Saturday, February 4, 2012

Frederik Pohl's Rules for Writing

1. Write every day. Yes, that means that you must write 365 days a year. No excuses.

2. Write 600 words a day. If it takes you 45 minutes, fine. You are done for the day. If it takes you 18 hours, fine. That's how long your writing required that day.

3. Finish every piece you start. That way, you never fail as a writer since a writer's only real failure is the abandoned piece.

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I got this from Writer's Delight blog and it sure resonates!

If you write every single day, you'll have that story finished pretty darn quickly. 600 words multiplied by 30 days is 18,000 words. So in two months, you'll have at least 36,000 words on paper. That's a novella already! In six months, you'll have 108,000 words -- a novel!

And to think, you started your novel with only 600 words a day...

(Note: In general, under 80,000 words is a novella or juvenile fiction and over 80,000 is a novel. Traditional publishers like seeing novels between 80,000 and 120,000 words. However, you should write until the story is done, then worry about word counts!)