One of the things you find a lot in writing books are prescriptions: This is THE (only right and workable best) way to write/develop a career as a writer.
And they’re wrong. Or so I think, anyway.
There is no One True Way to write. (This is practically my motto, and has been for years.) I know professional writers who outline, who don’t outline, who start at the beginning, in the middle, at the end, who start with characters, with plot, with setting, with theme, with idea, who develop whatever bits they’re missing in every order imaginable. And they all write books that sell, and many of them win awards.
But I don’t know any writers at all who wouldn’t really like to make the writing process easier for themselves. And I have often seen individuals who have had very little contact with other writers fall into the trap of thinking that the way they have found that is natural for them is automatically the one and only way that will work for everybody.
It’s understandable. When you have struggled and labored for years, and suddenly you stumble across a method that makes things (relatively) easy … it’s like the sun coming out, or winning the lottery, or any other revelation. It often doesn’t occur to people that that other way of doing it, the one that was soooo difficult and sooo laborious for them, might really work well for some other people. Or that their shiny wonderful perfect method might not be nearly so perfect for other writers.
Even very experienced writers and editors fall into this trap. It took me several years to cure one of my friends of telling me encouragingly, “It doesn’t have to be long, you know.” For her, short is easy and long is hard; I’m the exact opposite. She has finally accepted that I can do it fast or I can do it short, but not both. She doesn’t understand it, but she accepts it. And she’s had far more experience with other writers of various types and temperaments than I have.
What all this means is that first, it is worth trying out even the most ridiculous-sounding recommendations for how to write, because you never know when one of them might turn out to work for you. And second, if whatever method you are using isn’t working for you, it is not only OK to move on and try something else, it is a really, really good idea to do so.
Writing is a product-oriented business. Editors want a good story; they don’t really care how you get to it.
I just wanted to let you know that I just picked up the Enchanted Forest stories again lately after having left them alone for several years. (I probably read them in junior high and I am now a junior in college.) Back when I first read them, I could not put my finger on why I enjoyed them so much, but I certainly can now that I’ve seen much more of the world. Cimorene was a strong, feminist-friendly character that showed young girls that they were able to accomplish so much more than having their sole goal in life as finding a man. Many princess characters are shallow and have little to offer girls who are ambitious and adventurous and who don’t fit that mold. Cimorene is not that way and I think that’s why I connected with her so much. So anyway, I just wanted to write a comment and thank you for writing books that give young girls a positive and strong main female character to read about and enjoy. Good luck in all future endeavors.
I completely agree. I don’t think that one author writes the same way.
I daydream for a long time before I actually start writing. Like, a really long time. That’s how I get my best ideas.
I just started reading The Grand Tour. I loved Sorcery and Cecelia! Just a quick question, though. Why is the title Sorcery and Cecelia? I’m just curious.
“Sorcery and Cecelia” was a compromise title. Caroline and I wanted to call it “The Enchanted Chocolate Pot,” but our original publisher thought that sounded like a picture book. We went through three or four other possible titles, none of which I can now remember, before we settled on “Sorcery and Cecelia” as something that both the authors and the publisher were OK with.
Hi. I just discovered your blog. I have most of your books on my shelf, but I haven’t read Thirteenth Child yet. I’ll look forward to doing so.
I can identify with the comment about `fast or short but not both’. My best friend teases me a little (in a nice way) about complicating my short stories until they’re not exactly SHORT stories anymore.
It’s worse than that, Jim – I find that the same techniques don’t even reliably work for me across different stories. Some yarns have entirely different working modes for no discernable reason!
As for ‘short or fast’, that’s always been true of me too – right up until the short I just finished writing, which whooshed off at all-time peak speed. Ha!
There is One True Way which I can uphold and one only, and it involves the ritual application of posterior to chair…
Shh–I was trying to break it gently. 🙂
With regard to Sorcery and Cecelia, I’m glad “The Enchanted Chocolate Pot” was kept as a subtitle. I remember cracking up in the bookstore when I first saw that. 🙂
I’m also an Enchanted Forest fan from what is starting to feel like “way back.” (Nearly all of my school friends borrowed the series at one point or another!) It’s a delight to see well-written YA fantasy, and I’m looking forward to the new book.