Writing Tips for Complete Beginners

I love working with new writers, I do it a lot, and I’ve been thinking about writing tips for complete beginners. Not people who’ve got a half draft or two knocking about on their hard drive. Not people who’ve been tinkering with fanfiction. People who honestly have nothing but a vague idea and a desire to write something. First-time writers who aren’t even sure they can do it yet.

Because it never ceases to amaze me how many people I meet who want to write a book. They have a great idea. They’re keen. But they don’t think they can do it!

It’s not that I don’t understand why. Writing a book is daunting! Before you’ve started it seems like a huge, unmanageable project. Where would you start? How would you go about it? How does it even work?

In my experience as a developmental editor, I’ve come up with a few pointers that I like to share with writers just beginning their journey. The maddening, brilliant, terrifying, exhilarating adventure of writing their very first book. And I’ve distilled those pointers down into a blog post! So, here are my six writing tips for beginners:

Start by figuring out what you want to say

What’s the message at the heart of your book? The idea you want to convey? The question you want to explore? Knowing this is the first step, and if you’re not sure yet then that’s something to work on.

It doesn’t have to be all that deep, of course! Your question might be ‘What would it be like if humans could walk through walls?’ The idea you want to write about might be all the different types of ketchup you’ve tried.

Here’s the thing though: this idea needs to be interesting enough to you that you’re prepared to write a whole book about it. At some point you might also want to consider whether the idea is interesting enough to other people that they’ll want to buy your book, but that’s pretty irrelevant if you can’t even muster up the enthusiasm to write the thing in the first place!

That’s why one of the first questions I ask writers I work with is what they want to write about. If they can get excited about the idea, it’s a good sign for the rest of the project! If they can’t answer the question, that’s something we need to work on before going any further.

The second of my writing tips is to use what you know about how you like to work

Some people are great at sitting down at the same time, every day, and writing for an hour. Other people need to be right up against a deadline before they can get words on the page. Some people can only get in the zone if they’ve got a four-hour window in which to write.

Of course, most people think they need more time than they actually do to write! But when I’m working with a beginner writer, I encourage them to think about their preferred approach, and use that.

Writing a book is a relatively long-term project; it takes a serious investment of time and effort to get to a first draft. Even more to revise that first draft and get it into a publishable state. And even more on top of that to promote the thing, if you’re looking to make sales later down the line! So, it’s worth working out as early as possible how you’re going to fit all of that around your life.

If you need some kind of external pressure, you need to find a way to create that for yourself. An accountability partner of some kind. If you know you’re going to need uninterrupted time, you need to look at where in your schedule you can carve that out.

I also like to work with writers on ways to fit writing in, even in less-than-optimal conditions! But first and foremost, I think it’s important to work with what you know, and try to find ways to play to your strengths.

Some kind of outline is a good idea

Yes, I know, some people are practically allergic to plotting. I get it. And I’m not here to make you go against your instincts; if you know for sure that you need to roam the wilderness of your imagination and write about whatever you discover there, then fine! But for the overwhelming majority of writers, and particularly beginner writers, some kind of outline will help them to get the best results.

This might be a brief, bullet-pointed list of important plot events. It might be an in-depth, scene-by-scene breakdown of every moment that you want in your story. It might be a rough sketch of the ideas you want to convey, and the order that feels most sensible at this point. Maybe it’s just a paragraph about the ending you want to get to, and the tragic break-up you want the character to go through somewhere along the way.

There are a few reasons why I recommend all of my beginner writers attempt some kind of outline. An outline, even a really rough one, can do wonders when you’re sat there thinking, ‘What am I meant to write next?’ It gives you a sense of direction.

It can also be helpful, even if you find yourself disagreeing with it later! Because sometimes the best way to figure out where you want your book to go is to try writing something that turns out to be wrong. You’ll get more information about what you do want to write from heading in the wrong direction than you will from sitting and staring at a blank page.

There’s also the fact that, the clearer a sense you have of where you’re going, the more you can get away with writing out of order. Which has become kind of a favourite thing of mine, and can be a great way to feel less stuck if you’re trying to finish a first draft.

A slightly contradictory writing tip: research is vital! It can also be a trap

This is kind of two writing tips in one. Pretty much everybody needs to do some kind of research as they’re writing. This is obviously true for non-fiction writing, but it comes up in a lot of fiction as well. Whatever your project, questions will arise that you want to make sure you’re getting right.

And I am all for research! Not only does it help to make sure that your writing is accurate, it can also provide you with inspiration beyond the immediate question you’re answering. It can open up whole new avenues to write about, help you to flesh out characters and background information, and generally create a more compelling book.

But if I had a pound for every beginner writer who told me, ‘I couldn’t write that chapter this week, I still need to do more research,’ I would have enough money to buy my whole to-be-read list. Probably twice over.

Here’s the thing: there’s always more research you could be doing. After a point though, it just gets in the way of the business of writing. Even when it’s relevant and necessary, there comes a point where you need to set it aside, make a note to come back to the research later, and just write what you can.

Quantity is more important than quality, at least when you’re starting out

I’m not an advocate of smashing out a truly awful first draft for the sake of it. I think it’s important to make an effort to write well, even at the first draft stage, because that will help you to get better in a way that just chucking words at the page won’t.

But quality is not the most important thing when you’re a complete beginner. And the expectation of quality can crush an otherwise promising first draft before it’s even had the chance to get off the ground. Bit of a mixed metaphor there, but hopefully you take my point!

So, here’s the writing tip. When you’re a complete beginner, you need to write something – anything – before you can look at improving it. I also think that pushing through to a full first draft is important, even if some (or most) of it isn’t that great. Once you’ve got something roughly complete, it becomes a lot easier to start the redrafting process and really learn from your first attempt.

Editing as you go works for some people, but I think it’s better for people who already have some experience with writing, and with editing their own work. Not so much complete beginners.

One of my most important writing tips for complete beginners: Practice is great, but you’ll need feedback to get better

To an extent, you can definitely improve as a writer by practicing. Writing, reading what you’ve written, thinking about how to do better next time, and then beginning again.

You can also improve as a writer through reading! Active and considered reading, within and beyond the genre you want to write in, can be a great way to grow your understanding of what good writing looks like. At the end of the day though, it is my firm belief that you need feedback on your writing for real improvement. This is one of the most important writing tips, as far as I’m concerned.

Believe me, I know how excruciating it can be to share your work with somebody. But, especially as a beginner writer, there really is only so far you can get on your own.

Now, there are a load of different ways you can get feedback, depending on your preference, budget and the kind of feedback you’re after. Whether you want to join a writing class and get feedback that way, match up with a critique partner, find a beta reader or hire an editor is up to you and what you need. But if you want to really improve, if you want your writing to be as good as it can be, you need to get other eyes on it.

What are your favourite writing tips for complete beginners?

What do you wish you’d known when you were starting out? Or what do you wish other writers knew? I’d love for any advice to add to the collection!