5 Ways To Improve Your Writing
No matter how seasoned of a writer you are, you can always hone your craft. There are plenty of ways to do it that don’t involve formal schooling. View my list of best ways to improve your writing skills.
1. Novel Concepts Exercise
If you’re working on a novel, you probably don’t have much time for other writing projects. While working on my first novel, I wondered if I’d know how to start a second one when I finally had room on my plate to do so. It had been years since I’d thought about any premises or characters outside that first book because of how it consumed me.
One day, I decided to test myself by brainstorming other book ideas and their protagonists’ traits and motives. I think this is a great exercise for developing versatility as a writer. Personally, I like knowing that I’m not a one-trick pony; I can write a range of styles, characters, and even genres if I want to, which creates endless possibilities.
So grab a notebook or open Word and start outlining plots and character ideas. For an extra challenge, see how different you can make each new premise and protagonist from the others.
2. Write Flash Fiction
“... because the brevity of flash fiction makes it far less strenuous and time-consuming than book writing, it’s easy to do in conjunction with other writing projects.”
What is flash fiction? It’s a form of fiction even shorter than the short story, usually below 1,000 words, though it can have as few as five words.
Writing flash fiction can be another great way to work on versatility, as well as style, exposition, dialogue, and making editing decisions, since being concise with it is key. And because the brevity of flash fiction makes it far less strenuous and time-consuming than book writing, it’s easy to do in conjunction with other writing projects. Try one flash fiction writing prompt a week or one a day depending on your schedule and the lengths of your stories.
3. Participate In Online Writing Challenges And Workshops
If you’re looking for a more formal lesson in craft or are hoping to be inspired by a speaker, you may want to look into writing webinars. There are also tons of online writing challenges that you can take part in. Check out StoryADay, YeahWrite, and The Writer Games.
4. Brush Up On Grammar And Technique
I know this sounds like a bore, but I can say from experience that reading up on grammar and literary devices once in a while can be very helpful. You might not realize some of the mistakes you’re making simply because you forgot the rules. It happens. I’m always having to look up English rules. It’s nice to have a grammar guide on hand when you need to figure out the correct way to write something.
Of course, lots of authors deliberately break the rules of fiction and grammar, but, as the famous quote goes, you need to “know the rules well so you can break them effectively.”
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As an editor, I can usually tell when a writer has purposely broken rules to suit their style or when they’ve broken them by accident. We obviously don’t want our writing to contain mistakes, or for our deliberate breaking of writing conventions to be perceived as mistakes due to poor execution. For help with fiction techniques and style, I suggest How Not to Write a Novel by Howard Mittelmark and Sandra Newman and The Art of Fiction by David Lodge. Both were impactful to my work.
5. Read More Fiction
If not for certain novels I’ve read, my writing would be very different. I hope that you’re able to find those books that change you—the ones that help shape your style and voice. I certainly encourage you to read anything and everything that intrigues you, but if you already have genres and themes of interest, then I say read more books within those genres and themes.
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MJ Biggs is the author of the novel A Wonderful Place To Die.