The Art of War for Writers: Fiction Writing Strategies, Tactics, and Exercises

“you need to be designing your own writing improvement program. One way to do that is with a Writing Improvement Notebook. Here are the sections I have in mine: 1. EXEMPLARS Start with the authors you admire, the ones whose novels do the most for you. Find several paragraphs or pages in their books that really sing. Make copies of these outstanding pages, and put them in this section. Every now and again turn to one of these examples and write it out, word for word. Next, read the words out loud. The idea is not to try to become an exact copy”

“There was no day on which it was my positive duty to write for the publishers, as it was my duty to write reports for the Post Office. I was free to be idle if I pleased. But as I had made up my mind to undertake this second profession, I found it to be expedient to bind myself by certain self-imposed laws. When I have commenced a new book, I have always prepared a diary, divided into weeks, and carried it on for the period which I have allowed myself for the completion of the work. In this I have entered, day by day, the number of pages I have written, so that if at any time I have slipped into idleness for a day or two, the record of that idleness has been there, staring me in the face and demanding of me increased labor, so that the deficiency might be supplied.”

“Take a nice, long walk. Don't think about your book. Have a little notebook or recorder with you. You'll find the “boys in the basement” sending stuff up. When they do, write it down, and keep walking. (Note: I love Stephen King's metaphor of the “boys in the basement” from his book,”