Julie Glover

I’ve got more than 10 full manuscripts under my belt and several short stories as well. While none has been a breeze, some have come easier than others. I recently got to wondering which book was the hardest to write.

Let me share my top three contenders, why they were so hard, and what I learned from them. Maybe by reading about my journey, you can avoid those bumps and jolts in the road that can frustrate or slow a writer down.

3^rd Place

Coming into third place is the only novel that won me a NaNoWriMo badge one year. It’s not that the writing itself was a struggle—I found my 50,000 words to put down—but rather the result was messier than an unsupervised pizza party of preschoolers. When I read back through the manuscript, I realized that I got the story down quickly, but editing this baby was going to empty the red ink from all my pens.

Now, some do great with writing fast! If that’s you, keep up what works for you. But too many writers tell others they must churn out stories quickly to blow past that pesky self-critic that wants to question every word choice or to avoid getting stuck revising, revising, revising on chapter two.

Some call it the “vomit” method, meaning you vomit the words on the page, then clean it all up later to make it a beautiful story you can present to the world. And again, if that works for you, knock yourself out!

But after my experience, I know that isn’t what works for me. In fact, after I read that draft and realized how much effort would go into editing it to something good enough, I shoved the novel away and didn’t look at it for years. I’ll get back to it (because it’s a great story), but what I got out of NaNoWriMo was not a finished book but a lesson learned.

Give yourself permission to write the way you write, whether or not it works for someone else.

2^nd Place

A cozy mystery idea came to me in 2017—the sort of sweet story fodder that sparks your excitement and makes you reach for a pen just to jot down the idea before you lose it. Then, I began writing.

But before I got too far, I was talked into plotting the novel scene by scene by a well-meaning mentor. After I finished that multi-page endeavor, I went back to the manuscript…and nothing came. For me, the story was out, done, not all that intriguing anymore.

Have you ever lost interest in a story that previously excited you? What snuffed out that spark?

While it might seem the lesson learned is the same as before—follow your own writing process—that’s not the full conclusion I drew. Rather, I think a writer should know what keeps them going. What spurs you on to finish a story?

Is it a deadline? A reward you’ve promised yourself? Hanging out with your characters? The sheer joy of word-by-word, scene-by-scene writing a novel? The sense of accomplishment when you see the final product? Or like me, learning whodunnit no sooner than two-thirds of the way through your own story? That is, I write in part to discover. If the discovery is already done, I’m a whole lot less interested.

Figure out why you write to The End, and lean into that motivation.

1^st Place

In On Writing, Stephen King confessed to being a three-draft writer—the first rough draft, an edited second draft, and a polished third draft. Meanwhile, my YA contemporary novel Sharing Hunter took about 14 drafts. It’s a wonder I didn’t throw my hands in the air at some point and shout, “I give up!”

Or maybe I did. But I kept coming back, rethinking character arcs, reworking scenes, editing and polishing prose, until the product two drafts before the final one was nominated for an RWA Golden Heart* and landed me my dream agent. In 2019, I self-published that novel, and I am peacock-proud of how it came out.

Have you ever loved a story but gotten so frustrated that you wanted to chuck it?

Maybe you should chuck it. Some stories aren’t meant to be written. But other stories are worth the time and effort. Mind you, I could have cut down on a few of those drafts if I’d known sooner some of the wonderful things you can learn here on Writers in the Storm. If you can spare yourself some heartache, do so! But don’t give up just because it’s frustrating.

Former WITS host Laura Drake is the poster child for not giving up. She learned her craft, wrote and wrote until her manuscript shined, and sent out over 400 queries to agents to get her first book published. (And it’s a fantastic read!) As she has pointed out many times, if this writing stuff was easy, everyone would do it. They don’t, but we do.

Writing my hardest book taught me that it’s okay to move on from a project if you no longer want to do it, but…

If you love your story, keep writing and editing until you’re eager to put your name on the cover and get it out to readers.

