The Best & Worst Writing Advice You'll Ever Get

You know that moment when you're catching up with someone and casually mention that you're writing a book?

Just kidding! We all know there's nothing 'casual' about mentioning your writing. We might pretend to be nonchalant, but if you're anything like me, talking about your writing feels like ripping your heart out of your chest and offering it up on a silver platter.

For me, the decision is always preceded by a long internal struggle, a back and forth, and a careful evaluation of the pros and cons. Will they think I'm being arrogant? Will they judge me or think it's stupid? Do they even care? Or the worst of all - what if they ask what my book is about?

Anyway, often what follows after you announce your intention to write a book is a mostly well-meaning yet very demotivating speech about the trials and tribulations of publishing.

I'm here to tell you not to listen!

If anyone tries to 'warn' you about how hard it is to get published or tell you how to write your book, thank them for their concern and move on! Traditional publishing is no longer the only option and, either way, the biggest struggle you will face is finishing your manuscript. That's definitely not going to happen if you spend all your time worrying about it not being successful.

Of course, it's natural to want to seek guidance. With that in mind, I created this blog to share the three best and worst pieces of writing advice that I have ever received. For fun, let's start with the worst ones!

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The worst Writing Advice Ever!

1. It's impossible to get published nowadays, so you shouldn't even try.

Yes, people have really said this to me and, listen, most of the time they were coming from a place of genuine concern for me. They just didn't want to see me fail.

The issue? They have no idea what they're talking about. Most people are just regurgitating information they read once with no regard for whether the original source was correct or even reputable in the first place.

Here's the truth: Now more than ever, publishing is possible for ANYONE! There are a ton of new avenues opening up in the realm of self publishing. You can now publish a book from the comfort of your own couch. You can self-publish an ebook, you can self-publish physical books, or you can go the traditional route. If you do choose to go traditional, there are thousands of smaller publishing houses that you could work with that are often overlooked in favor of the flashier, but more difficult to attract, Big Five (aka Penguin Random House, Hachette, Macmillan, Simon & Schuster, and Harper Collins).

2. Write what is popular in order to be successful.

It sounds like great advice and that's why it is so dangerous. There are two main reasons why this is terrible advice:

A) The process from book idea to publication can take many years and publishing trends change much quicker than that. This means that by the time your book is released, the world will have moved on.

B) When one genre, topic, or aesthetic becomes popular, the market tends to become oversaturated with books that match it. This means that your manuscript will be competing with thousands of other manuscripts that are frankly, quite similar. In this case, self publishing doesn't solve the issue because traditional publishers will be spending big bucks on marketing books that yours will have to compete with.

In other words, unless you can crank out fully fledged and edited books within a few months and have a significant marketing and publishing budget, this advice won't guarantee success. Actually, even if you had all of those things, it still wouldn't guarantee success.

Here's the truth: Writing a novel is hard work. It takes time, grit, and a considerable amount of motivation. Those are not things that come easily if you are writing something you're not passionate about, so write the book you want to write instead! The quickest way to fail is to give up and never even finish your novel because you couldn't bring yourself to write it any longer.

3. "Write what you know."

Here's the thing, 'write what you know' is not technically bad advice, it's just worded so vaguely that it tends to cause more harm than good. If you take it to mean that you should stick to writing about experiences you've had or knowledge you already possess, then it's terrible advice; but if you take it to mean that you should use your own emotional experiences to inform your writing, then it's not so bad.

The difference between only writing about your own experiences and using them to inform your writing might sound elusive, so let me make it clear. If you only write about what you yourself have experienced, you will be limiting your creativity to a ridiculous degree.

• What if you want to write about pirates or dragons?

  • You can't!

• What if you want to write about the kind of love that sweeps you off your feet but you've only ever dated one person and it wasn't all that great?

  • You can't!

On the other hand, if you use your own emotional experiences to inform your writing, you can write about anything and make it feel real!

• What if you want to write about a witch who must choose between her coven and the one she loves?

  • You can, and you can use your experience with hard decisions to better convey what the witch is feeling in that moment.

Here's the truth: Most of those vaguely worded pieces of writing advice are not helpful. The 'advice' part is so intuitive that you probably already knew to do that, and the vague wording makes it confusing, increasing the chance for misinterpretation. The same goes for "show, don't tell." There are plenty of reasons why you might want to "tell" before you show, one such example, which I'm borrowing from a piece in Writer's Digest, is when you're establishing your character's goal. This is also just vague enough that many new writers have no idea what it means and it ends up getting misinterpreted quite often.

