Category: writing

I’ve been posting more on this blog lately. It’s not really because I like to talk about working out, though yeah, I do like to do that some. What’s really happening is that I am using 750Words.com to get in a certain amount of free-writing a day, and they’re starting to evolve into halfway reasonable blog posts rather than just personal rants.

While I will use the format for personal rants from time to time, I don’t think my writing practice is being improved by the stream of consciousness so much any more and I’m trying to write about specific subjects to write actual essays.

It’s actually a lot harder than you might think to write to a specific word count on a specific subject. Sure, sure, you can pound out a target word count of ranting in fifteen minutes or so if you’re a fast typist. But if you’re actually trying to write a coherent piece? That takes more time.

In my case, that’s okay. I’m a writer. Spending time writing is kind of like a pianist doing scales or an athlete doing drills on the basics of her sport. You do that to keep your skills up.

In fact, I’d recommend to anyone who wants to improve their writing to start just by committing to a certain word count of writing every day and then just plain doing the free-write. You really do get better at writing by writing, and you will get better just by that alone.

So, when do you jump from free-write to trying to write to a specific topic or drilling on technique? You do it when the free-write gets too easy. If you’re hitting your word count in fewer than twenty minutes on a regular basis chances are good you need something else to motivate you and keep you challenged.

There are lots of writing drills you can use to hone your skills. Blogging and essay writing is kind of my thing because I enjoy a good topic-specific piece, but it’s hardly the only thing available to you.

Do you like fiction? Challenging yourself to write fanfiction really is an amazing way to hone your skills. When my son was starting to think about his SATs and was worried about the writing portion of them, I told him that since one of his major forms of entertainment was to come up with cross-fiction stories about characters he liked and act them out in his room, what he could do is write them down. He has a running series now that he works on, though I think it’s jumped from fanfic to original fiction. His English grades definitely improved — not only the composition portion, but the literary analysis areas. So yeah, I’m in favor of fanfic as a writing exercise, even if I don’t read it.

I have a friend who challenged himself to write a short story a week for a year. He’s since turned it into a book, and it’s quite good. This is also a great exercise to hone your writing if you like to write fiction.

I think a lot of it does depend on what you want to do with your writing. I mean, professionally, I’m a tech writer. Over my lifetime of writing fiction I’ve made enough money to buy a couple of pizzas, and that’s it, so clearly I really need to work on my fiction skills over my tech writing skills. I love writing fiction. I just… well, I don’t think I’m all that good at it. Doesn’t stop me from writing it, mind. Sometimes, it’s a good and valid thing to write just for the fun of it after all.

But as I am writing this, something occurs to me. I don’t practice writing fiction nearly as much as I practice writing essays. I put out all these blog entries, and I write manuals and I write instructional pieces. That fills my writing time. Certainly anyone who knows my writing is more likely to follow blogs I write rather than any fiction I do.

Since I do have a personal Life Dream in terms of fiction, me sitting here and writing this essay as my daily writing practice is kind of silly when you think about it, isn’t it? I’m practicing essays, not fiction.

You get good at what you drill on a regular basis, after all, so the intelligent thing for me to do would be to start some sort of regular practice drilling on specific fictional techniques.

“Miss one day of practice, I notice; miss two, the critics notice; miss three, the audience notices”

This has been credited to a lot of different musicians over the years –Liszt among them. I first heard of the expression from my husband, who trained for many years as a classical pianist. While I studied piano for about four years, I never really did practice well, or with sufficient dedication to make more than minimal progress.

Thing is, it doesn’t just apply to musicians. Consistent practice is important to almost any skill or endeavor – be it an athletic skill or an art. One of the arts that really does require pretty consistent practice or it becomes swiftly noticeable you’re not doing it is writing.

I spent about a year from the summer of 2013 to the summer of 2014 not writing much. This was so unusual for me as to be out of character. I write all the time. I was a regular Harriet the Spy as a youngster, I learned a lot of the computer skills I now have as a way to get essays out there before CMS tools and blogging software became a thing, and I’ve always processed my thoughts and feelings in text in some format.

