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Creative Writing Tips You Should Know

If you are looking for a new career path this year in the midst of a global pandemic, creative writing could be a brilliant option for you.

Writing a book or a comic series or any other material is a great career option that can be done from home, and you can start right away without having to take a course first. 

Creative Writing Tips You Should Know

Whether you are stuck at home because of lockdown or you are recovering from an illness – writing can be a good way to kickstart a new professional career for yourself. 

creative writing tips

Today we want to share some simple creative writing tips you need to know this year. 

Invest in cloud storage 

You never know when inspiration is going to strike, and this is why access to cloud computing should be one of the first things on your list for writing. It is imperative that when an idea comes your way you are able to jump right in and share it.

By accessing your documents on your computer, mobile phone or tablet you’ll always be able to add to your story when you are ready to and this will make the process of writing much swifter. 

Keep a pen and paper close by 

As well as having cloud computing for your writing work – consider having a pen and paper handy at all times so that you can jot down ideas.

There are so many amazing ways to bring your book or story to life, and writing down small plot ideas or character details on a notepad will allow you to refer to these points as you write.

If you ever become a famous author you can even auction off these notebooks for charity! 

Draw your characters 

When trying to write a novel; one of the most key components are your characters. It is incredibly important that you are able to visualize your characters from day one because as you write, you’ll need to describe their bodies and their movements.

It doesn’t matter if you aren’t a natural artist – simply try to draw a sketch of each of your main characters that you’ll be able to use later on when writing as a reference.

If you are writing a fantasy book another important thing to draw might be the map of your world.

Create family trees 

When writing a book, every character needs some form of backstory and interest. You need to ensure that your characters are intriguing from the get go and that they genuinely seem like real people.

Consider creating a family tree for your characters to bring some life to them and help you as you create your story later on.

Being able to refer to random family members for anecdotes or within the story can be a useful tool when making more believable characters. 

Consider a world sketch 

As we mentioned briefly above – when writing a story it is a good idea to build your characters and your world to make life easier for you when writing.

The important thing about creating a small sketch of your world such as a map is that when writing the story, you can keep the locations consistent and help to immerse your readers in the world.

You can even hire an artist close to publishing who can draw the map for you to place inside the cover of the book. 

Draw from your own experiences 

Creative writing can be considered one of the more difficult art forms because it can be challenging to constantly have ideas.

Creative block is a real thing and when you are a writer for a living you need to use tricks to ensure you don’t get hit by this problem.

Drawing from real life experiences is a brilliant writing tactic that will help you be more descriptive with your creations as well as more realistic.

For example when writing an upsetting scene where a character cries – consider what processes your body goes through when crying and use those to describe the situation for example it could be: 

  • A hot sensation behind the eyes 
  • Pressure building and fogging the brain 
  • Blurry vision due to tears 
  • Blocked nose 

By writing the real sensations of crying you will make it more immersive and intense for the reader. 

Write from the heart 

It is so important as a writer to try and bring heart and soul into your work to engage people and keep them interested. This means that when you write a story it must be from the heart.

Don’t write things you aren’t interested in.

As writers we seem to have a misconception that if we don’t write about certain topics we won’t be successful but this isn’t the case. You should always write about subjects you care for because your quality of writing will be better and this will pull your target audience to your door.

Trust yourself and write about what you WANT. 

Keep editing 

When writing any piece of work you need to read it, reread it, and then reread it again.

The more times you read over your work and edit it, the better it will be for you because you’ll spot small mistakes or inconsistencies you need to change.

The quality of your finished piece will always be better if you take the time to edit it properly. 

Be conversational 

When writing dialogue for characters, it is important to use a conversational tone with language you would use yourself in a natural conversation.

It is highly unlikely that any character will speak in perfect English at all times.

Take the time to write in a way that you would speak yourself – you can even play our conversations in your head that you think your characters would have to make it more believable. 

Write down plot ideas 

As a creative writer it is important to keep a pen and pad on you at all times. Write down ideas as they come even if they seem stupid at the time, because you never know when an idea could be useful. 

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