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The Best Writing Advice Ever!

1. Develop your characters and plan their arc.

I can't emphasize this enough. No matter how good your plot is, if your characters fall flat, your story won't come alive. As Cron explains in Story Genius, the secret is to develop your protagonist's character arc and make sure every plot point in your novel is pushing them forward on that journey.

There are five things you should figure out about your protagonist that will be key to developing a story that keeps readers hooked to the very end.

A) Initial state - What kind of person are they when the story begins? What are their flaws what has happened to them to make them this way?

B) Goal (aka what they think will make them happy) - What is the purpose of acting the way they are acting? What are they hoping to achieve?

C) Lie - What limiting belief do they hold that is keeping them from realizing what they really need and how to get it?

D) Need (aka what will actually make them happy) - What do they need in order to change their lives for the better?

E) End State - Who will they become by the end of the story? Will they overcome the obstacles in their way and change their flaws into strengths or fail and become worse?

Those insights will help you keep your protagonist's character arc at the forefront of any plot development, but you should also create a character profile for your protagonist and any additional characters in your story. In them, you can include information about their backstory, personality, physical description, internal and external conflicts, role in the story, key relationships, and any additional notes that will help you keep their portrayal consistent and intentional.

2. Don't edit as you write your first draft.

The vast majority of people who set out to write a book never finish it, and first drafts are often where they give up. This is because the first draft can feel incredibly daunting, even more so if you are under the impression that it needs to be good.

First drafts are your opportunity to tell the story to yourself. They're about getting the words down on the page. If you get hung up on editing along the way and trying to make them perfect, you are likely never going to finish. So don't edit. Give yourself permission to release all those judgemental thoughts and just tell the damn story. After all, no one but you is going to read that first draft.

You will have ample opportunity to edit later and make your second, third, fourth, and all future drafts sound as lyrical or as clever as you desire. however, none of that will be possible if you don't allow yourself the space to be messy and creative and imperfect before. This is not to say that you can't or shouldn't create a detailed outline. I, for example, don't feel ready to start writing until I have a detailed scene-by-scene outline complete with worldbuilding & character info on color coded sticky notes... and guess what? My first draft still sucks. It's part of the process.

3. Do what works for you.

Here's the big one: do what works for you.

Yes, that includes ignoring all of my previous advice if it isn't helping your writing.

Writing a book is hard enough. You don't need the added pressure of trying to integrate the feedback and advice of everyone who thinks they're an expert. You would be flabbergasted if you knew how many people believe that they are qualified to give out writing advice just because they read a book once.

So what do you do when someone tells you to write your story in third person limited because it's the more traditional perspective and, thus, is held in higher regard? You write your story in whatever perspective you feel is right for it, even if it's not what they advised.

Let's practice that again. What do you do when someone tells you your female main character is too unlikeable and she should smile more? You write that character however feels right to you and tag #femalerage on the TikToks and tweets you make about it.

Writing a novel is an extremely personal endeavor. We leave a piece of us in everything we write. Do you really think somebody else is going to know how to write your story better than you?

Bonus: Get comfortable sharing your work with others.

I was feeling generous, so here's one more piece of writing advice for you to heed or disregard: Get comfortable sharing your writing with other people and learn how to process feedback without attaching your ego to it.

Hey, it's one of the hardest parts of writing, at least for me. It's one thing to pour your heart out on the page and write a story that you feel very strongly about. Letting others read it and judge it is a whole different beast, but it's a beast you'll have to wrangle at some point if you intend on ever publishing or making your stories public in any capacity.

My advice is to start early. Find a group of people, or even just a single person, that you trust and make a habit of sharing your writing and listening to their feedback. If its someone you were already close to, maybe try branching out once you've gotten a little more comfortable. The point is to flex that confidence and detachment muscle until you're able to share your work and receive feedback without feeling like you're going to pass out or pee yourself.

You also need to learn how to sort feedback into an "objective" category, which refers to that which points out things like grammar mistakes, and a "subjective" category, which is rooted on someone's experience with your writing. When it comes to subjective feedback, you should learn how to decide whether to accept it and integrate the recommendation into your work, or dismiss it.

You'll get there. It just takes practice.