But then with part of my mind, of course, which was detached from being Brenda, I was thinking how can I describe this journey. I think: I'll have bushes on the left-hand side where she's walking because that's more frightening than the open fields, and then on the right I'm going to have some of those distorted trees you get in East Anglia, distorted by the winds — some of them look like witches, waving witches' arms; very sinister.
And then I'm going to have a car coming past, and then there'll be this familiar, reassuring sound, and then just a blaze of light and sound as it rushes past, and that will make her feel even more lonely and isolated. So there's this duality of actually experiencing what your character is experiencing, at the same time with part of your mind thinking of the technique of bringing this alive for the reader.
Ian Rankin: Where do all these characters in your books come from? They come from inside your head. You're a role-player, you're an actor, and you've got all these different characters who you invent and who then are there forever.
I must have a cast of thousands by now of people I've invented. It's not really putting on someone else's clothes, it's putting on someone else's skin, their mind and their body. For example in The Complaints , Malcolm's sister has a fairly abusive relationship; you know, she's living with a guy who she loves but who's not a very nice guy. Well I didn't just want to look at her through Malcolm's eyes, I wanted to know what it was like to be her.
But I didn't go and talk to lots of battered women or abused people; I just thought, "What's it like to let yourself get in a situation where you can't escape, you don't want to — you don't want to walk away, you know you should but you won't and you can't? You just think about these people until they become real to you and you can inhabit their bodies, for a short space of time. I mean only for a page or two, but a page or two is all you need. Penelope Lively: I'm very keen on dialogue as a way of defining character, so I often find that the notebooks fill up with passages of dialogue between a couple of characters who at that stage will be called A and B or X and Y; they haven't even got names.
I know sort of who they are, that they're a he and a she, and they're central characters, or not. But I haven't named them yet because that comes later, but I want to hear what they say, I want to get some idea of what their voices sound like because in that way I shall be able to fill them out as characters.
It's the most odd business, the naming of characters in fiction, because it's so unlike people's names in real life.
Your name has not been chosen for you by your parents because they think you look as though you might be a Sarah or a Penelope — they've plucked it because they think it's a name they rather like and it perhaps goes with your surname.
Whereas in fiction you do feel that you have to match the name to the character and a character who sounds very much like a Tom or a Dick you're not going to be calling Percival. Hilary Mantel: Where do you pull your characters from? You have to create them out of your own self; where else could they possibly come from?
To create the protagonist of a book you really have to be prepared to live through them, and for me the process is physical as well as mental: I don't quite know how to put this, but I am so intensely engaged with my characters that their physicality passes into mine, and I've only just discovered the joys of working with a really healthy central character.
My health suddenly improved and I felt as if the boundaries of my being had become firmer. Cromwell is physically a short, broad, squat, strong man, and what I've always thought about him is that he was probably very hard to knock over. This is important because he had been a soldier, he had led a very adventurous youth, and I thought, well, if I'd only known what a tonic it would be, I'd have started writing this book years ago!
It is just amazing what imagination can do — what it can cause to happen in the real world, and every day I'm proving and exploring how strong the products of one's mind can be. How much planning is required when it comes to structuring a book? Beryl Bainbridge: Structure is the most important thing of all, I think, in writing. You may think of a marvellous plot, but unless you know how to structure it, which bit goes where and where, you won't get the full impact of it. Ian Rankin: I'm really not in control at all of what I'm writing.
It's almost as though before I start writing there's a shape sitting there that I've not seen yet, and when I start to write the novel the shape will reveal itself to me, the novel will decide which way it wants to go. Does it want to follow this character or that character, is this minor character really interesting and worth blowing up into a full-scale character or is this major character unnecessary and needs to be done away with?
Maybe the shape is sitting in my subconscious, buried way deep down. It's like a high-wire act, because you've no idea when you start the book if you can finish it or not; will it have a satisfactory denouement? A writer like James Ellroy, for example, will do a two to three-hundred page synopsis of the book before he starts writing it because he needs to know everything that's going to happen in the book.
I don't need to know everything that's going to happen; I'm much happier playing the detective; ie, the first draft is me getting to know the characters and their motives and everything else, so I start the book knowing almost as little as Rebus does, or whoever the cop or main character happens to be. I think that keeps the suspense level up, because if I don't know where the story is going probably the reader doesn't know either. So I'm not giving stuff away because there's nothing for me to give away; there are no red herrings at the start.