I hope my lessons learned help you as well:

1. Give yourself permission to write the way you write, whether or not it works for someone else.
2. Figure out why you write to The End, and lean into that motivation.
3. If you love your story, keep writing and editing until you’re eager to put your name on the cover and get it out to readers.

What’s the hardest book you’ve ever written and why? What lesson(s) did you learn from that process?

About Julie

Julie Glover is an award-winning author of mysteries and young adult fiction. She also writes supernatural suspense under the pen name Jules Lynn.

She's currently working on book five in the Muse Island series, an honorable mention in the difficulty category due to scheduling issues. But it's her own fault for going to France this summer.

Start the Muse Island series with book one, Mark of the Gods!

Image by Wavebreak Media at Deposit Photos

*Golden Heart was a Romance Writers of America contest for unpublished manuscripts that was discontinued after 2019.

by Ellen Buikema

How do I start to write a story? Does it have start at the beginning? Should I have a separate writing space? If I stare at the cursor blinking at the screen long enough, will ideas magically pop into my mind?

There is no one best way to start your story because there are too many variables to consider. But there are many ways to begin.

Great Ways to Start the Writing Journey

1. Start in the middle.

If you can’t think of a beginning, start deeper into the story. Author, James Scott Bell’s book Write Your Novel From the Middle suggests that the middle is where the protagonist tries to reach their story goal, where they transform. These changes cause conflict between the protagonist and the other characters, particularly the antagonist.2

2. Write like a patchwork quilt.

Write what you “see” in your mind and then put the pieces together. This is the method used by author Diana Gabaldon, who said, “I write just about everything piecemeal, including nonfiction articles, book reviews and essays. It’s effective because it works; I’m never held up stewing about What Comes Next— I don’t care what comes next, I just care about something I can see happening. The order of the happening has a logic to it (often, more than one), and that will become clear to me as I work.”

3. Start your story at the end.

John Irving writes backwards. He starts writing a book with the last sentence and then works back to where the story starts. This process can take a year or more. He’s written the majority of his novels this way.

In A Prayer For Owen Meany, Irving’s last line is, “O God-please give him back! I shall keep asking You.”

The first line. “I AM DOOMED to remember a boy with a wrecked voice-not because of his voice, or because he was the smallest person I ever knew, or even because he was the instrument of my mother's death, but because he is the reason I believe in God; I am a Christian because of Owen Meany.”

Beginning and ending, beautifully tied together.

4. Introduce the lead character.

Starting your story by introducing your main character is a great way to hook your readers emotionally—especially when written in first person, showing their worldview.

Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner, uses this type of beginning. “I became what I am today at the age of twelve, on a frigid overcast day in the winter of 1975. I remember the precise moment, crouching behind a crumbling mud wall, peeking into the alley near the frozen creek. That was a long time ago, but it’s wrong what they say about the past, I’ve learned, about how you can bury it. Because the past claws its way out.”

When readers care about a character, they want to know what’s happening to them next and will keep reading.

5. Entice your readers with action.

Start with something that immediately grabs the reader, like an action scene that lets your readers know right away what kind of story this is.

Here is an example from the opening scene of the dystopian fantasy Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury: 

“It was a pleasure to burn.

It was a special pleasure to see things eaten, to see things blackened and changed. With the brass nozzle in his fists, with this great python spitting its venomous kerosene upon the world, the blood pounded in his head, and his hands were the hands of some amazing conductor playing all the symphonies of blazing and burning to bring down the tatters and charcoal ruins of history. With his symbolic helmet numbered 451 on his stolid head, and his eyes all orange flame with the thought of what came next, he flicked the igniter and the house jumped up in a gorging fire that burned the evening sky red and yellow and black.”

6. Use an outline.

Some writers prefer to make a detailed outline, which helps keep them organized. This is a plotting technique. Jim Butcher, who writes contemporary fantasy and steampunk, gives a detailed description of his method for setting up a story in his live journal. titled, Putting It All Together: How to Get Your Story Started or Organizing This Frickin' Mess

Jim Butcher is a big believer in the BIC (butt in chair) method. If you decide to enter NaNoWriMo, this is the method you will use.

