General rules for writing, in no particular order:

1. The only way to fail is to give up. You can write whatever you want, and there will be someone who’ll love it and someone who’ll hate it.
2. Trying to do your best is good. Trying to make a story the best it can be isn’t. Consider this: you will learn over time. Any story you write now will be inferior to any story you write once you’re more skilled. Accept it and move on. The important part is to write and learn, and if anybody tells you otherwise, ask them how many novels they’ve published, and how much they’ve sold.
3. Your first novel will suck. Accept it. It’s a learning experience, and by the time you finish it, you’ll have learned so much, that you’ll likely want to write a new, better one.
4. Your tenth novel will suck. Other’s might disagree, but you’ll see all the flaws. Or see none of them. Writers are the absolutely worst judges of their own work.
5. If you write, and it feels like a slog, likely you’re doing something wrong. Stop and try something else (different technique, different story, different something.)
6. There are no rules in writing. They are only guidelines, there to be broken.
7. There is only one rule in writing: figure out how your mind works, and make sure that you write in a way that fits it. You can’t force your brain to work in a certain way, and you can do yourself some real damage by trying. If you’re a pantser, pantse. If you’re a plotter, plot. Or do both at different times. But make sure you learn what works for you.
8. Story trumps language any day.
9. Story trumps grammar any day.
10. Story trumps everything, unless you’re writing literary, in which case focus on language and grammar – to each genre its own!
11. When it comes to writing, persistence trumps luck.
12. Luck and persistence trumps anything.

Luck and Persistence! 😉

Ever had a story that started out with a great idea, and then… died?

Like the first chapter is amazing. The second is OK. The third is so boring you want to rip it all out.

What you’re describing is the moment where the brilliance of the idea fades. (more…)

Sometimes, you can’t do squat.

Like me. In the spring, I burned out. I’d planned to break the quarter-million-words mark, even hoping to reach half-a-million. I’d managed 235 000 the year before, in basically six months, I was writing at speed, planning a Kickstarter for my series, bright future ahead. And then, BAM!

Burnout. (more…)

Best writing advice for newbies, from Ira Glass:

Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me.

(more…)

You’ve got to realize that your writing is special.

Not special in the way that you are a fabulous snowflake that will melt the literary world, but special in the way that nobody but you can do it.

Comparing yourself to others destroys this idea. (more…)

The gun on the mantle piece doesn’t have to go off, and doesn’t even have to be there, at least not in the final draft, but it’s good to have it there while writing. (more…)

What happens when a nuclear bomb hits a city?

Neil Halloran (of WWII Deaths documentary fame) takes on the question. It’s not a pretty picture, but there are things we can do to lessen the risk. (more…)

Sometimes the world kicks you.

Sometimes you stumble, slip, fall down. Best intentions are only that, intentions. Sometimes they fail.

The key isn’t to be eternally successful. The key is to be kind to yourself when you fail. Learning to forgive yourself is a skill. Forgiving yourself is a skill, too, but you can’t start with it. You have to start by learning how to learn it.

Forgiveness is tough. We learn to forgive others. We’re taught to do it, forced to do it, but rarely does anyone take us aside and tell us to be kind to ourselves.

Instead, we internalize the critical voices, the ones that tell us what we should do, absolutely must do, least we end up outcasts, alone, hated, bereft. (more…)

Yet another X Tips to Greatness vlog list.

Except this one is from Jerry B Jenkins, who know what he’s talking about after writing professionally for some 190+ books in 40 years. And it’s not about where to put the commas, but rather how to survive writing a long work. (more…)

Pop psychology is full of pithy seize the day quotes. The purpose of life is to live it, to taste each experience to the utmost. Memento mori. Live like you would die tomorrow.

If I knew I’d die tomorrow, I’d spend the day playing video games, bingeing on chocolates, and wailing that life wasn’t fair.

If I lived this way every day, I’d get obese, depressed, and likely would die tomorrow. (more…)