I don't like all that kind of stuff like red herrings, a sense of holding back necessary information from the reader, which Agatha Christie did brilliantly throughout her career. To me that's the least interesting part of the crime genre. PD James: By the time I begin writing, the plot is there and there's a chart which shows in which order the things come so that the structure is right. But that will change, as new ideas occur during the writing, which makes the writing very exciting.
New ideas: sometimes one greets them with huge enthusiasm and thinks, "Oh, that's really clever, yes, this is how it happened and this is logical and right and inevitable and that will be how it will be. Michael Holroyd: When you write biography or history or non-fiction you always look for a way of escaping from the prison of chronology before you come back into it, and sometimes what I try to do is to have two lines of progress in a narrative: one is the "and then and then and then", , , But then there's the thematic line as well, and that doesn't keep exactly in step with the other, so the challenge is to have a narrative where you can stop the sequence of things and have a thematic break from that and then return.
I once, in my biography of Shaw, left Sidney Webb I think on the top of a hill — at a certain date, of course. Then we had a lot more "and then", and 30 pages later I thought, "Okay, he can come down now". After the writing's finished, how do you judge the quality of your work?
John Fuller: I don't think a writer is necessarily a good judge of his own work, whichever way it goes. He can be over-fond or overcritical. Peter Porter: I'm not at all confident about the quality of what I do, and I suffer like all people do, I think, who are writers, an intense disappointment — not at the reception of what I've written, but at my own inability to bring off what I want to bring off. Auden in his introduction to his Collected Poems well, the first one of his collected poems , said in a writer's work there are usually four categories — he loved categorising things.
First, sheer rubbish which he greatly regrets ever having done. Second, poems he's got nothing against except they're not very important; they're not very good but, you know, he doesn't hate them. Third, the saddest of all, the fair notion, fatally injured.
And then the last one, the handful of poems he's truly grateful for, which if he were to publish would make his work seem dangerously slim, and vitiated. Penelope Lively: I would love to just disappear to the other side of the world at publication time, or put my head under a pillow or something, but you can't.
So I simply dread it. I love a year in which I don't have a book coming out and dread a year in which there is one. A bad review doesn't get any easier to take, so you just have to sit and suffer for the period that it happens. Some writers say they don't read their reviews. I never quite know whether to believe this or not. That must mean not picking up a newspaper for about two months. Hilary Mantel: You have to give an author the elementary courtesy of getting the basics of their book right.
But if that's in place, well then opinion is free, and from time to time you are going to be horribly misunderstood, but after all, you gave that book into the world to be misunderstood. You can't staple yourself to it and go round explaining yourself and protest that the critics have misunderstood because that is something they're perfectly at liberty to do. The secret is that by the time reviews come out you must be deep into another project, and that is what gives you your energy and the motivation to carry on; it's the new book not the old book.
Such a lot of it is about keeping your confidence up. But I think that's got more to do with what happens day by day than what the critics say, because the blank page breeds a crisis of confidence every morning. And once you've navigated your way through all the difficulties thrown up by a particular book, and done it again and again, that's where your confidence is drawn from. Michael Holroyd: I have altered one or two things as a result of reading reviews and thinking: "That's a valid point, never thought of it.
If I get another chance to do it in a new thing I'll make a note of that," and I have had a chance and I have changed it. But if simplicity is your thing, then you may have found your perfect free writing tool.
It helps keep your project organized by giving you space to include notes on all sorts of things, like character notes, scene notes, scene goals, etc. You can specify whose point of view each scene will be written in, and you can see the word count of your entire novel broken out by chapter—all at a quick glance:. One thing that yWriter does differently than a lot of other writing programs is focus on scenes rather than on chapters.
A lot of writers prefer this since scenes are usually fun chunks of story to work on. And using yWriter, you can rearrange all those scenes to compose a compelling novel. But one downside is that it only works for Windows at least, for now. Evernote is a note-taking app. This is what it looks like on a mobile device:. While Evernote has been around for a little while, they seem to always be expanding on their features, making it one of the best writing softwares out there. Its functionality is a bit too limited.
The Hemingway Editor is a unique kind of writing tool. Simply paste your writing into the editor and scroll through. What I love about this tool is how easy it is to use. Everything is color-coded and super easy to understand, so you can see at a glance where your writing could use a little elbow grease.
Reading this, you may be wondering: Dropbox? How is that a writing tool? Especially for writers who write on more than one computer, who need to collaborate with other writers or editors, or who want an easy way to back up their work. A lot of writers choose to save their book on Dropbox, so that it will be automatically backed up. And as you can see, it looks the same as any other folder on your computer:. You may know of this software, you may not.
