How do you write a book? The steps in a row!

How do I write a book? It is the question that many beginning writers grapple with. Often you start, but you quickly run out of inspiration. Or the story becomes bogged down in tedious twists of thoughts instead of powerful page-turners.

The tip we give to any budding writer: Break up the task and work in steps. We have listed those steps for you.

Step 1: Write, write, and write

You have been longing to write a book for a while.

You imagine that it must be wonderful: at least one day a week you look for a pleasant place to write nicely. Away from work and from home. Surrender completely to writing. You may even have already written something. And you want to finish that, to eventually print your own book.

But in practice… you hardly have time. There is always something more important.

To be able to write a book you will have to block time free. Grab your diary and book an hour every day, half a day every week, a day every weekend… as much time as your schedule allows. But realize that you will have to leave things to it.

Vox Ghostwriting It is important that you get the writing flow started. And that only works by writing regularly. Quality comes from quantity. You develop quality while writing and rewriting.

Step 2: Come up with a storyline

What’s before? Thinking up a storyline or discovering in writing what your story should be about?

There is no unequivocal answer to this. As a writer you often have a preference for one of the two methods when you make a book yourself.

The emotional writer preferably starts by writing a first scene. As he writes, he finds out what his story should be about. The ideas for his storyline arise more or less playfully.

The schematic writer prefers to work from an idea. He first works out a storyline, makes schematics, thinks up the main points that his story is about and only when he knows where the story is going does he start writing.

The storyline is the sequence of events that a character goes through on the way to a solution or to a question, a problem or a loss.

Step 3: Do your research

Where do you get the information that you include in your book?

In general, it is advisable to stay close to your own experience. Especially as a starting writer.

But an unknown world can fascinate or appeal to you so much that you have to write about it. In that case, you will have to consult the knowledge and experiences of others.

Where can you find that information?

You map this out by answering the following questions:

  • Which experiences belong to the experiential world you want to write about? *
  • Which of those experiences have you had yourself?
  • Which are still strange to you?
  • Is there an experience that you could look up in real life?
  • What do you have to do for that?

The answers to these questions will help you take the next step.

Step 4: The right perspective

Your choice for the perspective of your story is closely related to the story you want to tell. Often you choose the right perspective in a natural way. You probably know from which character and with which point of view you will tell the story.

Many chapters in writing manuals have been written about the technical aspects of perspective. However, what is most important here is that you as an author must be able to empathize with your protagonist. To really know and understand them. That makes your book credible.

The perspective you choose influences the person form in which you write, but it does not determine it exclusively. You can write your story from the main character in both the first person and third person.

“Best advice I’ve ever received: Finish.”
– Peter Mayle

Step 5: Apply structure

In the entire writing process you are, consciously or unconsciously, concerned with the sequence of the fragments and thus with the structure of your book.

In a story structure and time are logically closely intertwined.

You can choose to tell the story chronologically. In that case it is important that your whole story is written in the same grammatical time.

However, you can also go back and forth in time. For example, start at the end and then jump into the past. If you choose to do so, thoroughly study grammatical tenses and apply them correctly.

In this step you will also give your reader a helping hand. You will distribute the text correctly on the pages through a logical chapter layout, clear headings, blank lines, paragraphs and new pages.

Step 6: Rewrite and prepare for editing

Most books are only created during the rewriting process.

Your book keeps growing and changing as you contemplate it sentence by sentence over and over again. You work from small to large.

In the initial phase of rewriting you often come across new substantive discoveries. As you have worked through your text more often, you will notice that the changes become smaller and more detailed.

Write without fear. Edit without mercy. ‘

Tip to start writing your book

The best tip we can give you is to just start writing.

Because you shouldn’t fantasize about books, you just write them.

What are you waiting for?

Your book is ready to be written!