Terry McMillan’s Advice to Aspiring Writers
3:25 PM
- Write as if no one is ever going to read it.
- Try not to read, revise or rewrite what you’ve written until you’ve had a chance to let it simmer.
- Don’t believe your family, friends or lovers when they tell you: “It’s great!” What else are they going to say?
- Try not to think of an idea for a good story. In fact, leave your brain out of it.
- Write about what frightens you. What you find perplexing. Disturbing. What breaks your heart. And what you wish you could change.
- Write as if you’re telling a story to an old friend you haven’t seen in years. It’s one way to find your own voice.
- Read work by writers that you respect and admire. Just don’t try to imitate them.
- You want your reader to see what’s on the page, not read the words, so paint a moving picture.
- Don’t compare what you’re writing to published authors. They were once in your shoes.
- Remember that a story is about someone who wants something and someone is preventing them from getting it. Whatever that might be.
- All of us have flaws. Pass some of yours on to your characters!
- You want your reader to care about your characters, worry about them and hope they can get out of whatever mess you put them in.
- You have to have conflict in your story. Even fairy tales and cartoons have them.
- Even if your early work gets rejected, don’t beat yourself up. It doesn’t mean your work isn’t good. It may not be ready yet.
- If you feel the same after you finish writing something as you did when you started, you’ve wasted your time.
- Fiction is a way of making a lie believable.
- Write the kind of story you’d like to read.
- Read everything you write aloud. Pets make great listeners. They don’t judge.
- Don’t forget that a story should be life affirming. There’s enough negativity in the world as it is.
- Tell the story from your character’s point of view instead of yours.
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