Tips on Writing a Book

I was wondering how best to answer your questions until I saw that Gene below has done a fantastic job answering them. This piece you've written is very useful. Thank you for sharing this.

I can help. I've written, edited, or contributed to more than a dozen books in the past 25 years, and I write fiction, non-fiction, and poetry. I've done 7 books of poetry so far, I'm working on a non-fiction collection, and the rest have been nonfiction of various topics. Now that I think about it, it's been almost 20 books. Answering your questions... 1. How do I go about writing a book? (1) Think about what you want to write and outline it. That doesn't work for poetry, but it does work for Fiction and nonfiction. Some fiction writers just like to start and see where the book takes them, and if they can get a book done that way, fine. For myself and others, whether it's a short story or a novel, having the concept is important, plus key points you want to have happen. You may or may not have an ending in mind. Then you link the parts. Non-fiction is easiest. You can outline the whole thing, write the parts individually and fill in as needed. 2. What type of book should I try to write? (2) Best advice is to write what you know, or at least what interests you. If you're not interested you're not going to want to do it, especially if you're not getting paid. If you're getting paid a shitload of money, the money is your motivation. If not, your passion for the topic or project keeps you going. If you don't know what you're talking about it will show in the work and you'll end up with a crappy book if you finish it at all. 3. How important are details surrounding the characters? (3) Good question. I used to think one needed to know all the details of all the characters, so the reader could be immersed in the world. That's not true. Getting bogged down in details slows the pace of the story, and it becomes too much for you to keep track of and for the reader to absorb. Keep things manageable. Think of Lord of the Rings. Tolkien had a glossary in the back so you could keep the characters, places, and other details straight and even then it was easy to forget some of who was who, and that was a great book. If you want to spend that much time and effort, literally years upon years, doing that, good for you and good luck. Otherwise think of a plot with characters people can relate to. We don't need to know what they're wearing at all times, their eye color, or their complete backstory. Two people go on a date and are attacked by a werewolf. Where did they go? What happened next? Those are the important things. 4. Does the genre of the book change the amount of detail that should be given? (3) Yes. A children's book would limit the type of language you use, as well as some of the details. Other genres - horror tends to be more graphic. Romance focuses on of course more sensual and emotional things. But there are blends of genres. Paranormal romance pumps up the sensuality and ratchets down the gore and horror. 5. How do I avoid recreating someone else's book on accident? (4) Don't worry about it. Really. Writing and Lit 101 tells us all plots boil down to very few key conflicts. And, for example, if you watch movies and know your lit, "The Lion King" is a very blatant recreation of "Hamlet," just reset in the jungle with animals. "Hamlet" has been redone countless times, as it's a great plot. "Sons of Anarchy" was another reworking of "Hamlet" at first. And that's fine. Write your story your way and if it resembles something else but you didn't set out to rip anyone off, that's fine. Love stories, ghost stories, vampire stories, war stories, there are common elements to all stories in those categories. What makes a story great is the way it's told, sometimes the characters, and what makes it different. 6. What is the easiest genre, in your opinion, for a beginner writer? (5) Depends on when they're beginning. If you're young, maybe Young Adult. If you're old, whatever you're most familiar with, which is the best way to go overall. What do you like? Write what you feel capable of, and what you're most interested in, so you can make it through. 7. What might be the easiest to transition to, from my experiences that are written in the form of poetry? (5) You said your poetry is based on your real life. Mine almost always is, too. If you do that, just writing about real life would seem to be easy if you do it in longer forms like paragraphs. Change the names and you have standard fiction. Pick a relationship, or a time frame in your life, write about that, maybe change how things went so the outcome is better or worse, happier or more tragic. It's still what you know, because you were there and you know the people involved, but you've turned it into a story. 8. Which is easier: non-fiction or fiction? (6) It depends. Again writing what you know is the only way to make it easy. Did Tolkien know elves, dwarves, trolls, and kingdoms when he wrote the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings? No. What he knew was maps, because he had an interest in them, so he was able to make his own. And he knew ancient languages, and classic mythology, legends, and folk-tales. And he knew war, since he'd been in World War 1, and he'd lived in India. So he combined all of those things. On a more basic level, Harper Lee wrote "To Kill a Mockingbird" based on people and events similar to what she knew, and Stephen King wrote "Carrie" based on what he knew - a high school, kids like he knew, and a girl with powers that were fantastic but understandable. So for them fiction was easier, because it's what they knew and wanted to write. On the other hand, David McCullough had always been interested in history, and loved doing research. So he made a career out of doing deep research into people like John Adams and Harry Truman, then retelling their stories in a way that would make them seem relatable and interesting to us. When I've done non-fiction, I was really excited about one book I did, "The Senior Dummies Guide to Music in the Digital Age" because it was something that had never been done before, and made use of knowledge I'd accumulated from working in used books and media for a long time, so that was easy for me to do. The others were not as fun, but still easy because it was just compiling information and laying it out in a logical manner. 9. If I were to do non-fiction, what would be the best to write about? (7) I'd say there are two elements to this. 1. Write about what you're interested in 2. Write about what there's an interest in, so people will want to read it. On the second point, if there isn't a demand for it, you have to balance that out with your own interest and ability to explain it. Let's say you love socks. How much demand is there for a book on socks? Probably not much. So you would have to write about the socks in such a way that people would look at that book without even knowing what's inside and say, "Wow, socks are the most interesting thing I've ever read about. I had no idea socks were this cool." Put simply, the best thing to write about is either what everybody wants to know, and that you're qualified to discuss, or what you're super excited about and you can get everyone else excited too.