101 Habits of Highly Successful Novelists

Insider Secrets from Top Writers

Andrew McAleer

• Publisher: Adams Media
• Year: 2008
• ISBN:
  9781440515248
• Topic: Lingue e linguistica
• Subtopic: Editoria

This title focuses on the behaviors necessary to succeed in the dog-eat-dog world of fiction writing by asking successful authors how they practice their craft. Readers will learn how to adopt those habits on their quest to become novelists. The book will inspire, nourish, and provide the needed kick in the pants to turn the wannabes into doers! The 101 Habits of Highly Successful Novelists is full of "aha" experiences as the reader uncovers the collected wisdom from the cream of today's fiction writers.

Part I
PASSION

My 1955 edition of The Oxford Universal Dictionary offers so many definitions for the word “passion” that I almost gave up trying to figure out why the word is so important to the subject of writing.

I found this definition in my travels: “The suffering of pain.” I didn’t like that one even though it applies all too well to the life of an author. Then there was: “The being affected from without.” I have absolutely no idea what that means, but it was a frightening throwback to the college course I took on Analytic Philosophy. Finally, way down deep in a tertiary definition I found: “An aim or object pursued with zeal.” Kind of like the Indian arrowhead I bought from the Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma and gave to my eight-year-old nephew Liam.

Now, it wasn’t just any old Indian arrowhead, I informed him that it was a “genuine” Indian arrowhead just as advertised. And I believe it too because I scooped it out from the hundreds that were contained in a genuine wicker basket. Anyway, when I gave it to Liam he inspected it from all angles and came up with question after question about how a Native American bow and arrow actually worked. And being a genuine expert on the subject, I answered each question with a qualified precision P. T. Barnum might have envied. Later, when Liam thought he was alone, I saw him looking at the arrowhead as if it possessed some concealed, magical spirit. Indeed, in Liam’s eyes, it did. I could see he wanted to know what was the person like who made it? Its adventures? Who found it and where? In Liam’s mind, that little chunk of rock had grand stories to tell. That’s passion. And whether he knew it or not, as Liam asked himself these questions and tried to answer them, he was writing.

Perhaps I’m a genuine fool to take on Oxford, but the next time I want to know something about passion, I’ll ask the nearest kid.

Chapter 1
A PORTRAIT
OF A NOVELIST

The interest is easy. The concentration . . . you need a very very strong superstructure. . . . You know, you need a big big superstructure and the determination to make it work. Now, one of the big revelations for me, early on as a writer when I was into writing The Big Nowhere, was that I realized I could execute whatever I could conceive of.—James Ellroy

Successful novelists are not born. They do not have a sixth sense, an extra set of hands, or a third eye. They are dedicated writers—workers really—who start books and don’t quit until they are finished, revised, rewritten, and revised some more, again and again and again until their manuscripts are marketable. Successful novelists have families, jobs, and problems. They are individuals bound by the same time constraints as the would-be novelist with “no time” on her hands.

Successful novelists are single mothers, single fathers, lawyers, movie store clerks, reporters, rabbis, steamboat captains, priests, veterans, rabbit trappers, bellhops, etc. Successful novelists are simply people who turn day-to-day grind into literature because they choose to and don’t quit when life gets in the way as it always does and always will. And thank God life does get in the way, otherwise they would have nothing to write about.

1. Being Creative and Original

The man who has no imagination has no wings.—Muhammad Ali

Your novel is what your thoughts make it. Your life is unique and like no other. There will never be another one of you. Your singular experiences help make you who you are and what you are about. Inside of you are your unique novel, characters, and story line. Only you can create the novel you wish to create. No one else can do it but you. I have edited a small award-winning magazine for the past decade and have read thousands of short story submissions and the cover letters that accompany them. I cringe when I read “My story is just like . . .” or “My characters are reminiscent of . . .” I ask myself: What is your story? Who are your characters? And believe me, other editors and agents ask these same questions. Readers want, indeed demand, and are entitled to originality. They want to explore the new world you have created and to meet the original and exciting people who exist in your mind and not in some other writer’s work.

Now, let’s look into the minds of these creative authors who have brought us so many wonderful new worlds and different characters.

GREGORY MCDONALD People ask me how to write a book. That’s the wrong question. The question ought to be, how does one write this book? I don’t know. Only the person who conceives of a book, short story, poem, painting, or piece of music really has the ability to bear it and birth it . . . fulfill it, in accordance with itself.

BILL PRONZINI Always do your own work. Never try to imitate favorite or bestselling authors. Never follow current trends; what is a hot topic today may well be ice cold by the time a novel is written and submitted for publication. Imitators are seldom successful. An individual’s unique style and vision are what editors are looking for.

PETER LOVESEY Beware of the cliché. By this I mean not only the cliché phrase (“It’s an old trick, major, but it might just work.”), but the cliché plot (the murderer turns out to be the narrator) and the cliché style. Don’t try to be a second Raymond Chandler or J.K. Rowling. By all means learn from successful writers, but be yourself, and say it freshly.

CARRIE VA UGHN Don’t compare yourself to others. There will always be someone who writes faster, or slower, or gets a bigger advance, or better advertising. Everyone’s career and writing process is a little different. Follow your own path.

2. Being a Natural Storyteller

The art of art, the glory of expression, and the sunshine of the light of letters, is simplicity.—Walt Whitman

Baseball enthusiasts often contend that Ted Williams was a natural hitter. While there may be some truth to this, what is certain, is that Ted Williams loved to hit a baseball. He would talk about the science of hitting a baseball constantly, and he even wrote a book on the subject. Williams would also visit lumberyards to personally select the wood used to mill his baseball bats.

Likewise, the natural storyteller requires more than just wanting to tell a story. Storytelling is having a love and full appreciation for the art of telling a story and how the story is created from its inception. Storytelling is an appreciation for the way someone else tells a story and for how it sounds and how it appears in short form, on the big screen, or in a novel. How was this story told and how might you tell it? What makes this story a failure? Storytelling is more than just words, words, words.

BEVERLY BARTON Most people will agree that there are different types of writers, but many of us fall under the category of natural-born storytellers. We were born with stories in our minds and characters running rampant in our brains from the time we were children. Even before I knew how to read and write, I made up stories. By the time I was nine, I had written my first book. Writing comes as naturally to me as breathing. Storytellers don’t necessarily paint poetic pictures with their words the way true poets do; instead they relay stories that draw the reader into the action and make the reader care about what happens to the characters.

JOANN ROSS I believe we’re all born storytellers. If you watch infants babble to themselves and toddlers having conversations with their stuffed animals, you can see the wealth of creativity humans are born with.

Then, about the time children start going to school, they learn to color inside the lines—that the sky is blue, the grass is green, and no, you can’t have a separate desk for your imaginary best friend. Little by little, that storytelling ability drifts away. Most of the writers I know have somehow managed to stay in touch with that inner child who’s never heard of such a thing as an internal editor.

WILLIAM LINK Story is the strongest element in writing. Structure seems to be the great weakness in our current movie fare. I found at Universal when I worked with relatively new or young writers that were generally good with dialogue, character development, atmo...