Well, I’ve been doing Q&A Sunday for a little over a year. I had tons of questions! But they’ve kind of fallen off. So, I decided to start on something new. If you have a question, I’ll still answer it here, but when I don’t have questions, which is more often than not, I wanted to offer something to aspiring writers.
The romance community is simply amazing. The number of people willing to share their knowledge and expertise always astounds me. In 2018, I’m going to start offering workshops for authors, and it only makes sense, for me, to start writing about writing!
I’ve answered a few reader questions about writing, but when I started out, I had more questions than people I could ask. Some of these posts will go deeper than others. Some will be more general. Some will make you think, and some will give you ‘homework.’ Overall though, I want to help you, the aspiring author, to make you you, the published author!
Ready?
The first thing I think every author needs is a healthy love of reading. I’m not talking you read a couple books a year, or you pick one up every once in a while. I’m talking you should be so anxious to start reading a new book that you twitch! Well, maybe not that bad, but you have to love it. It should be almost like an addiction.
I have a Pinterest board called I Dream of Books. There’s a reason for that. I really do! When I was battling cancer, I had a horrible time sleeping. I was always a poor sleeper, but it was even worse during that time. I would use that time to read. I was awake anyway, and reading a book helped to calm my mind and alleviate some of my worries. Or at least forget about them. When I would read at night, I’d frequently dream of the book I was reading!
I still read at night, although not usually as late as I used to. I still dream about books I’ve read, and books I’m writing.
I think you need that if you want to be a writer. You have to love books. You have to have a list of authors you love so long that you could spend your entire paycheck on them. Of course, you don’t, but you could.
Now, does what you read have to be what you write?
No!
But they should be related.
What I mean by that is if you absolutely love reading fantasy, you might not write Inspirational YA as well. If you love contemporary romance, writing historical paranormal might not work out so well. If you love both, then yeah, go for it. But if you don’t enjoy reading it, you’re probably not going to love writing it. Let’s face it, you can read a book in a day. It takes a month, or sometimes many months, to write a book. If the topic isn’t one you love, you’re going to hate your job. And that’s no fun.
If you’ve thought about writing a book, ask yourself if you love what you want to write about. If not, think about writing something else. I have friends who read paranormal for their guilty pleasure, but write (and read) romantic suspense or contemporary. I’ve started reading some historical, but all the research that goes into it is too much for me. You have to figure out what works for you. But make sure you love what you write!
