how to write novel names in essays

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How to Write a Book Name in an Essay

Last Updated: February 14, 2024 Fact Checked

This article was co-authored by Noah Taxis and by wikiHow staff writer, Danielle Blinka, MA, MPA . Noah Taxis is an English Teacher based in San Francisco, California. He has taught as a credentialed teacher for over four years: first at Mountain View High School as a 9th- and 11th-grade English Teacher, then at UISA (Ukiah Independent Study Academy) as a Middle School Independent Study Teacher. He is now a high school English teacher at St. Ignatius College Preparatory School in San Francisco. He received an MA in Secondary Education and Teaching from Stanford University’s Graduate School of Education. He also received an MA in Comparative and World Literature from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and a BA in International Literary & Visual Studies and English from Tufts University. This article has been fact-checked, ensuring the accuracy of any cited facts and confirming the authority of its sources. This article has been viewed 62,506 times.

When you’re writing an essay that includes a book title, it can be confusing to write the title correctly. However, it’s really easy once you know the rules. How you write the title will vary a little bit depending on the style your instructor assigns and if you are typing or handwriting the essay. Luckily, it's easy to follow the rules for writing a book name in an essay.

Writing Help

Typing an Essay in MLA or Chicago Style Format

• For example, you would write To Kill a Mockingbird , The Lord of the Rings , or Wuthering Heights .

• If you have the book name in front of you, you can just copy it down as it is printed.
• Articles include a, an, and the.
• Prepositions include at, in, on, of, about, since, from, for, until, during, over, above, under, underneath, below, beneath, near, by, next to, between, among, and opposite.
• Coordinating conjunctions include the FANBOYS, which are for, and, not, but, or, yet, and

• For example, you would write the name of William Faulkner’s novel Absalom, Absalom! with both the comma and the exclamation point in italics.

• If the highlight bar goes away, try again, making sure that you don’t click anywhere on the page after you highlight the book name.

• Alternatively, you can press the italicize icon before you type the title.
• If you’re using Microsoft Word to type your essay, the italicize key may appear if you hover over the highlighted book name.

• If the next word after your title appears italicized when you resume typing, simply highlight it and click the italicize icon to remove the formatting.

• For example, The Lord of the Rings trilogy is sometimes published in one volume. In this case, you could write the name of the first novel as "The Fellowship of the Ring" when citing it in an essay.

Typing an Essay in APA Format

• Capitalize the first letter of the words, not the entire word.
• If the word is a two-part hyphenated word in the title, you should capitalize both words. For example, you would write Blue River: The Trial of a Mayor-Elect .
• If there is a dash or colon in the title, you should capitalize the word after the punctuation, regardless of how long the word is. As above, you would write Blue River: The Trial of a Mayor-Elect .

• For example, you would write Philip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? with the question mark italicized.

• If the book name is not highlighted, left click and drag your cursor again, making sure that you don’t click again anywhere on the page.

• If you are using Microsoft Word, the italics icon may appear when you hover over the highlighted book title. It’s okay to click this key.

Handwriting an Essay

• For MLA and Chicago style essays, capitalize the first word of the book name and every word other than articles, prepositions, or coordinating conjunctions. For example, write The Lord of the Rings .
• If you’re using APA style, capitalize the first word and all words longer than 4 letters. [9] X Research source This means you would write Public Policy in Local Government .

• If you’re writing on lined paper, it may help to follow along the line of the paper. However, make sure your line is dark enough so that your instructor will see that you properly underlined the book name.

• For example, you would write Judy Blume’s Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret by underlining the punctuation marks as well as the words.

Expert Interview

Thanks for reading our article! If you’d like to learn more about academic writing, check out our in-depth interview with Noah Taxis .

