The clickbait lesson

There are all kinds of summaries out there in the world. Tweets that are relegated to 280 characters. News stories in RSS feeds that need to fit in very tight spaces. Pop-ups that try to get you to visit a random website based on a little box.

While I can't recommend clicking on each pop-up you see, you can still learn something from them.

Notice which ones actually have you considering checking what they are advertising. See if you can transfer that to your story pitch.

If you just had that pop-up space, how would you use it to get someone to go read your story? What words or phrasing got your attention? And which ones can you repeat?

Next time some clickbait comes up, take a second look and figure out if there's anything you can learn from it.

Flash fiction needs story

Flash fiction is a great, quick way to complete a story. It's short while still being able to get to the heart of a matter.

Don't be fooled, however, flash fiction is still a story.

You need something to pull your readers in, because they can stop as easily after that first flash fiction sentence as they can after the first chapter of a novel.

Make your characters engaging. Make the action exciting. Make the scenery electric.

You might only be writing a few words, but make sure you make those words count as much as you would those in an epic novel.

Your favourite author might not be what you need

Writers should read in all genres. They should branch out and be familiar with all kinds of writing.

That doesn't mean that you won't develop an affinity for one specific writer. You might choose one author as your favourite over all others. That's natural.

And, as your favourite, you'll want to know what they think you should know about writing. You'll want to soak up all their advice.

Go forth and do that.

However, don't feel that you're obliged to follow that advice.

Maybe your favourite writer is a pantser and you're a planner. Maybe you love reading horror novels, but have kids stories in your soul. Maybe your chosen author writes in the first person, but you feel more comfortable in the third.

You can have a favourite author and you can make sure that you're up to date on their advice, but you don't have to follow every piece of that advice. Get to know their writing and their pointers, and then decide which ones work for you.

The rest, you can leave for other writers.

Learn the business from interviews

Have you ever read interviews with writers? Those that literary publications do? If you read enough, you'll start to notice a pattern in the questions.

How did you get published? How did you find your agent? How did you decide what method of publishing to use?

Not only can these interviews be interesting, but they can also help you realize the basics of writing and publishing.

There's a reason the same questions always get asked: because they're essential to getting a book published. They are required to get from the blank screen to bookshelf.

If you don't know the answers to all the questions that are always asked, you might not have a full story. Take a moment and check if you might be missing something essential.

Maybe you aren't writing a novel

Sometimes you get stuck and you don't know why. You have a great story idea, but you just can't seem to make it happen.

Well, maybe that's because you're trying to write a novel based on an idea that wants to be something else.

Maybe you're writing a short story. Maybe you're writing a script. Maybe you're actually writing a poem.

Not every idea needs to become a novel. If you're stuck in your writing, take a moment and think about whether you've picked the right form.

Yes, that's scary

Here's one great thing about writing a horror story: you can make anything scary.

Chucky was a doll. The fog is a deadly entity in one book. Characters of every shape and size can suddenly have murderous urges when given the right motivation—or even better no logical motivation at all.

You can make anything scary if you put the right context around it.

So next time you're low on inspiration, just look around you and think about what you see in your surroundings that you would most hate to have attack you. Once you find that, get to writing and make it scary to the rest of the world.

Olympics and other topics that always come around

It's good to write about topical content. People look for movies and books and articles about the things that are on their minds.

However, if something suddenly springs to your mind because it's in the news, it's probably too late for you to jump on the bandwagon. By the time you write, edit, and publish a book on this subject, it will probably no longer be current.

That doesn't mean you're out of luck, however.

Really good books will find their audiences even when their subjects are out of date.

And, more importantly, topics always come back around.

The Olympics happen every two years. Holidays are annual. World events are celebrated every milestone anniversary.

Like everything else in the writing industry, timing is crucial, as is patience. Write the best you can, and then find the timing that is right for your work.