Do you also have a crazy imagination and passion to express that through the art of writing? Ever seen a movie or read a book and wonder, how are these film makers and authors make such amazing stories!

Although having a vast imagination is the first step to write a fictional book, knowing how to express and show the entire story through words is what actually makes you a fabulous fictional book writer!

In this blog, you’ll see how to show your vast imagination through words and some tips to write fluently and overcome writing blocks!

• Make sure that the story includes all the elements and is long enough to write a book

As discussed in the introduction, a vast imagination is the first step to write a book. However, a story includes many elements. A start, conflict, actions and resolution. When you have a story in your mind that sounds unique and fabulous in your head, grab a notebook and start writing down the story roughly and what conflicts will it hold and what actions will be taken to come to a resolution.

• Dump all the ideas and points on a piece of paper

Whether that’s the story ahead of what you’ve imagined first or creative ideas to enhance your story, write down everything that’s on your mind and keep on writing until you have no more points left in your head and you can do nothing but just stop your pen right there! filtering these ideas out will be the next step. This step is really important as you’ll gather all the points and then you’ll come to planning the outline. 

• Plan the chapters, format and the length of your book.

Now that you have your entire story planned, the next step is to plan the number of chapters you want to include and if not chapters then the length of the book, which is the number of words you’ll write approximately. After that, you have to plan the format that you’ll use, if you wish to, this step is optional. Planning this outline will make it easier for you to write your story as you know what part to include in what chapter and what words you have to write in it.

• Last but not the least, plan the characteristics of your story

By characteristics I mean, what writing style will you have, what will be the tone. How will your dialogues sound? For example, dramatic, optimistic or a neutral tone. In this step, you can also choose to brush up and learn new vocabulary, this will greatly enhance your writing piece! After this, you are all set to finally write your story!

Although, each writer has a different writing journey and this means a different set of mistakes too but here are some tips to implement that will help you to make less of those errors.

1- Learn & Learn

Read books and different writing pieces, this could be anything! Magazines, novels, brochures, ANYTHING! look at the writing style and other details of the writing pieces and keep on learning and looking for those details. This will help you to know what kind of tone, for example, will best suit in your story and other elements such as the plot, character development, resolution and more. The purpose is to just  get inspired! 

2- FIll in the ultimate character questionnaire 

What is a character questionnaire and why do I need this? You might be wondering. We all have once read or seen the series of Harry Potter…and I’m sure the ones who love the series know who Harry Potter is, his personality, his skills and some quirks about him. Well, this wouldn’t be possible if J.K Rowling didn’t frame and known the character before expressing him through words in her book. So, to create amazing characters and to make your audience know about the characters, it is you who should know your character first! 

To know that, ask questions such as what is the appearance of my character, what do they like, what do they dislike and other questions…just like you would ask someone to know them like no one else does! Trust me, these details will help you to write when you are stuck and don’t know what to write and proceed further, this obstacle when you’re stuck is called a writing block. 

3- SHOW, NOT TELL!

We’ve heard about this golden rule everywhere! What does this mean? This simply means that you have to write your story in such a way that your readers can visualise the entire story while reading it! This is literally the golden rule that should be kept in mind when writing any fictional piece! As this keeps the readers engaged and only when written in such way, your readers can actually judge your story and if that’s interesting enough to read and visualise even more! To do this, use sensory language. For example, do not write-

I went to the garden and played a lot! 

INSTEAD, WRITE-

I went to the garden, full of fragrant lush greens and flowers in their brightest shade! I played football with my three friends and…

Both of the sentences tell us the same thing but there is a difference. The first sentence might not have hooked you as it sounds boring, something that some of us even hear every day and do not have any reaction to it! 

On the other hand, the second sentence might have hooked you and you wished if you could read and know what happened after this character started playing football with his three friends. This is because this sentence connected to your senses with words like fragrant, lush and brightest shade. 

 This is yet a basic sentence and you can, in fact, should use more details and descriptions to build an imagery in the minds of your readers. Use words and phrases  that you know will intrigue your readers. For example, if you’re writing a horror fictional piece, search and add the kind of words in your story that will create a scary mood. Examples include haunted, twisted and fearsome. 

4- Keep on adding more words and phrases to your vocab list

There’s never an end to the vocabulary of any language! If there is, then at least no one on this earth can say that they know all of them! This means that you can learn new words each day and upgrade your vocabulary each day! This is one of the best tips for writers who haven’t aren’t published authors yet to the authors with great expertise in the field of writing! 

Adding new and better words to your writing piece enhances your writing piece and you as a writer gain an image of someone who is very knowledgable and creative! 

These are all the steps and tips that you need to ace your fictional writing piece. There’s more to it that you’ll on your own realise and know during your writing journey but these are more than enough to write a book that is good enough to be published. 

Do let me know if you would like read more informative blogs like these in the comments section! For now, Au revoir!