Tonight at the Orem library, there was a very useful writing panel that gave good advice about writing. Here are my notes:

– To be a writer you must A. write. B. Develop a thick skin. C. Crave criticism. D. Become a better writer from the critiques given by hard-hitting critiques. E. Get used to rejection.
– When giving critiques don’t just say what is good about a manuscript that is not useful to the writer. Give what is needed to improve the story. Give to others what you would like to know about your own writing. It’s important to crave negative feedback for it gives the author the opportunity to learn. You’ll learn what you need to fix.
– Every successful author has faced a lot of rejection. Critiques give you a chance to learn what is needed to change a story.
– Authors who love the own work don’t improve. Successful authors favor critiques that have a lot of comments for improvement.
– Suggested book: literary market, is available in the library.
– Local markets: Blade star, good; covenant good, Cedar Fork does take all rights, shadow mountain, is a part of Deseret Book. Tory house, features material about American West and the great basin area.
– The thing about small press is not much money is made from books, so most of the contracts will favor the publisher rather than the author. Many authors find this acceptable as it is in the chance to publish.
– If you do go, the self-publishing route you will need to be good at marketing to be successful. There have been many successful self-published books because of good self – promotion. One way of good self-promotion is to be featured in Good Reads.
– Torrent: sounds like a place where people have gotten illegal books.
– By writing, you build your resume to get a big following. This will provide a better chance for a future sales.
– Some small presses may only run 400 – 30,000 book run.
– Cedar Fork is not known for doing the best I marketing.
– Recommended book by Don Pointers, Marketing book.
– Have good ideas and horn your craft. Keep practicing and get better.
– Read the best books of the genre you write in.
– Characterization advice:
a. Each character needs to have a flaw. For example, Superman is not brave. There’s nothing that can harm him except occasionally, kryptonite.
B. people want to read about struggles.
C. they want to be able to relate to that character.
D. Give your character the unique physical attribute. This will queue the reader to better identify that character. Some examples are Ron Weasley’s red hair, Hermoni Ranger is smart and Harry Potter is a good wizard.
E. Give each character a special ability. F.
– Give the character some back history. The events of their past makes them who they are. Their past, influences how they will respond to various given situations. It will also influence their motivations behind their actions.
– Give bad guys something good about them. Most motivations start out good and get corrupted as time goes by.
– Create a foil character that can be balanced against your character. Two examples is Luke Skywalker who is inexperienced and innocent and who wants adventure compared to Han Solo , who is cocky and a scoundrel.
– Writing techniques: one author will write the ending first and then plot backwards. That way the author knows where he is going.
– Many authors will have a notebook, also known as the character Bible, or plot map where authors keep detailed notes of each character. It might include hair color, age, past history and key points of their lives, and maybe a brief description of the evolution of the character throughout the story. This is very useful when there are multiple books in the series. One author discovered that they had their characters too much alike, and realized they had to add more distinguishing features between their characters.
– One author will have a draft of his book where he will write notes within the borders. He will include areas where he expects to a change in the character or a change in the plot. This acts as his reminder of how the story and characters progress.
– Time for writing: You have to make time to write. A writer can accomplish a lot, even if you do it in 10 minutes installments. Changes in one’s life may influence their writing pattern. At one point, you may need to write from 4 to 6 in the morning or another point of your life write late at night.
– One author takes about 30 minutes to get into the groove of writing. So they like to allot a two-hour time slot for writing.
– It may also be nice to have a special place for writing that’s dedicated to writing.
• Website on writing Iwritenetwork.com

If you have some writing advice that you like to share with readers of this blog, please feel free to provide them in the comment section. Thank you.