Get your writing out there!

I've always been a bit scared of posting my writing online - I mean, it's mine. What if someone else steals it?
It's taken me a while to realise that even if someone does steal an idea or a chunk of text, they won't get far with it. If they're out thieving, they probably haven't got the ability to finish a story so nothing will happen if they come                  
                                                          across your writing.

Now that this fear is out of the way, put your writing to the big wide world! There are so many websites that you can use to promote your own writing and post it. I am a recent Wattpad convert, after years of not being too big on posting my stuff on the internet (if you haven't heard of Beth Reekles, look her up!) and I'm learning it's quite fun. I can post my stuff in installments of one story (great for novels) or little pieces of their own merit.

Of course, there are many more websites out there and I could exhaust myself listing them all but a quick google search for "writing websites" can easily churn up hundreds of different sites. Do a bit of reading around to find the right one for you. I settled with Wattpad because I've heard a lot of good stuff about it - also, agents and people in the literary world are known to occasionally find something they like there. It's worth a try! Even published authors are known to post their work on the site, too. It's a great place to meet likeminded people, all striving for that bit of recognition.


Of course this was coming: my shameless plug. But this is my blog after all, and I'd love to promote my work (it hasn't even got 50 reads yet!) so every little counts. Send me a message if you have any questions or concerns.

http://www.wattpad.com/story/5275996-alphabet-soup

Happy Writing!

- Lydia

Revising your book: it's not so scary

Ever since I started writing, I've been plagued by the thoughts that at the end, it'll need months of revision and hard work and the story will end up being totally different from what I wrote in the first place. Most of that is probably true but if you truly love the idea, it won't be so hard.

I recently finished the first go at revising a book I wrote in the summer of 2011, which seems so long ago now. I left the book for so long because I had fun writing it for the remarkably short two weeks it took - not something I've replicated yet! - and because I had no hope of anything professional for it - it was just something for me. Then I noticed it the other day and thought, hmm, why not start revising it? I took a hard copy and a couple of highlighters and spent a few days pawing through the pages, often highlighting whole sections that made no sense or where the "find and replace" function had gone horribly wrong, or I'd made stupid spelling/grammar mistakes. But because I'd left it so long - which I recommend highly - there were some really great bits I'd forgotten about. Any faith I'd lost from the stupid bits was made up for by the odd gem I stumbled across amongst those newly colourful pages. It's worth it.

Now that I've changed all the glaring errors and a few tiny mistakes, I'm a lot more confident in my writing. I fixed the odd plot hole and tied up loose ends. There's still a long way to go before it's a beautiful, polished book but I've made the first few steps and those are the ones that count the most. Had I not made the effort to revise it, I wouldn't have been inspired to write a sequel. I had forgotten how much I loved that set of characters and through the revision period, I was enlightened and desperate to continue their story. I encourage you to do the same.

Lydia

Don't hold back for the first draft!

You may want to get everything perfect the first time round but this won't happen. Don't worry about it like I did - it's easy to go back and change things once you've got the first draft down because then you've got the bulk of the story and you're just tweaking it, rather than coming up with the new words to move the story along.

I spent years being too scared to write the stories I wanted to write and use the names I wanted to use in case they weren't "right" in the end, even if it was just for stories I was writing for fun, for only me (and a few friends, perhaps) to see. I was scared to use lyrics from songs, or film titles or brand names in case I'd have to get rid of them at the end. Then I realised, why not just use them for now? There's no point spending days worrying about using a real town's name when a) it'll end up being changed in the end anyway and b) you should be getting on with the actual writing rather than fussing over little details. That comes with revision, another thing I've always been terrified but it's not as scary as I thought. That'll come in another post.

The gist of this post is: get the words down, whatever they are, and worry about the changes later. Especially if it's an idea you're only writing for yourself. I recently finished revising a book I wrote about eighteen months ago and it was one I didn't hold back on at all - I just wrote what I wanted because I had no want for it to ever be published, and I finished writing it in two weeks. It has ended up being the favourite of the books I've written, mostly because I had such fun writing it. Writing shouldn't be a chore, it should be a release, an escape. So don't hold back.

Lydia

Don't be afraid to return to an old idea!

You keep coming up with new ideas. Every time you sink your teeth into a good story, another idea comes along and sweeps you off your feet like a new romance, only for you to realise that after all, it wasn't that great. But you don't want to return to the old ideas because that wouldn't be loyal to your new ones, your ever changing creativity, right?

WRONG!

For a very long time, I hated going back to old ideas because I didn't think I could ever get them right if it didn't work the first time or if I just never got round to finishing it. It's usually just down to me being distracted by a newer, seemingly better tale to tell. You have to remember that once upon a time, your old ideas were the new, shiny ones that keep popping up. And the new, shiny ones will soon become the old dusty ones you forgot about. No matter what you say, those new ideas will keep arriving and the old ones will be slowly gathering dust in the corner.

It's time to give the old ideas a polish, get them out and look them over. Recently, I wanted to write but I didn't want to carry on just yet with my current projects. Instead of dragging a new story into the mix, I decided to go back to an old story I'd finished in 2010 for Camp Nanowrimo which had lost its last two chapters. I decided, how about I write up those last two chapters again - finally - and revise the story. Now that I'm looking back over it again, it's better than I remember it being. At the time, I thought to myself, this is the story I want to publish first and now I remember why. Those old ideas are often the gems - the little diamonds of stories that came along before you turned into a haggard, jaded writer monster.

Lydia