• ↑ https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/mla_style/mla_formatting_and_style_guide/mla_general_format.html
• ↑ https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/subject_specific_writing/writing_in_literature/writing_about_literature/formatting.html
• ↑ https://www.grammarly.com/blog/underline-or-italicize-book-titles/
• ↑ https://askus.library.wwu.edu/faq/116757
• ↑ https://libguides.up.edu/apa/books_ebooks
• ↑ https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/italics-quotations/italics

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How To Write Book Titles The Proper Way: A Complete Guide For Writers

• February 10, 2022

Book titles within essays or papers can be tricky. There are specific rules that are given for how to include a book title in a way that sets it apart from the content of your writing given by the Modern Language Association. However, as with many other things in life, there are exceptions to the rules. This article will guide you through the rules of the writing style guides so that you can include a book’s title in your paper or essay correctly.

How to write book titles:

Style guides and book titles.

When it comes to book titles within text, there are a few different style guides that have rules you can follow, depending on your writing type. The three types that you will encounter most often are; MLA style, Chicago manual of style, and APA. A writing instructor will usually tell you what style guide you are expected to use for a particular essay or paper.

MLA Style Guide

The MLA handbook states that you should always italicize book titles when styling book titles within your text. The exception to this rule are religious texts. You would not italicize the Holy Bible or the sacred books or titles of other religions. Note the following example.

Pam had stayed most of the summer indoors, re-reading her favorite book series. She was already up to  Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone , and she didn’t regret not being more active or going outside.

In the above example, the book title is italicized. Fiction titles and nonfiction titles alike must be in italics when within the text.

Series Titles in MLA

In the above example, a book from a series was used. But what if the text had not specified which book from the series Pam was reading? Would it still need to be in italics? The answer is: in this case, yes. In other cases, sometimes.

It’s really not as confusing as it seems. When you are talking about a book series but don’t want or need to include the complete series titles for the purposes of your work, you only have to put words in italics that also appear in the book titles. So, because  Harry Potter  is part of the title of all of the books in the series, you would italicize his name every time you mention the book.

However, if you were talking about Katniss Everdeen, you would not have to do this, as the book series she is featured in doesn’t use her name in the titles of  The Hunger Games  series. The same would be true of books like the Nancy Drew books.

Quotation Marks

There are instances in which titles should be placed inside of quotation marks within a paper or essay. This is done when you cite the titles of poems , a chapter title, short stories, articles, or blogs.

So, for example, if you were to write a paper that featured a poem from a book, you would put the book title in italics and the poems cited in quotation marks.

An example of an enduring love poem is “Annabel Lee” from  The Complete Tales and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe. 

Chapter Title

Another time that quotation marks should be used is when using the title of a chapter. If you are citing a specific chapter of a book, you would enclose the title of the chapter in quotation marks, and the title of the book should be in italics.

The desperation and sadness of a man on death row can be seen in the “Wild Wind Blowing” chapter of Norman Mailer’s  The Executioner’s Song. 

Short Stories

Short stories are another case. Much like the title of a chapter or poem, in which the title is placed in quotation marks, while the title of the book or collection it is found in is italics. The same can be said for sections, stories, or chapters cited within a literary journal.

Stepping away from his norm of horror and gore, Stephen King writes of trust, love, and regret in his story “The Last Rung on the Ladder,” which can be found in his short story collection  Night Shift. 

Punctuation Marks

If you are citing a story or title that includes question marks, you need to make sure to italicize the question mark when citing. Keep all punctuation, such as a question mark, comma, ellipses, colon, or exclamation mark, as it is in the original individual books.

If you want a funny and irreverent read, you’ve got to try  Are You There, Vodka? It’s Me, Chelsea.  Chelsea Handler has done a phenomenal job of being vulgar, relatable, and explaining life from her viewpoint in this hilarious and memorable book.

The Digital Age: Are Book Titles Underlined Anymore?

MLA style used to dictate that a book title should either be in italics or underlined. However, that is no longer the case. As computers started to take over as the major tool used in writing, it became unpopular to underline book titles. Therefore, this rule was dropped from the style guides.

However, it should be mentioned that when handwriting an essay or research paper, many instructors prefer that you underline book titles, as it’s relatively difficult to handwrite italics. If you are in a writing course or a class that is heavy on handwritten work, be sure to ask your instructor or teacher which method they prefer for citing a book title.

How to Come Up with Book Title Ideas

Now that quotation marks, italics, and style guides have been discussed, let’s move on to how you can come up with your own book title. If you’d like a title for your book that sounds interesting and will get a reader’s attention, you may find this article helpful.

