The Writer's Library

Websites With Free Writing Prompts

2008-11-26T23:58:00.002-05:00

Writing prompts are very handy when you write on a regular basis and need a break or just have a case of writer's block.

In addition to other resources for writers, Writer's Digest as a library of writing prompts that as of this article takes up four entire pages.

CreativeWritingPrompts.com has 302 free prompts that you can view by hovering the mouse over the prompt number. Some of these are pretty funny.

The Teacher's Corner appears to be where all of our grade school and middle school teachers are getting prompts for English classes and journals. This site appears handy for parents looking for home schooling resources, and all the prompts have some sort of historical or educational value to them.

Creativity-portal.com is one of the more impressive and useful sites that I found. I'll actually be adding it to favorites to visit often. It has prompts for bloggers as well.

Writingfix.com also has a prompt generator. It looks like it was designed for fiction stories.

How to Do Research When Writing a Novel

2008-11-26T23:49:00.003-05:00

Failure to research when writing a novel can be harmful to your story in many situations. If you write something that is inaccurate from a historical or technical standpoint, often there are going to be readers who pick up on your mistake. This can result in either you looking sloppy as a writer or at worse could cause a reader to stop in the middle of the story. In this article, I'll show you ways to do research for a novel that will help you long-term.

1) First of all, take the time to brainstorm areas of your story that may require or be enhanced with research.

Obviously there are going to be things you're already familiar with from experience, but research should be done in areas you're not sure about or have little experience. This will save you a lot of time and keep your focus where you need it.

2) Internet sources are not bad, but look at several and try to stick to authoritative sources.

If you're doing a story on space travel, surf around NASA's site to get ideas about little details that could help you. If it's a historical novel, visit several sites that are geared solely for that time period. I have nothing against Wikipedia or similar sites, but often they're more of a general source and may not have fine details. Part of creating a believable story are having those fine details.

3) Take a day and spend it at the library.

I like looking at books that don't even have an ISBN. The people who know most about historical periods are often the people that lived in them. If you can get access to those kinds of resources, those will help you as well.

4) Keep everything organized in a notebook or folder.

The ones I do are a combination of both visual and short notes that I think are useful. With characters, it's nice to have visual of things like clothing, hairstyles, etc. Keep everything about a character in one place so you don't have to worry about him or her having green eyes in chapter 2 and blue eyes in chapter 17.

More Tips:

I base my writing style on the idea that readers are going to be smart and are going to pay attention to detail. I don't go into so much detail that it drags the story down, but choosing the right words and details helps stories a lot.
About the only warning I have is that the one time you ignore this step is the one time it will come back on you...it's one of the Murphy's laws of writing.

How to Write and Self-Publish a Cookbook

2008-11-26T23:39:00.003-05:00

If you love cooking and like sharing recipes, creating a cookbook can be a fun and even profitable project. In this article, I'll show you an easy way to write and self-publish a cookbook with a very minimum budget.

1) First, register with Lulu.com or a similar website that will allow you to self-publish for free.

I like Lulu because they don't charge you any upfront costs to publish and only make money when you make money.

2) Next you'll need to download a template for the size of the cookbook you'd like to create.

I've found that the US Trade (6" by 9") size is the most economical if you want to sell physical paperback or hardback books. If you want to do e-books only, that doesn't matter as much.

3) Type up all of your recipes in the Word document, keeping one recipe per page for easy reading.

You can use "Save As" and use the same template over and over to keep from having to download it again for each book that you do.

4) Select the "Publish" tab of the website to get a program wizard that will give you instructions on how to upload the Word document, pick a cover, and determine what you want to charge for your book.

If you wish, you can then buy copies for yourself at wholesale. It's not a requirement however.

5) Lulu will create a unique web page for your cookbook.

You can then link to this site from your blog, personal website, or social networking website. I've made money just from doing this without spending a dime!

Additional Tips:

If you play with the dollar amount using different bindings, etc., you can come up with a cookbook that you can reasonably use for fund raisers or for personal profit.
Don't copy and paste other people's copyrighted work (including recipes) into your book without permission.

