6 Tips to Improve Your Writing Game (Without a Degree!)

I realized that when you devote your entire life to something, it can become much harder and actually stifle your creativity. So instead, I've spent the last four years figuring out ways to become a better novelist on nights, weekends and occasional holidays.
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The movie ends, the credits scroll through and finally -- after a captivating two hours, it says "Adapted from the book, The Fault in Our Stars by John Green."

"Am I going to watch that say Katie Kiaunis one day?" my dad asks, knowing how badly I want to write a book that really impacts people's lives someday.

I've wanted this for as long as I can remember, but because I chose to study business instead of literature in college, I felt like I had given up by chance. I often contemplated going back to school for an MFA, but couldn't justify giving up my career. I also realized that when you devote your entire life to something, it can become much harder and actually stifle your creativity. So instead, I've spent the last four years figuring out ways to become a better novelist on nights, weekends and occasional holidays.

1. Attend Conferences: Over the past year, I've attended both the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers Conference as well as the Writer's Digest Well-Sold Weekend. Yes, this has been the most expensive part of my writing journey, but what I've gotten out of them has far outweighed the cost. Beyond the tactical skills learned, both conferences have taught me about what it's really like to be a full-time writer (not always so glamorous!), how to inspire yourself to write and how to find a network of like-minded writers. Some other nuggets:

  • Most people buy books for other people rather than themselves. This understanding helped me think about how I positioned my book, and why someone would pick it up as a gift for someone else.
  • Your query/pitch should always contain comps, or similar books in your genre. Best case scenario, this will be both a blockbuster hit as well as something very recent that's done well in the market.
  • Think about the scenarios people would read your book in (beach, vacation, commuting, etc.) and cater your book to that reader.
  • Conflict is what drives your book. This should be on every page in some way.

2. Get to know your favorite authors: I knew I wanted to be an author when I started reading Jodi Picoult's novels. I always liked reading, but her books made me see the world differently. All of a sudden, it was acceptable to be the curious, nosy and research-obsessed person I always was. I could actually use this skill towards something productive!

Over the years, I've talked to anyone that will listen about her books and how impactful they are. I've read her website over and over again to visualize how she got started and how I could do the same. I've gone to at least three of her book signings/talks and read every one of her 22 books. Since I watch her closely on social media, I saw that she posted a charity link this fall, where the winner would get to have dinner with her and her husband in her NH town. Despite the price tag, I jumped at the opportunity to meet my idol, and it was one of the coolest experiences of my life. Beyond just being a down-to-earth, kind, intelligent person, Jodi talked to me with such energy about her entire journey in the publishing world as well as her upcoming novel. She confided that she almost gave up right before her big break, and how hard it is to make it. Despite the reality that it is still very difficult to make it in this industry, I was inspired that if she could do it, maybe I could too.

3. Figure out how to research: I've always known you should research for your novels, but given that I've mostly written Women's Fiction or Young Adult novels, I felt like I had all the information I needed in my head. By going to the above conferences, though, I realized how much better my books could be by having more points of view than just my own experiences to go off of. I set off to write a book about a PhD Psychology student -- something I don't really know much about. I went to my town's local college sites, and searched for the current PhD students, and then did some digging into what they study and are involved in. I then sent a "cold-call" email to two of them, explaining that I'm a writer and would love to pick their brains. Within 24 hours, both of them responded that they would be happy to chat. I was ecstatic, and learned so much from them that I never would have learned on my own or through books on the subject.

4. Dissect a book: Maybe this idea is so interesting to me because I loved school, but I once read about the idea to take apart a book and construct it back into an outline. I tried it on two different books that I loved, and after each time, felt a little more confident in my own ability to craft a detailed outline. The idea is to go chapter by chapter and write down what happens on each page (or paragraph if you're ambitious). By doing so, you start to understand the flow the author used and how they strung together all of the sub-plots and conflicts.

5. Read everything: A year ago, I was on a mission to read only Women's Fiction novels as that was what I wanted to write, and I wanted to know everything about my own genre. But then on a whim, I read Gone Girl followed by The Girl on The Train, and my mind was blown. All of a sudden, I realized that I was keeping myself in a box and only allowing myself the creativity of what had previously been done in my genre. By starting with these psychological thrillers, I started to read even more outside my genre, and felt more creative than ever as I allowed myself to take down the walls of staying within the genre I thought I wanted to write. Now my favorite novel is The Luckiest Girl Alive, a book that seems to be the direct results of a women's fiction-psychological thriller cross.

6. Join many book clubs: This can be hard because they are time consuming and you can only keep up with reading so many books per month. However, book clubs are the best feedback you can get on how people read -- what they remember, what made an impact on them and what they're still thinking about when they close the book. If you think about it, this is like gold for a novelist.

I could probably go on for days as there are just so many ways that you could invest in your own writing career, but these are the ones that have made the greatest impact on me in the last year.

Which ones are you using, and how are they impacting your own writing career?

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