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8th Day, Write or Wrong: How did you start writing
Schroedingers Cat
Shipmate
Sometimes it seems like a huge move from being an ordinary person to being a writer. So how did you start? How did you decide to write something of your own, to put your words out where others might actually see them?
Comments
I've done some creative writing, but my work is as a journalist. I planned to go to J-school after college, but had an opportunity to sing opera professionally, and took it. A few years later, I came back to it, on a part-time basis; I've been writing full-time since the fall of 1998.
Rossweisse // I'm not dead yet
I had written an autbiographical piece as a response to my dad dying, many years ago now, and it was probably not a bad piece for what I was wanting to do. But I didn't do anything more. And as a computing graduate my entire prose writing for my degree was one 1500 word report.
Then I did a theology degree, where I was writing 10K words per module, which was something of a shock (it was 5 assignments of 2K each, so as long as I took them individually, I could cope with that).
Then I undertook a PhD. At 70K words. And I realised that I might actually be able to put together something of that length. When I left the church, I started putting some of my creative energy into writing some stuff, some ideas I had that I wanted to put down.
And I discovered that I might not be too bad at it. Especially when I got some of my anger out, and started writing humorous work, which is probably what I am best at.
I ended up as a primary teacher and then children's librarian.
You could write the story of your life to begin with and that will give practice.
There are web resources that explain about how to play, draft and edit.
But the best advice I can give is just start and write anything and everything: look out the window and write it down.
As you gain confidence you might want to join a writers forum. They aren't scary as that's what lots of people do. There might even be one in your local library/community centre,
The issue of publishing/marketing is an entirely separate can of worms from the actual writing, and it is not only OK, it is probably helpful to split the two issues. Just like you can swim for pleasure, without being on the national Olympic butterfly-relay team.
Then I had mental health difficulties and as I came out of them I found myself compulsively keeping diaries and finding opportunities to write. I was also doing a theological Education course and I started off doing the short answer option but built up the courage to attempt essays. Then I started an OU Masters in Sociology. I got on because I have an M.A. in Mathematics. My instinct was still that I would be unable to write the essays, which would be a great excuse for not doing a PhD. I did not fail a single essay and could score over 80 if I had the inclination. Exams were still interesting. I went to a PhD and joined a creative writing group, so officially I can write. However, where to draw the line between not writing and writing is beyond me. All I know was there was a time when I could not write and now I can.
You can also private publish but that costs, although there are plenty of private publishing houses out there.
From what I know, getting an agent is tough.
Good luck.
Getting one seems to be entirely a matter of luck. You need to remember that they all have day jobs working for their current clients, and reading your MS is something they may or may not get round to in the evening when what they really want to do is to have a glass of wine and put their feet up, rather than delve into the ever-growing slush pile.
My advice would be to get into a good - I stress that adjective - Writers' Group and ask for recommendations both ways - ie once you've shown the members of the Group that you can write, someone there may be able to introduce you to their agent, or at least suggest somone that you can name-drop with.
As so often, it's Who you know that counts.
I also wrote a children's picture book, when my children were small. I tried to find a publisher, but the ones I was willing to send it to told me it was too niche. So I waited 20 years or so, and found a micropress, and that book (Catherine's Pascha) came out in 2015. My second book (The Saint Nicholas Day Snow, another picture book) came out late last year.
The picture books are a great deal of fun. But the technical writing still pays the bills.
I wish I still had those notebooks.
I trained as a scientist. In my second job after PhD, I was a young lecturer asked to produce a course on what was then a new and exciting topic, namely renewable energy. There were no textbooks a the right level (senior undergraduate) , only specialist research papers on individual facets of the subject. So I developed a series of lectures drawing on those papers but simplified to the level that my students might understand. Eventually this turned into a commercially published textbook (co-authored with one colleague), which was I think the first on the subject at that level, with the writing and rewriting mostly done in university vacations.
That was in the 1980s, and my wife reckons that she produced 3 children in the time my colleague and I took to produce one book, so her "productivity" was much better than mine! The book is now in its third edition , with a fourth in preparation.
Two lessons I draw from this experience are (1) you would be very lucky to live off your earnings as a writer and (2) it nearly always takes several drafts to get a good product.