Enough mistakes within your manuscript and readers will brand you a careless writer and drop your books. When you understand SPAG, it is easier to choose the most appropriate words to express yourself, write clear and interesting sentences and paragraphs, and make sure that your writing flows.

Most of us learn grammar through grammarclasses, constant reading and usage. But as a professional writer, you'll needto stop by Purdue's Online Writing Lab, subscribe to Grammar Girl's quick and dirty tips, and/or read up on The Elements of Style  for a quick update toyour SPAG.

Regardless of how good your grammar is, youmight still need external help to assess it. The word processing program youare using to write likely already has an autocorrect feature to catch grammarissues. However, consider passing your work throughonline software like Pro-Writing Aidor Grammarly.These software go beyond just looking at basic grammar. They catch issues withoverused, vague, abstract and over-complex words, as well as plagiarism.

STEP 5: EXPAND YOUR VOCABULARY

Word choice is extremely important in creative writing. Yet few writers actively work on improving their vocabulary and keep repeating the same expressions day in, day out. Just picking up a new word from your dictionary every day and practicing its use could help in building your vocabulary. For a little help picking out words, there are websites that will email you a word of the day. Make up sentences using that word or use the example provided in the dictionary as a writing prompt.

STEP 6: LEARN ABOUT THE ELEMENTS OF STORY-TELLING

The three most important elements of your storyare plot, character and setting. Some writers like to start by creating a life-likelead character and letting the character take the story where s/he feels like.Some writers prefer plot driven stories. Others begin by building an intricateworld then creating stories within it. All these are legitimate ways oforganizing your story, but the best kind of writers know how to manipulate allthese elements to come up with a rich story. Learn the rules before you startplaying with them or breaking them.

STEP 7: GET YOUR STORY CRITIQUED

Writers are notorious for overestimating or underestimatingtheir writing abilities. If you want to know how good (or bad) you really are, write a story of at least1,000 words then get other people to read and assess it. These people can't befamily or friends because they'll lie to you to spare your feelings. You needcritics who are unbiased, critical and voracious readers within your genre ofchoice. Bonus points if those critics are fellow writers.

The reason you need more than one critic is because one may be biased, but if two or more people point out the same issue with your writing then it's time to reevaluate. Find critics by joining offline writing groups in your locality. If that's too much of a hustle, then no worries; the online writing community is alive and vibrant. You can workshop your manuscript through critique sites like Scribophile, Absolute Write and Hexbound.

PS: Wattpad is not a great site for getting  critiqued. Why? Because you're giving away your work for free, most readers will feel like it's bad manners to be overly critical of your work so they tend to soften the blow. You need to get people who don't care about your feelings lol.

STEP 8: REWRITE CRITIQUED WORKS

Once you've workshopped your manuscript, the next logical step is to incorporate the advice you received by rewriting the piece. Rewriting is the process of re-sculpting and polishing your story so that it reads better. Get this rewrite critiqued too just to see if it is received better then make any suggested changes or write something new.

Comments? Questions? Ask below and I shall try to answer.