Coming up with a good title for your book is a challenging yet essential marketing decision . The right title can make your target audience choose your new book off of the shelf instead of another writer’s work. Your book cover and your book title are quite possibly the most important marketing decisions you will make.

How to Choose a Good Book Title

Certain criteria should be met if you want to have a good book title , and there are specific steps involved in getting there. You may have assumed up until now that titles of books were just spur of the moment decisions made by authors or publishers, but a lot of work goes into writing good titles.

Grab the Reader’s Attention

As a general rule, you want your reader to remember your title and to sound interesting, even without the reader having seen the cover. There are several ways to do this. You can be a little dark with your title, be controversial, provoke the reader, or even be funny.

There are many examples of such works that use memorable and attention-seeking titles. The following are some different titles that are effective and would most likely provoke a reader to grab them from a shelf for closer inspection.

• Burn After Writing (Sharon Jones)
• Love in the Time of Cholera (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)
• Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (Mindy Kaling)
• Are You There, Vodka? It’s Me, Chelsea (Chelsea Handler)
• The Devil Wears Prada (Lauren Weisberger)
• Chicken Soup for the Soul (various authors)
• God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian (Kurt Vonnegut)

Shorter Titles

If your full title for your book is long, you may end up boring a reader or creating a situation where a reader tries to remember the title of your book, but it’s too long and ends up getting it confused with another book. Although you should always do your best to make sure that there aren’t books by other authors that share a title or have a title similar to your book (more on that in a minute), you don’t want a person to get confused and get the wrong book instead.

Research Your Title Ideas

It’s a good idea to take the titles you have considered for your book and make a list. Then, do your homework. You can use tools like Google Adwords to test out your title to see if there are others like it, or you can simply use any search engine and plug your title ideas into the search bar and see what similar or exact titles of the same words pop up.

Readers are generally busy people. They don’t have the time or the energy to ensure that writers get a title right. They’ll look for the book they are interested in, and if it proves to be too difficult, or if there are other books written that have the same title, they’ll move on to something else.

A writer really has to make sure that they have a title that isn’t going to be ignored, is interesting, isn’t too long, and isn’t too similar to other works.

The same goes for titles of short works within a larger body of work. Short works, like poems or stories, need to have unique titles as well when included in a larger body of work, such as a collection. If stories are similar in nature, be sure to title them differently so that readers will be able to tell them apart, as well.

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Writing A Book Title In Your Essay – The Right Way

Table of contents

• 1 APA Style: How to Write Book Titles in Essays
• 2 APA Style Essay: Writing The Name of The Author
• 3 MLA Style Essay: Citing a Book Title
• 4 Chicago Style Essay: Writing the Book Title
• 5 Writing Various Types of Titles
• 6 Should We Underline or Italicize Book Titles?

When you are writing an academic essay , the book title and author’s name should be written in italics. However, if the book title is part of a larger work (such as a journal article), it should be underlined instead. So, you’re wondering how to write a book title in an essay?

Writing an essay with a book title can be tricky, particularly because each style guide has its own formatting rules for including titles in the main text. Whether you are using MLA, APA, Chicago, or Harvard referencing styles, you will need to consider how to properly format the book title. For more complicated literature-based assignments, seeking assistance from an admission essay writing service may be wise, as they specialize in writing essays that incorporate academic sources.

In this article, we will explore how to write both titles in an essay properly so that you avoid any mistakes!

APA Style: How to Write Book Titles in Essays

When writing an essay, you must follow the style guide provided by your professor. Some teachers may require you to use APA style and others MLA style. There are some rules on how to quote a book title in an essay. You should use italics and quotation marks when writing book titles in essays. For example: “ The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II. “

When writing a book title in APA Style , you should be aware of these rules:

Write the book title in italics and place it after the author’s name, which is presented in reverse order (last name first).

Use quotation marks around the headline of a chapter or article.

Capitalize proper names that are not common nouns (names of people, places, organizations), but do not capitalize words such as “and,” “or,” “to,” or “and/or.”