PauseFor is a productivity app designed to motivate you to stay off your phone. That means you can get more writing done by spending less time scrolling through Twitter or whatever your social medial of choice is. PauseFor is designed for YOU to set a time, and then not pick up your phone until that time is done. You can be a philanthropist AND a writer at the same time. When you a certain amount, you get to choose where the donations go. It has taken over as one of the most versatile simple editing softwares and for a good reason.
This writing software is perfect if you need to brush up on your grammar or are looking for an easy way to sound professional in written emails as well. I would recommend not worrying too much about the cost of these programs.
Here is a breakdown of the most recent prices f or all of the tools in this article along with their comparative features:. Stay focused on crafting your next book and stick with the book writing software that gives you the best results in terms of saving you money, time, and frustration. Now that you have these awesome tools at your disposal, what is your favorite writing tool? What best suits your needs as an author?
Can you speed up the writing process with any particular tool? Disclosure: Some of the links above may contain affiliate partnerships, meaning, at no additional cost to you, Self-Publishing School may earn a commission if you click through to make a purchase. How to write, self-publish, and market your books. Before you embark on a book marketing campaign, you need to make the best book you can.
Without professional editing and design, your product won't rise above the other great books in the marketplace. Steven Spatz - September 15, 0. Having great ideas and good intentions might be the baseline of your writing efforts, but having a writing strategy can help you get your book written. These five steps can help you find the theme of your narrative and deliver a compelling story. Editing software uses powerful algorithms to compare your content with that of thousands of published authors.
Self-editing a piece slated for publishing goes beyond spell-checking your work. These writing mistakes should also be addressed to ensure your writing is clear, vibrant, and effective. As a writer, your work can go well beyond entertainment and help expand literacy around the the US and the world. From eliminating book deserts in poor communities to helping adults learn a new language, there are many programs in place whose mission is to end illiteracy.
Of all the elements that go into a professionally published book, a stunning cover design is one thing that can convince a potential reader that your book is worth investigating. Selling books in large quantity to non-retail buyers may be new territory for you, but you can rely on the same tactics you would in a job interview to help craft your approach.
There are lots of details, options, and paths you can take when self-publishing your book. We've fielded a lot of real questions from real authors, and this post might answer some of yours.
This video gives instructions on how to format your book using Microsoft Word on a Mac. Interior Templates are also available on bookbaby.
Strong book sales numbers in the first half of set the stage for what should be a great holiday season for published authors. Newman's debut novel, "Falling," garnered a big advance and a movie deal. But the former flight attendant might have flown even higher had she self published.
No matter what you write or how you choose to publish, authors can agree on one thing: social media has redefined the way books can be promoted. Start Promoting Your Book Now! Steven Spatz - March 4, 5. There are dozens of things you can work on to start your book promotion before you finish writing your book.
Steven Spatz - September 1, 5. The Self-Publishing Survey conducted by BookBaby focused on revealing the most successful book marketing strategies for self-published independent authors. When planning your book promotion and marketing, remember this equation: more book reviews equals more sales.
Steven Spatz - June 29, While the article "Amazon Bottlenecks Frustrating Indie Publishers" from Publisher's Weekly dates back to pre-holiday issues of indie book publishers having inventory tied up with Amazon, the potential backlash of returns — and a glut of inventory for these independents — could pose a significant problem in the next month.
Your book's pre-sale period is crucial to your book's chances of success for so many reasons. Fitzgerald mainly grew up on the East Coast, and it shows in his writing. His first three books are set entirely in New York and New Jersey. His later works — like his later life — take place further afield, traveling across Europe and journeying to Los Angeles.
His penchant for using familiar settings continued through his final novel, The Last Tycoon , in which he takes on the world of Hollywood, where he spent his last few years writing film scripts. Orwell lived a life in transit; he rarely ever settled anywhere for over two years. Perhaps relatedly, his best works of fiction, Animal Farm and , are not specifically concerned with evoking a sense of place; their preoccupations are more political. Salinger is a New York City writer, through and through.
He grew up in Manhattan, spending a good amount of his adult life in the city as well. His literary career hit its stride when he was first published in the New Yorker, to which he then onward frequently contributed. Morrison set her first novel in Lorain, OH, where she grew up. However, many of her narratives unfold in places she never lived. This is likely because, more than mining her specific experiences for her work, Morrison explored and cataloged the African-American experience — fundamentally reshaping the canon of black literature as she did so.
It is neither plantation nor ghetto. In his wonderful Nobel lecture , he outlines his experiences grappling with his identity in relation to his geocultural roots, both as a child and an adult. That night sparked a journey that would turn into his first novel A Pale View of Hills.
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