How to Prepare to Write a Short Story

2008-11-26T23:32:00.003-05:00

In this article, I'll share a few foundational areas that will help you in creating a great short story. Preparing not only makes a story better, but it makes it easier to write as well.

1) Explore Your Characters

If you think of your favorite stories, books, and movies, almost 99% are great because they were character-driven. With fictional characters, it's helpful to create a profile including background information, motivations, and physical descriptions for continuity. You can keep this in a file folder, notebook, or a database file on your computer for handy reference.

2) Research Your Setting

This is going to vary based on the nature of the story. A historical short story for instance can benefit from little details from the time period the story is set. Due to the attention span of the average reader, you want to balance creating an environment and boring the reader. There is a happy medium that creates a very rich story in a short amount of pages.

3) Create a Framework for Your Plot

Even if you don't have all the details, creating a framework for your story generally makes things a lot easier. With novels you generally have more room to explore multiple sub-plots, but short stories are generally very focused.

4) Revise More Than Once

Walk away from the story for a few days, then revisit it. You will find ways to improve it several times. Eventually you will reach a point that adding or changing would actually take away from it. Then you're really done.

Additional Tip:

Start doing these steps on paper, and over time it does get easier to do it automatically. I still use notebooks a lot just so I'll have a reference for ideas I want to use later.

How to Overcome Writer's Block

2008-11-26T23:15:00.002-05:00

Whether you're writing for fun, for profit, or for school, writer's block is one of the most annoying problems you're likely to encounter at some point. In this article, I'll share some ideas that I've found helpful.

1) One very common cause of writer's block is a lack of preparation.

If you're doing a nonfiction work, you may not have done enough research for your creativity to have enough information to work with. In fiction stories, I've found it's better to start with a general plot outline as opposed to just writing myself into a corner.

2) Take a look at the environment where you're attempting to write.

Is it dull and boring? Something I've found helpful is developing a home office that is creativity-friendly. An exciting and warm room will often provide more benefits than distractions. If needed, you may need to write on paper in a different setting and then type the report or story later.

3) If you have problems generating ideas in general, try keeping what I call "brainstorming notebooks"--one by your bed, another in your car, and a third in your office.

A lot of times ideas will hit you in everyday life that won't occur to you while sitting down in front of a computer.

4) Don't try to force an idea--most likely it won't be as great as the one that hits you if you take a break for a few minutes.

Instead of getting frustrated, give the situation some time. Usually it will pay off for you, with the only exception being where you've procrastinated until the last minute.

Tips for Staying Motivated in Writing

2008-11-26T22:54:00.003-05:00

I begin writing for fun when I was nine years old. I loved it, and for a long time writing fiction stories was one of my favorite hobbies. Having to write for (boring) class projects however turned writing into a chore however, and I nearly stopped after college. I want to share with you some ideas that may help you if writing is your dream, even one that has been dormant for awhile.

1) First, I think it's extremely important to find at least one writing community to help you develop your ability and encourage you to write.

In a lot of ways, writing is a lot like business in that the more support you have the great your chance of becoming successful. Writing.com was the website that got me started and has a very encouraging and positive environment for new and experienced writers alike. They don't pay you in cash, but the immediate feedback and tools you get for free are incredible.

2) Find time to write daily and establish a habit.

The great thing about web sites and online portfolios is you can access them at multiple locations and in small spaces of time. For example, I'm writing this article in my mother-in-law's house, and I have the ability to start a bigger project here and finish it at home tomorrow. This makes writing a great career as well, consider if you work at it long enough you can travel without a drop in income.

3) Once you feel comfortable, try your hand at writing for profit.

Ehow.com is a great place to start, as nearly everyone knows how to do something that can help other people. They are real and have paid me very well for my effort. Other good sites include Hubpages (get money by signing up with affiliates such as Google Adsense), Gather, Helium, and Blogger. With other sites, just be careful to read terms and conditions of agreements very carefully--you don't want to put yourself in the position where you're doing all the work and someone else ends up owning the rights to it for a low amount of money. Stick to "non-exclusive" and "use" agreements with other sites.