Do not capitalize prepositions that appear at the beginning of titles if they are followed by an article (e.g., “A,” “An”), but do capitalize prepositions at the beginning of titles if they are not followed by articles (“Of”).

The first word of the headline should be capitalized, as well as any other words after a colon or hyphen. For example, “The Elements of Style: Grammar for Everyone”  or “Theories of Personality: Critical Perspectives.”

Capitalize proper names and words derived from them (e.g., the names of people, places, organizations), except proper nouns used generically (e.g., ‘a bed’).

APA Style Essay: Writing The Name of The Author

You should always use the full name and surname of the author in your APA essay because this will give proper credit to the writer. If you do not mention the author’s full name, people may not know who wrote what and will think you copied it from somewhere else. This will cause lots of problems for you and your reputation as well.

Make sure that all authors’ names appear in the same format in each entry. For example, if one person’s surname is Smith and another’s is Jones, both have first names starting with “J.” It may seem like they are being cited as different people when they’re actually written differently from each other on separate pages in your paper.

To write an APA essay without any issues, there are certain rules that you need to follow while writing an author’s name in APA essay:

• Use only one author’s name in your paper unless there are multiple authors
• If there are multiple authors, then use both their last names followed by the initials of their first names
• Only use initials of first names when there are three or more authors; otherwise, use full names with their last names

Example: Johnson, M.C., Carlson, M., Smith, J. N., & Hanover, L. E.

MLA Style Essay: Citing a Book Title

Now let’s discuss how to mention a book in an essay. The MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, 7th edition, published by the Modern Language Association (2014), contains detailed rules about how to cite a book title in an essay.

The following guidelines will instruct you on how to refer to a book in an essay in MLA style :

• List your sources at the end of your paper, before the works cited page or bibliography.
• Use italics for titles of books, magazines, and newspapers, but not for articles within those publications, which should be placed in quotation marks.
• Include all relevant book information under two categories: “title” and “author.” In the former category, include the work’s title and its subtitle if there is one; do this even if neither appears on your title page (see below). In the latter category, include only primary authors who have written or edited an entire book; if there are multiple contributors, you should cite them separately under each.

The general format for citing the title of the book in an essay is as follows:

Author’s last name, first initial (Date). Title of Book with Subtitle if there is one. Publisher Name/Location of Publisher; Year Published

Chicago Style Essay: Writing the Book Title

One of the most important things to remember when writing in Chicago style is how to write the title of a book in an essay. To write a good book title in an essay, you should follow these steps:

• Write it at the beginning of your sentence.
• Capitalize it just like any other noun or proper noun.
• Put a comma after the title unless it’s an introductory clause or phrase. For example: “The Firm,” by John Grisham (not “by”) and “The Catcher in the Rye,” by J.D Salinger (not “and”).
• In addition to the book’s name, punctuation marks should also be italicized.

For example: Harry Potter and the Half-blood Prince: Children’s Edition

Writing Various Types of Titles

Now that we covered how to write a book title and author in an essay, it’s time to look at some different types of titles. When you write a book title in an essay, several things must be considered. Whether it’s a book, series, chapter title, editor’s name, or author’s name, how you write it depends on where it appears in your paper.

Here are some key rules for writing headings for novels:

•  Use capital letters to write the title of the novel. For example,  The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett .
• Use italics and capital letters to write the name of the author and his/her other works mentioned in a book title—for example,  Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice (1813) .

You should use quotation marks when writing headings of short title poems, articles, and stories.

However, before deciding which format to use, it is important to understand the main idea you want to express in your essay. Additionally, you could use essay papers for sale to help you accomplish your goal of writing an essay effectively.

Should We Underline or Italicize Book Titles?

It depends on which style guide you use. The Modern Language Association and Chicago Manual of Style both suggest using italics, while the American Psychological Association suggests using quotation marks with a few exceptions.

The way you write the title of a book in an essay is different depending on the instructions you were given. For example, if you’re writing an essay in APA style, use quotation marks around the book’s name. If you’re writing for MLA or Chicago style , however, italicize the book’s name instead. If you’re writing a handwritten essay instead of using a computer, capitalize and underline the book’s name.