That year I’ve spent not writing on a consistent basis has dulled my skills beyond belief. While I’m physically weak from not exercising my body, my writing is weak from not doing regular workouts in that field as well.

Because the only way to get better is to practice, I turned back to 750Words. The premise behind 750 Words is very much like the whole idea of Morning Pages from The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron. The way to make writing flow easily is simply to write. You must have quota and do it consistently every day. For me, typing 750 words every morning is better than doing it longhand. I don’t like to write longhand and since so much of my work requires typing anyway, I prefer to use that medium to do my morning pages.

Why the Turquoise Horse? The 750Words has several sorts of incentives and badges one can earn to encourage one not only to write, but to write consistently. If you sign up for a challenge and write every day for a calendar month, you earn your Turquoise Horse. I did it for August and was just notified this morning that I got mine

The badges are all whimsical and add a bit of fun to encouraging people to practice their writing. Just do it. Just write it. Don’t care about quality or form. Don’t worry about eloquence or humor. Rant where you must, talk about how tedious it is if you have to, but get those750 words out.

That’s an important step. Never underestimate flow when practicing one’s art.

What about improving? That’s also an important step. Any author will tell you that until you have that first draft, you have no business in the world thinking about editing. Editing comes next. Yes, you should edit. Yes, getting critiques is incredibly important.

But until you have that first draft, you’ve got nothing to work on.

If you’re a writer or want to improve your writing, I do recommend a practice like 750 words. It helps

In Glory Road, Heinlein has a character who can’t go to sleep and he asks for something to read.  “Words in a row” is the way he put it.  I remember that really resonating with me, as I have had a similar habit since even before I got into science fiction.[1]

So, I’m a pretty voracious reader.  When I started carrying a purse regularly, purse shopping took on some serious specifics. It had to be large enough to fit a couple of paperbacks.  Even so I had to leave some of my favorite epics at home whenever I travelled.[2]  I disliked that.

When e-readers became popular, I cheered.  Most of my favorite books really are words in a row.  Not too many diagrams or illustrations needed to supplement the text[3] and formatting page by page wasn’t a real issue.  It was the text that was the important thing.

So, I’m a big fan of e-readers.  I get a little frisson of delight when I slip my Kindle into my purse with its library of hundreds of books to choose from.  I like it even better when I am reading long computer manuals on travel and don’t have to carry those brick-like things with me and crowd out my fiction weight!

Does that mean I hate “dead tree” books?

Not in the least.  My copy of The Lord of the Rings in its red leather binding is a treasure to me.  I love the marriage of the art of the book craft as well as the story.  A book on origami or knitting is pointless on a Kindle.  The color illustrations that are large enough to see and understand are integral to the usefulness and beauty of the book.[4]

But when it’s words in a row that make the story and make the art, my oh my do I love my e-reader.

I had a rather unusual pleasure today.  I edited a piece for a friend.

Now this chick can write. Funny?  Oh very yes!  Clear?  Yep.  Has a specific voice.  My goodness yes.

So, when I saw it and asked if I could edit it, it wasn’t because what she did sucked.  It was because it was good and just needed a few rough edges sanded down and polished.

Something that is a real myth about the writing world is that an editor will just ruin your piece.  I even believed it for awhile.  Blame it on some of Heinlein’s snarky comments if you want.  But the truth is that no editor wants to ruin your piece, kill your voice or anything like that.  That’s not the editor’s job.

It’s the editor’s job to make you look brilliant. Well, insofar as possible.  Can’t make bricks without straw.  But what an editor wants is for anything that passes her desk to be readable, instructive, entertaining or whatever might be the goal of the publication.

Her comment was, “Oh wow. Ok that’s amazing. I totally see. You sort of turned it into the piece I wanted it to be in the first place with the editing.”

That means I managed to do my job in working on it!