More Tips:

Persistence matters in writing. I've seen statistics that anywhere between 50-75% of Americans have a great idea for a book. Out of that however, it's a small percentage of people who actually go for it. I want to encourage you if this is a dream that you've put off to the side. It's amazing what you can do if you just get fear and procrastination out of your way!
The only thing I feel like I should caution you about is any opportunity where you have to pay someone large amounts of money to publish your work. Those are usually scams. Check out any site on the Better Business Bureau first before you sign up with them.

Tips for Writing Reviews

2008-11-26T22:48:00.003-05:00

Whether they're for a movie, restaurant, book, or another type of business, there are several things that reviews all have in common. In this article, I'll show you some tips for writing a review article quickly and effectively.

1) Prepare before you go.

The easiest thing to do is create a template of where your focus needs to be as you take notes. For movies, you may want to list each actress or actor's name so you can make comments on individual performances as well as the overall movie. The same idea can be applied to restaurants (quality of food, quality of service, etc).

2) Take notes.

It's hard to recall an entire experience when you're constantly getting new information--in broadcasting I learned that most people's short-term memories only last 2-3 transitions (cuts, dissolves, changes in camera angle, etc.) Notes will help you recall things you may have forgotten otherwise.

3) If possible, go back more than once.

This adds credibility to a restaurant or business review and with movies gives you an opportunity to catch things you may have missed the first time.

Additional Tip:

Be honest with praise and criticism, but don't feel like a review has to have a negative tone to it to be read. If anything, positive reviews when they're earned are very encouraging to people.

How to Start a Personal Journal

2008-11-26T22:26:00.003-05:00

People start personal journals for many reasons, and they're very worthwhile in helping you focus your thoughts and goals in life. In this article, I'll share some ideas and tips in starting a personal journal.

1) This is going to vary from person to person, but I think I'm pretty reasonable when it comes to picking out writing materials for journals.

I still have spiral-bound notebooks that are over 15-years-old from when I was a kid that are in good condition. They work fine as long as you pick one without perforated pages and use a dark-colored pen as opposed to a pencil or light ink. As my writing has changed however, I've switched over to hardback journals.

2) Got writer's cramp?

If you need some inspiration, try searching "personal journal prompts." You'll find wide variety of resources that are free.

3) If this is your first journal, consider taking a few pages to do some autobiographical information.

Later on you may want to pass on family history to your children and grandchildren or use it to write stories or even books.

4) If you're looking for an online option, Writing.com is a good site that has the ability to set items you write to either public or private.

I like their site because you can access it from multiple locations (as long as there's an Internet connection) as opposed to accidentally leaving a journal at home. I basically do a combination of both.

5) What's very important in all of this is establishing a habit of writing as soon as possible.

When you get used to writing on a daily basis, it does become easier. It also helps you in venturing into writing for profit if that's a goal you'd like to have.

More Tips:

When I first started out, I didn't worry as much about spelling and grammar as much as getting my thoughts on paper. If it's personal and only something only you're going to read, you're going to get better at these naturally over time. Just don't let them keep you from enjoying the process.
Have fun with this. I used to think writing was a chore (mainly because of some teachers I had), but fortunately I also had teachers that showed how rewarding writing can be for your life.

How to Write and Sell an Ebook

2008-11-26T22:00:00.003-05:00

When I first started writing for profit, the idea of creating ebooks was very appealing to me. I just didn't really know how to do it. In this article, I'll show you one option you can take. It's not the only way to do things, but it's a way I know that's legitimate and helpful.

1) Obviously, you're going to need to have an idea or some existing material in mind to do this project.

For me, I had some short stories on a site called Writing.com. Basically on that site, people could read my work for free. After I had written 14 short stories, I decided I wanted to combine them into a book and if possible, an ebook that could be instantly downloaded.

2) At this point, there are a lot of options out there available to you. After I did some research, I personally decided to look into a site called Lulu.com.