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• Writing Tips

How to Write Book Titles in Your Essays

3-minute read

• 26th May 2023

When writing an essay, you’re likely to mention other authors’ works, such as books, papers, and articles. Formatting the titles of these works usually involves using quotation marks or italics.

So how do you write a book title in an essay? Most style guides have a standard for this – be sure to check that first. If you’re unsure, though, check out our guide below.

Italics or Quotation Marks?

As a general rule, you should set titles of longer works in italics , and titles of shorter works go in quotation marks . Longer works include books, journals, TV shows, albums, plays, etc. Here’s an example of a book mention:

Shorter works include poems, articles, chapters of books, episodes of TV shows, songs, etc. If it’s a piece that’s part of a biggHow to Write Book Titles in Your Essayser work, the piece considered a short work:

Exceptions to the Rule

The rule for writing book titles in italics applies specifically to running text . If the book title is standing on its own, as in a heading, there’s no need to italicize it.

Additionally, if the book is part of a larger series and you’re mentioning both the title of the series and that of the individual book, you can consider the book a shorter work. You would set the title of the series in italics and place the book title in quotation marks:

Punctuation in Book Titles

Do you need to apply italics to the punctuation in a book title? The short answer is yes – but only if the punctuation is part of the title:

If the punctuation isn’t part of the title (i.e., the punctuation is part of the sentence containing the title), you shouldn’t include in the italics:

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Summary: Writing Book Titles in Essays

We hope you’ll now feel confident when you’re writing and formatting book titles in your essays. Generally, you should set the title in italics when it’s in running text. Remember, though, to check your style guide. While the standards we’ve covered are the most common, some style guides have different requirements.

And once you finish writing your paper, make sure you send it our way! We’ll make sure any titles are formatted correctly as well as checking your work for grammar, spelling, punctuation, referencing, and more. Submit a free sample to try our service today.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you write the title of a book in a sentence.

Set the title of the book in italics unless the book is part of a larger work (e.g., a book that’s part of a series):

When do you use quotation marks for titles?

Place titles of shorter works or pieces that are contained in a larger work in quotation marks:

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How to Write Book Titles in Essays: APA, MLA, Chicago Styles

It’s your practical and up-to-point guide on how to write a book title in an essay. You’ll get the formatting rules and examples for citing book and author names in academic papers.

We’ve covered the top three citation styles: APA, Chicago, and MLA.

How to Write the Title of a Book in an Essay

First, remember the general rules of citing book names in academic works.

Here’s how to cite books in essays :

• Use capitalization. Every word of a book’s name goes in the title case, except prepositions, articles, and coordinating conjunctions.
• Use italics for longer and independent works. Use double quotations for shorter ones (poems, articles, book chapters, or play acts and scenes).
• Use single quotations for a book’s title within another title. (When citing monographs about literary works, for example.) 

While capitalization rules depend on the citation style, some general tips have a place to be. Please, no capitalization for:

• Articles: a, the (unless the book title begins with it)
• Coordinating conjunctions and prepositions: of, and, or, but, for, to, nor, in, so (unless the book title begins or ends with it)

Subordinating conjunctions (although, unless, because, if) go in capital letters.

How to Write a Book Title in an Essay: APA

APA (American Psychological Association) is the most popular style for citing academic works. It’s common for the social sciences like Education, Psychology, Sociology, and others. The current edition: 7th (2019).

Book titles in APA stand for:

• Italics. (If a book name includes any punctuation, italicize it too.)
• Capitalization. (Capitalize all words longer than four letters , regardless of the part of speech. Also, use capital letters for two-part words and those coming after a dash or a colon.)
• Double quotations instead of italics. (When citing a short work like an article or a poem; when citing a book chapter or when the book is a part of an anthology.)

For example: 

The Lord of the Rings but “The Fellowship of the Ring” (The latter is part of the trilogy.)

Related: How to Cite a Movie in APA Format

How to Write the Name of a Book in an Essay: Chicago

The Chicago Manual of Style is a guide by the University of Chicago. It’s common for fields like History, Fine Arts, and Business. The current edition: 17th (2017).

