My first suggestion is to write your book! You have had it in your heart, you’ve had it in your mind for how long? And you haven’t sat down to write it yet!
So you want to write a fiction acim authors, non fiction, a mystery, a fantasy, an autobiography: Whatever you want to write, all you have got to do is sit down and write it but when you do sit down to write, don’t ever worry about editing, don’t worry about misspellings, don’t worry about any of that kind of stuff. Just write your book and get it in your keypad, just keep on writing, write until it’s done because you’ve always wanted to do it and you are never going to be satisfied until you have done it or at least attempted it and then you can say at least you have tried to write a book or maybe you’ll end up writing a book and..maybe you’ll be a best seller! Or maybe not, but at least you’ve tried!
The first thing that you need to do is make a decision on whether to write it yourself or hire someone to do it for you.
#1: Write The Entire Book Yourself:
Notes! Carry a notebook around with you everywhere you go and take notes down. Find a quiet place to write – it could be the spare bedroom, your office, the conservatory, when you are in a car, on a train, waiting for a bus, or even the garden shed! Basically anywhere away from any family or friends or kids, from whoever or whatever is going to interrupt you. This is because you never know when you are going to get a great ideas and you need to be free of distractions to create and get those ideas down. Also when you are reading a great book, have a notepad with you to jot down ideas you come across from the book.
Set aside a minimum of two hours a week to write. Tell yourself every Monday or every Friday “I’ll write… the kids are in school… perfect! From 10am-12noon I’ll write every Monday. I’ll sit down and get focused”. Hey, even if you do that and maybe it’s not working for you that particular time, that’s fine too! You are supposed to enjoy your writing; writing is fun, healthy and stress-relieving so try to find the time to write. If it works, it works. If it doesn’t, move on because next time inspiration might strike and the time will come again.
Some people attempt to set aside time to write but with their busy lifestyle it doesn’t work. So whilst the setting aside two hours a week somewhere quiet may work for some people, others might want to go away on a retreat as I know some authors do for sometimes five days and all they’ll do is sit down and just write! They will take their computer but with the internet disabled and their phone left firmly at home. And that’s it! They just sit there and write.
I have heard people put together a whole book in just five days. They sat there in front of their computer and wrote their book. So it’s up to you to do it whichever way you prefer. But remember that you are going to do the job once and get paid for potentially a life time so it’s worth investing the time to do it. Try both strategies and see which one works best for you.
Tips:
Most people find that it works better if you put two hours a day everyday to write something down and do it consistently.
You can write a book without even being able to write! For example Dragon Naturally Speaking is software that you can install onto your computer, attach a microphone to it and then recite your book or just your ideas into your computer. The Dragon Naturally Speaking software recognizes your voice and how you pronounce your words and then processes it with the end result that you can actually speak into the mic attached to your computer and the Dragon Naturally Speaking software will faithfully transcribe what you are saying with about 80-90% accuracy. It sometimes takes a while to catch up so don’t look at the computer screen while you’re speaking because it could be up to ten seconds behind you. So turn to the side, put your microphone in front of you and speak and the computer will catch up whilst you just talk normally and naturally about your subject.