7. Start with a mystery.

Begin with a mystery on the first page that keeps your readers intrigued until it’s solved. Mystery can be within any genre. Start with a question, problem, or strange event, and they’ll need to know what happens next.

“People’s lives—their real lives, as opposed to their simple physical existences—begin at different times. The real life of Thad Beaumont, a young boy who was born and raised in the Ridgeway section of Bergenfield, New Jersey, began in 1960. Two things happened to him that year. The first shaped his life; the second almost ended it.” The Dark Half, Stephen King

8. Create a Synopsis.

• Decide the genre you want to write.
• Flesh out your main characters.
• Think about the desires of your characters, their motivations, and what kinds of conflicts those desires might cause.

9. Let yourself write badly.

For me, this is not easy to do. I write a page and want to go back and “fix” any errors I’ve made. There are always errors.

One of the suggestions from NaNoWriMo was to sit and write without going back to change anything. Don’t rethink. Go with the flow. I didn’t believe that I could do this, but I tried anyway. It worked! I was a lot more productive. Granted, much was edited after the 50,000 words, but not stopping to edit after every paragraph or page allowed for better flow and more content.

10. Make up the story as you go.

Sometimes you have a basic idea of where the story starts, where it ends, a vague idea of what might happen in between but details are lacking. Write whatever pops into your head and make sense of it later. You never know what gems you’ll mine amongst the winding words.

Spending the time and effort to create a fantastic opening for your story is a great goal. However, worrying over it can stop your progress cold. The stress from worry will stifle your creative mind, so use your favorite method of relaxation, and then keep on with your writing journey.

Here are more ideas for ways to start a story.  

How do you like to start your stories? What methods have you tried?

* * * * * *

About Ellen

Author, speaker, and former teacher, Ellen L. Buikema has written non-fiction for parents and a series of chapter books for children with stories encouraging the development of empathy—sprinkling humor wherever possible. Her Works In Progress are The Hobo Code, YA historical fiction and Crystal Memories, YA paranormal fantasy.

Find her at https://ellenbuikema.com or on Amazon.

Image by Paul Mears from Pixabay

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

When characters are scared about what might happen, so are your readers.

Imagine your character in a dark room, surrounded by shadows, covered in—

Thud. What was that? Is someone there?

Maybe it’s nothing. The cat chasing his tail. The ice maker cycling up in the fridge. Or maybe it’s a masked killer creeping over the window sill.

Whatever it is, your character is freaking out a bit, and odds are, so is your reader. They’re gripping the novel tight, their breath is coming a little faster, and they’re desperate to know what’s out there and how it’s going to affect the character they’ve grown to love.

So, what do you do now?

Are you milking this moment for all its worth, or letting it die before it gets to scare the pants off of anyone? Are you digging deep into your own fears and weaving them into what your character is feeling, or jumping right to the reveal of what made the thud?

Hopefully, you recognize the power of fear as a tension-generating device, and you’re crafting scenes that tweak nerves and unsettle stomachs, and create a mood where anything is possible, and the worst is very likely right around the corner.

But what if you’re not trying to scare anyone? That’s only for horror writers, right?

Nope, not at all.

If you’re not using fear, you’re missing out on a huge opportunity to engage your readers.

Emotions connect readers to characters, and fear is a powerful—and useful—emotion.

Fear is one aspect of anticipation, which is at the heart of tension. Readers anticipate what might happen, good or bad, and they keep reading to discover how it all turns out.

That connection is vital to pulling readers into a story and making them fall in love with your characters. When they connect, they care. When they care, they worry. When they worry, they stay up late to finish and tell all their friends about this awesome book they just read.

Find the opportunities fear offers and make the most of them.

Look at your scenes and brainstorm how fear can make them stronger.

But remember—there are many types of fear, so you don’t need to approach every scene as if it were part of a horror movie. A parent can fear for a child on their first day of school just as much as a group of campers who picked the wrong vacation spot can fear for their lives.

Adjust as needed for your story, genre, and market.