How to format book titles in Chicago:

• Italicize longer and independent works; put shorter ones in double quotations.
• Use italics for punctuation within a title.
• Capitalize all words except articles (a, the) and ALL prepositions or conjunctions (regardless of length).

For example:

In George Orwell’s 1984 , the author presents a dystopian society characterized by pervasive government surveillance and the suppression of individual freedom. The harrowing events in “Chapter 2,” where Winston Smith begins to rebel against the Party by starting a forbidden diary, mark a pivotal moment in the novel’s exploration of resistance against totalitarianism.

The style resembles the MLA format, but it’s flexible, allowing you to “break the rules if necessary.”

How to Write a Book Title in an Essay: MLA

MLA format stands for the Modern Language Association. It’s common for humanities like Literature, Culture, Linguistics, etc. The current edition: 8th (2016). 

How to format books in MLA:

• Italicize all words, including punctuation and those of two parts or going after colons and hyphens.
• Capitalize all words except articles (a, the) , prepositions, and short conjunctions within a book title.
• Use double quotations instead of italics when writing a book chapter or a part of a book series.

In Little Women , Beth March dies in Chapter 40, “The Valley of the Shadow.”

Formatting Book Author Names in Papers

Use the author’s full name (first and last) to format it in your essay for proper credit.

If a book has two authors, use both last names and initials. For works with three or more authors, use the last name of the first one and add “et all.”

No need to italicize author names in papers.

Why Properly Cite Book Titles in Essays

The short answer:

You won’t get a high grade for an essay. Formatting blunders count as mistakes.

The longer answer:

• You prove writing skills and an understanding of the rules in academia.
• Your papers maintain consistency. It’s critical to stick to criteria to prevent confusion. The consistent format for book headings also serves to better scannability and readability.
• You learn to cite different types of references for your future projects.

Do you italicize book titles?

Yes, you put book titles in italics. Please italicize long and stand-alone works: books, movies, webpages, reports, or music albums. Shorter works’ titles (articles, essays, poems, songs, or book chapters) come in quotations. (1)

Do you underline book titles?

Underlining book titles is an outdated practice. Some still use it in handwritten essays, but it’s not a must-follow rule. Neither APA nor MLA (or Chicago) mentions underlining book names in academic papers.

How to use book title capitalization in texts?

Capitalize every word in a book’s title. Exceptions are articles (a, the), prepositions, and short (three or fewer letters) conjunctions in mid-titles.

Are books italicized in all formatting styles?

Yes, book titles come in italics in all styles: APA, MLA, and Chicago. When citing book chapters or a book as a part of a series, use quotation marks instead.

How to write a book author in an essay?

Use the author’s full name when citing their book in your papers. For works with several authors, mention their last names and initials. Unlike book titles, author names come in standard formatting with no italics.

References:

• https://english.csuci.edu/resources/essay-writing-essentials.htm
• Essay samples
• Essay writing
• Writing tips

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How to Write A BOOK Title In An Essay

Writing a book title in an essay can be confusing. But it is necessary for the credibility and clarity of the write-up. Plus, each writing style has its own rules for formatting titles. Hence, doing such an activity could be a real pain for the students.

Don’t worry, as you are in the right place! Since this interesting article focuses on guiding you about how to write a book title in an essay accurately. So, read it thoroughly before you search for a professional  paper writing services  provider.

Table of Contents

Understanding Formatting Guidelines

The first step in learning how to write book name in essay is to learn the basics. It means you need to get comfortable with different formatting guidelines. Let’s begin with the style guides.

Different style guides

When writing essays for college , it’s important to know the rules for formatting book titles. The three most popular style guides are MLA, APA, and Chicago.

In  MLA format , you should usually italicize book titles. You can also put them in quotation marks when a type of work demands.

For example, a book title like “To Kill a Mockingbird” would be italicized:  To Kill a Mockingbird .

However, a chapter title within a book would be placed within quotation marks. For example, “The Ewell Family.”

In  APA style , the first word of book titles is capital.