Basically they're publishing on demand, meaning you don't have to put up money to be in their system and sell copies of your books and ebooks. Lulu and sites like it make money when something sells, and the percentage isn't bad considering a few people who've bought my books found them on their own without extra marketing on my part(one even lived in Singapore!). My general recommendation however is be very careful when it comes to your money and finding a distribution source. There are scams out there, as well as good opportunities.

3) Lulu and similar sites like it have templates where you can upload a Microsoft Word copy of your work and have it formatted to an Adobe Reader download.

I recommend this because it works with a lot of different electronic readers as well as most computers since the program itself is free.

4) If you do self-publish, keep in mind that your marketing is primarily in your own hands.

This can actually be a good thing if you enjoy it. I personally keep my marketing very simple. I have a blog and just write in a lot of different areas to where there's at least some name recognition and hopefully the realization I put a lot into what I'm doing. You just have to be patient, and good things will happen for you if you're persistent.

More Tips:

Even if you don't consider yourself a writer, there's a high demand for knowledge in a lot of different areas. Give it some thought because you may have something to offer that other people would like to know more about.
Unless it's a copy of an actual print book, I'm learning to keep ebooks shorter due to people read them during shorter time spans.
Don't assume that if you just write the book that people are going to flock to buy it. Writing the book is about 50% of the work and marketing is about the other 50% when it comes to making an income doing this.

How to Write a Popular How-to Article

2008-11-26T21:54:00.003-05:00

If you're writing how-to articles for income, the popularity of an article can play a major role in the number of hits you receive on-line or the chances of it being accepted for print. While I personally don't make popularity the only reason I write an article, I don't ignore it either. Here are some ideas to consider that I've found helpful.

1) First of all, I think writing how-to articles is very similar to inventing a new product in the aspect of the popular saying, "See a need, fill a need."

Inspiration for how-to articles is unlimited because there are many people out there who want solutions to problems or want to learn something new.

2) Keep your titles simple for articles you want to appeal to a mass number of people, especially if your topic is fairly general.

A long title won't impress people unless it's addressing a specific problem or topic, where you're likely going to have a smaller audience. (This isn't necessarily a bad thing, especially if little has been written on the topic). What I've noticed however is when I change a long title to something more simplified, I get better results as far as hits.

3) Do a little "homework" and thinking before you begin writing.

Be observant of the world around you. I pay attention to what people are talking about and what topics are popular in larger works such as recent nonfiction book best-sellers. I read a lot as well, and sometimes an article comes from having a different viewpoint or approach to the same topic or problem. I keep notebooks at home, in my car, and at work so when an idea hits me I won't forget it.

More Tips:

Another great thing about writing how-to articles is that you can learn something new as well. I know since I've first started writing articles that I've learned a lot of new things in the process of researching topic ideas. From an income standpoint, you're getting paid to educate yourself and help other people! That's a very fun combination.
Don't try to write on topics that personally aren't interesting to you. I've tried that before, and the quality of your article suffers no matter how hard you try to force it. With articles, it's not totally "Write what you know" but "Write what you want to know."

How to Create a Believable Fictional Character

2008-11-26T21:43:00.003-05:00

This article is mainly geared toward fiction writers who already have characters in mind or created. It is a checklist of ideas to keep in mind that will help you create realistic characters or slightly alter existing ones.

1) When you start brainstorming the traits of your character, you want to look more at how those traits impact your character than the really the traits themselves.

Too many times I've seen writers give a detailed list of traits when they begin to describe a character--this can make the character seem flat if you're not careful. The advice of many writing books of "show, don't tell" is very important in characterization as well as plot. If your character is intelligent, show them doing something intelligent. Don't just have it listed.

2) You need to have some background information on your characters that is specifically for you as the writer--it doesn't have to be something that the reader even knows directly.

This can be information about the characters personality, general reactions when they have a certain emotion, etc. You can keep this stored in notebooks or even in a computer database if you're more technically oriented.

3) It's helpful sometimes to mentally put your characters in situations that aren't related to your plot.

Playing with ideas may help you create a more solid character, even when the ideas themselves don't make it into your book or short story.

