Welcome, pupil. I hope you brought snacks.
Let us start with a disclaimer. I am not writing this with a plan because plans are for cowards, and I am not perfect. I may and probably will be, at some point, wrong, and I may even be a hypocrite. Do not take my word for gospel, as is the ultimate rule of the Internet. Thus the title.
Because I am not omnipresent, -potent, -scient, whatever other omni-prefixed words there are, I don't have the full spectrum of knowledge regarding any particular subject or have experience in all of these things. I don't actually read that much, to my own shame and misfortune. This, I'd argue, is the most important part of writing: Reading.
READING!!!
And read good books, too. You can learn from good books. Not just from the messages and morals and lessons and all that fun stuff that they supposedly give you, but they also teach you how to write. They will show you character development, worldbuilding, pacing, vocabulary, a lot of stuff that I will never be able to fully address or even teach in this series. Learn from the masters of literature—they are the ultimate example. I will merely streamline and repeat what they say into bite-sized, five-minutes-ish reads.
And even the authors who SUCK can teach you, in a weird way. If you can isolate and point out what is wrong with their work and how to fix it, you have learned how to avoid that problem yourself. Even if you don't know how to avoid it, you become aware that it exists. That is valuable. Incredibly valuable. A knowledgable mind is better than a smart but ignorant one.
Don't be afraid to read your own work either. Read it aloud if you have to. You can expose your own flaws very easily, turns out. Don't be afraid to tear yourself down to pieces.
Because when you start posting to social media or publishing, everybody else will rip you apart way harder. Have fun!! :)
YOU ARE READING
The Idiot's Guide to Writing
Non-FictionHas your imagination been running wild but your brain just can't get the details on paper? Are your stories lacking just a little something that you can't put your finger on? Do you look up at the professionals and go, "man, what are they doing that...