For example, a book title like “The Catcher in the Rye” would be written as The catcher in the rye

Chicago Style

Chicago style demands a book title to be in italics or quotation marks. It is very similar to the MLA style. But Chicago style gives you a bit more leeway to use italics or quotation marks. It’s best to stay consistent with what you pick throughout your essay when using the Chicago style.

Consistency within the Essay

You must be consistent when including the title of a book in an essay. Figure out what style guide you must follow and ensure you stick with it. That means all the book titles you mention should look the same.

For example, if you choose to italicize book titles according to MLA style. Ensure that all book titles in your essay are italicized consistently. Avoid mixing italicization with quotation marks or using different formatting styles within the same essay.

Inconsistency in formatting can confuse readers and undermine the professionalism of your work. Paying attention to detail and maintaining consistency will contribute to your essay’s overall clarity and readability.

Determine the Appropriate Style Guide to Follow

To determine the appropriate style guide to follow for formatting book titles in your essay, consider the following:

Assignment Requirements

See if your teacher or the instructions for the assignment mention a certain style to go by. Stick to that, if they do, to ensure everything is consistent, and you meet the expectations.

Academic Discipline

Your field of study can affect which style guide you should use. For example, humanities and literature students usually use MLA style, while social sciences usually use APA style. It’s important to know what’s typical in your discipline to choose the right guide.

Formatting Book Titles in MLA Style

Humanities and liberal arts disciplines use MLA writing rules. In MLA style, book titles are usually in italics like in APA style. But there can be variations in capitalization and punctuation. Let’s explore each aspect in detail with examples:

In MLA style, book titles are put in italics to make them stand out from the rest of the text.

Titles of shorter works, such as articles or chapters, are enclosed in quotation marks.

Example 1: Italicized Book Title

Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby .

Example 2: Book Chapter (In Quotation Marks)

Smith, John. “The Art of Persuasion.” Essays on Rhetoric.

Capitalization

In MLA style, follows the title case. It means keep the first letter of each word capital. Capitalize articles, conjunctions, and prepositions only if they are the first or last words in title.

Example 3: Correct Capitalization

Lee, Harper. To Kill a Mockingbird.

Punctuation

In MLA style, there should be no special punctuation like colons or periods between the main title and any subtitles. However, if the book’s title includes a subtitle, a colon should separate it from the main title.

Example 4: Book Title with Subtitle

Gladwell, Malcolm. Outliers: The Story of Success.

Edition and Volume Numbers

To refer to a certain book edition, add the edition number after the book title. If the book is part of a multi-volume work, indicate the volume number after the title as well.

Example 5: Edition and Volume Numbers

Johnson, Mary. Chemistry in Focus. 2nd ed.

Smith, Adam. The Wealth of Nations. Vol. 1.

Translated Titles

If the book you are citing is translated from another language, include the original title and the translator’s name in the citation.

Example 6: Translated Title

Kafka, Franz. The Metamorphosis. Translated by David Wyllie.

It’s important to remember that MLA style is always changing and being updated. So always refer to the latest edition of the MLA Handbook or your institution’s writing guidelines.

Formatting Book Titles in APA Style

Usually the social sciences disciplines use APA (American Psychological Association) style. Let’s look at how you must consider capitalization, punctuation and italics in this writing style.

Just capitalize the first word of any subtitles and proper nouns.

All other words, such as articles (a, an, the), conjunctions (and, but, or), and prepositions (in, on, at), are in lowercase.

Example 1: 

“The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business”

In APA style, book titles are italicized to distinguish them from the rest of the text.

Do not italicize titles of shorter works, such as articles or chapters. Just enclose them in quotation marks.

Example 2: Italics

Here’s an example of an italicized book title:

The Catcher in the Rye

In APA style, there should be a colon (:) between the main title and any subtitle.

When citing a book title within the text of your paper, use title case and italicize it.

When including book titles in your reference list, use sentence case and italicize it.

Example 3: Punctuation

Here’s an example of proper punctuation and citation within the text and reference list:

In-text citation

According to Smith (2019),  The Theory of Everything  provides an in-depth analysis of astrophysics.

Reference list citation

Smith, J. (2019).  the theory of everything . Publisher.

Include the edition number in parentheses right after the book title when a book has a specific edition.