4) Do your homework.

If your main character is a pilot, you may possibly have readers who are pilots. If little details are off, your drama may suddenly become a comedy to them. You don't have to go overboard, but either do enough research or have a friend who's an authority review it for you.

5) Be observant of people in general.

This is especially helpful in studying mannerisms, such as people running their hands through their hair if they're frustrated or nervous. Sometimes this is also helpful for coming up with conflict ideas as well. Just don't creep people out by following them around with a notebook in public.

Tips:

Take the time to look through some books on psychology and personality-types. When you study real people, it makes creating fictional people a lot easier.
There are also a lot of free online resources on personality-types as well.

How to Get Writing Ideas

2008-11-26T21:32:00.000-05:00

I believe that writer's block comes from two things: not being prepared or wanting your writing to be perfect on the first draft. In this article, I will address both of these issues and help you get a better flow of ideas going for you.

1) One of the first things you need to do is get in a habit of carrying a notebook and something to write with wherever you go.

We all have down time--waiting in line at the post office, doctor's office, etc. You can brainstorm during these times and come back to your ideas later when you're home. This has personally allowed me to come up with dozens of short stories I don't think I would've done otherwise. If you want to do it, keep separate notebooks by your bed and in your car as well. Just remember to write down that great idea you get in your car when you get to a red light--not while the car is moving.

2) Read.

I've also found it helpful to keep some reference books in your home office about the area you like to write about. It's always good to read about a book a month to keep your mind sharp and help you to spark some ideas. This makes some writers uncomfortable--thinking it's going to limit their creativity--but for me it's had the opposite effect. I sometimes even read a little of people I disagree with (don't buy their books--just read a few pages) and have an idea of how I'd put a topic in my perspective.

3) Don't worry about getting things right on the first draft.

While I was in school, I used to be so worried about getting a paper back with red ink on it. Now I actually like it when I run copy past other people and have them catch my mistakes. It makes your final draft better than if you keep it to yourself.

There are a lot of great web sites for writers that are very nice and helpful when it comes to reviews. One of my personal favorites with a great community is Writing.com.

Tips:

Keep yourself in a habit of writing, even if it's not the masterpiece of work you're wanting. It makes things easier when you take on a larger project.
When you fill up a notebook, put it in a filing cabinet. The next time writer's block hits you, you have a whole set of ideas you can start on.

How to Write Natural Dialogue in Fiction Stories

2008-11-26T17:23:00.000-05:00

In creating novels and short stories, it can sometimes be difficult to create natural and realistic dialogue. In this article, I'll show you ways you can solve this problem.

1) The first step involves taking a look at your characters.

Keep in mind traits such as personality, where they are from, their ages, and their education. Dialogue is a tool that you can use to show these traits to your reader without directly telling them. Taking the time to do this will help you determine not only what a character might say, but how they would say it.

2) Second, mentally picture your characters interacting as if they were on a TV show or a play.

Is there anything about what they're saying to each other that seems odd or out of place? Sometimes a sentence may be correct from a grammar standpoint, but you may have to reword it for dialogue because of how people speak in reality.

3) Third, read the dialogue out loud.

This will help your pacing. If you feel like you're out of breath after a string of dialogue, you may want to shorten your sentences. Likewise, if you feel like the dialogue is too short for the situation, you can smooth it out.

4) Last, do a check of your overall story.

Do you have a lot of "he said" and "she replied" after each sentence? You can eliminate a lot of those after you've established who is talking. This makes the story as a whole flow a lot better.

Additional Tips:

Try paying attention to the conversations of people. You'll begin to pick up on patterns such as rapid subject changes.
Think of ways you can show your character's personality by how much they speak and how much they listen.
On the other extreme, you don't necessarily want your dialogue to completely reflect how people talk--especially filler words such as "um."
Avoid phonetically spelling out accents of characters if at all possible. This can annoy your readers after a certain point. Mention the accent, but make the words themselves easy to read.
Also avoid modern slang if you intend for the story to be longer-lasting.