1. The Fear of the Wrong Choice

Every scene has a goal, but what if the character is chasing the wrong one? What if they’ve made a terrible mistake and the goal they’re pursuing will only lead to ruin?

When a character is utterly convinced they’re right, and that their goal is the correct one, readers will naturally assume they’re correct. That can steal a lot of the tension and mystery out of the scene. But when we layer in a few hints that it’s not the best choice, or give the character reasons to wonder if they’re doing the right thing, we allow uncertainty to creep in.

Uncertainty leads to worry, which leads to fear, which leads to tension. (And eventually to hate according to Master Yoda, but we’ll stop before we get there).

2. The Fear of the Reason Why 

Remember I said fear was a great motivator? Well, there’s also the fear of doing the right thing for the wrong reasons, or doing the wrong thing for the right reasons. Basically, just the character worrying about why they’re acting at all and their reasons behind it.

Maybe they’re being selfish and they know it. Maybe they’re not sure if their motivations are from a good place. They might knowingly do something awful, because it’s the only choice they have and they truly believe they’ll be able to turn it all around before it goes bad.

Not every character acts from the goodness of their heart, so let them worry about why they’re so gung-ho to do whatever needs doing in the scene.

3. The Fear of What’s Out There 

Ah, conflict. It’s a given the characters will face it, and face a lot of it, before the novel is through, but the question is…how awful will it be?

Hopefully, pretty darn terrible (whatever “terrible” means in your story).

Characters will have to figure out how to circumvent the problem. They’ll need to weigh the pros and cons and look at all the options, and worry over them all. They’ll need to decide how far they’re willing to go to fix this issue. They’ll need to accept that things might not turn out in their favor and it’ll end in screaming and death.

This is a major fear every scene should have, even if the characters know what conflict awaits them—they just won’t know how it’ll turn out. 

4. The Fear of it Coming Back to Bite Them 

Which all culminates in the fear of the consequences for their actions. Characters should have a lot at stake, and worry about how their choices and motivations are going to affect their plans.

What if they’re wrong? What if they’re right? What if they’ve made awful mistakes and set terrible things in motion that they’ll barely—if ever—recover from? (Do this last one as often as you can. Really, it’s tons of fun). 

Stakes are a great way to add fear, tension, and a dark cloud hanging over the heads of your characters. If they screw up, they really should regret it.

5. The Fear of the Ugly Truth

Character arcs are rooted in fear. It’s the fear created by whatever happened to them in their past that’s haunting them to this day. In a lot of stories, fighting against the fear that “the past” is right is what the book is all about.

Let characters worry that deep down, they deserve all the horrible things that have happened to them. They’re not worthy of what they want. They’re just kidding themselves by trying to be a better person. They’re everything that person who wronged them said they were.

This is what’s driving them on an emotional level, so don’t skimp out here when developing your fears.

Fears aren’t only relatable—they’re universal. 

We all have them, so we all understand how they can warp a person’s mind and behavior. Fear can make a character act in ways they never would have otherwise, and cause them to act against their better judgement. It can push buttons and ruin relationships. It can divide and conquer and leave a character alone when at the worst possible moment.

It can create situations that yank on a reader’s heartstrings and fully immerse them in the story.

Which is what we want as writers—to tap into those fears and create an emotional connection that helps us engage our readers and give them a story worth their time.

What are your characters afraid of? Do you take advantage of that in your novel?

About Janice

Janice Hardy is the award-winning author and founder of the popular writing site Fiction University, where she helps writers improve their craft and navigate the crazy world of publishing. Not only does she write about writing, she teaches workshops across the country, and her blog has been recognized as a Top Writing Blog by Writer’s Digest. She also spins tales of adventure for both teens and adults, and firmly believes that doing terrible things to her characters makes them more interesting (in a good way). She loves talking with writers and readers, and encourages questions of all types—even the weird ones.

Find out more about writing at www.Fiction-University.com, or visit her author’s site at www.JaniceHardy.com. Subscribe to her newsletter to stay updated on future books, workshops, and events and receive her book, 25 Ways to Strengthen Your Writing Right Now, free.

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