HOW TO START WRITING A BOOK

Question: I want to write a book, but I have too many ideas, and I can’t settle on one genre. What should I do?

Writers are interesting people. We love to read. We love ideas. We have many interests. It’s amazing that any of us can settle on one topic long enough to finish a whole book.

Think about personal experiences. Most of us have had many painful experiences in our lives. Start from there. Write about a time in your life when something happened that changed you. Write about how you are different. Personal experiences are a great place to start.

Keep a journal. Natalie Goldberg tells her students not to start writing a book until they have kept a personal journal for at least two years. Then she tells them to read the journal, pick out entries to be developed into longer pieces, and go from there. I didn’t think I could write a memoir because I had so much hurt. (I’m autistic. When I grew up in the 1950’s we were considered different and sometimes even delinquent. My mother and two grade school teachers tried to beat the autism out of me.) I found a beginning for writing about this in my journal entries.

As a college study skills teacher, I discovered many fun ways to learn. I’ve discovered in the notes I wrote for teaching college classes, a possible book. If I hadn’t put these ideas in study plans, they could have gone into my journal.

My advice is start writing in your journal about some of your ideas. Then after a year or two start rereading those journals. Pull out similar entries and start a manuscript.

While Natalie Goldberg and Julia Cameron suggest writing a journal longhand, I have a computer journal. I can cut and paste entries into new documents that become articles.

Keep journaling. I hope this helps it works for me, and i have a similar problem.

A JOURNAL ENTRY A DAY

Did you write every day in your freshman English journal? I did. I hadn’t kept a journal before, but I leaped into the assignment. The instructor said to buy a ruled notebook, and we would start our journals in class.

I didn’t wait. I had a few extra notebooks at home, and I started writing that very day. All these years later, I am still writing in my journal everyday.

I became a freshman English teacher and assigned journals. I know many students did not take to them as enthusiastically as I did. I would collect journals at the end of the semester and some students had just one of two pages. Few students took a liking to journals as quickly as I did. But there were a few who enjoyed the experience promised to keep writing journals.

Some had kept journals before the class started. One student told me she would keep a separate journal for the class because her personal journal was too private.

A few students made their own journals. One student was a kindergarten teacher’s helper and she used construction paper for covers and she added drawings. While I preferred students keep a cheap notebook, I did enjoy the special efforts. Those students who created their own notebooks seemed to have more fun.

The question I was asked most often was: What do I write in my journal?

I would ask them what made them angry. If you are mad about something, then you have lots to say about it.

Oprah Winfrey tells her audiences to keep gratitude lists. That’s a much better idea, but for many people finding the joy in life is harder than finding the faults. We often concentrate more on things we don’t like that on the blessings life is giving us. I gave the students writing prompts from various books and websites. I suggested unsent letters, altered points of view and descriptions.

One of my favorite assignments from my own freshman English class was to go someplace on campus and make a list of 126 sense sensations. We had to list things we tasted, smelled, felt or heard.

The assignment didn’t work very well when I assigned it. It became a journal suggestion instead.

Now that I am retired I still keep a journal. I consider it practice writing. Sometimes I experiment with chapters and scenes for one of my own writings. Sometimes I write about my pets; sometimes; I just write down memories. There always seems to be something to write about.

If I have a day when few words are coming, I start a silly story. After a few nonsense words, I find the words I was meant to share for the day.

What are your experiences in keeping journals?

Learning Hack of the Day: Free Write in Your Journal

Several days ago, we started a journal because we know whatever career we choose, we will have to be good writers. Journals are practice writing and they help us to be more creative and to think through problems. Journals are to written in daily. To begin with, you might make your journal a diary, but more and more, you will want to get into creative thoughts or explore your feelings or devote the journal to dreams or special topics, like your pets or children or hobby. Every journal is individual. A good journaling trick if you are having trouble finding entries is to do some free writing. Free writing is writing as fast as you can. If you can't think of a word, skip over it. If you can't spell a word, spell it the way it sounds. If you can't think of anything to say, just keep repeating, “I don't know what to write,” Eventually something will start coming out, and you will be surprised at your insight. I remember a student who started out, “I don't have anything to say today.” Then he started writing about his feelings and ideas and ended, “I guess I had something to say after all.” Set a time limit or a page limit on your free writes. If you set a time limit, set a timer for five minutes. Ten minutes might be too long for beginners. Journals are a great way to keep in touch with ourselves. They also make great future reading.