If a book is part of a multi-volume work, you can also indicate the volume number after the title.

Example 4: Parenthesis

Here are examples of how to format book titles with edition and volume numbers:

Edition Number

Johnson, M. (2022). Chemistry in Focus (2nd ed.).

Volume Number

Smith, A. (2021). History of the United States (Vol. 3).

Include the translator’s name in square brackets if you cite a translated book. 

Example 5: Translated Thesis 

Here’s an example of how to format a translated book title:

Kundera, M. (1984). The Unbearable Lightness of Being [Original title: Nesnesitelná lehkost bytí].

Translated by M. Henry.

Formatting Book Titles in Chicago Style

The Chicago Manual of Style is mostly used in the humanities and social sciences disciplines. Chicago style follows two systems, namely Author-Date System and the notes and bibliography system. Let’s explore both of them.

Author-Date System

In the author-date system, you include:

• In-text citations with the author’s last name
• The publication year
• A corresponding entry in the reference list

Italicization

In the author-date system, book titles are italicized. It makes them Distinguish from other elements in the citation.

Chicago style uses a title case for book titles in the author-date system. It means the first letter of the title, subtitles, and any major words are capitalized.

There should be a period at the end of the full book citation in the reference list.

Example 1: In-Text Citation

Example 2: Reference List Citation

Smith, John. 2019.  The Theory of Everything . Publisher.

Notes and Bibliography System

You use footnotes or endnotes in the notes and bibliography system for in-text citations and a bibliography for the full list of references.

Similar to the author-date system, book titles are italicized in the notes and bibliography system.

In the notes and bibliography system, the Chicago style uses headline-style capitalization for book titles. It means that the first letter of the first and last words of the title are capitalized.

Put a period at the end of each full bibliographic entry in the notes and bibliography system.

Example 3: Footnote/Endnote Citation

John Smith,  The Theory of Everything  (Publisher, 2019), 25.

Example 4: Bibliography Citation

Smith, John.  The Theory of Everything . Publisher, 2019.

You may include the edition number after the title, and for multi-volume works, the volume number after the title.

Example 5: Edition Number

Johnson, Mary.  Chemistry in Focus . 2nd ed.

Example 6: Volume Number

Smith, Adam.  The Wealth of Nations . Vol. 1.

For translated works, include the original title and the translator’s name in the citation.

Example 7: Translated Title

Kafka, Franz.  The Metamorphosis . Translated by David Wyllie.

Citation of Book Titles in Other Situations

Let’s highlight some unusual circumstances of including a title of book in essay. Starting with:

Book titles within quotations

If you’re citing a direct quote from a book in your essay, you may need to put the book title in quotes. Generally, you should use double quotation marks for this.

For example:

According to Mark Twain, “The secret of getting ahead is getting started.”

In the novel 1984, George Orwell explores the theme of government surveillance through the famous line, “Big Brother is watching you.”

By using double quotation marks, you indicate that the words within the quotation marks are taken directly from the book.

Book Titles in Footnotes or Endnotes

In academic writing, footnotes or endnotes can be added to give extra info or credits. When including book titles, how you format them depends on the citation style you’re using.

In Chicago Style, book titles in footnotes or endnotes should usually be italicized or in quotation marks.

For Example:

Jane Austen,  Pride and Prejudice  (New York: Penguin Classics, 2002), 45.

Harper Lee,  To Kill a Mockingbird , (New York: Harper Perennial, 2006), 77.

Handling Foreign language book titles

Follow these rules for citing a book in a foreign language. You should keep the original language title, especially if it’s a popular work.

Italicize the foreign language book title following the same guidelines as you would for an English book title. Include a translation in parentheses if necessary.

Use the original foreign language title in sentence case without italics or quotation marks. Include a translation in brackets if needed.

Italicize or use quotation marks for foreign language book titles, following the same guidelines as you would for an English book title. Include a translation if required.

Special Cases

In certain situations, you might need to format book titles differently. Like if you’re talking about a poem or play. These types of works have their own rules for formatting titles. Let’s get to know them briefly. 

Typically, you’d put poem titles in quotation marks and longer pieces of poetry, like epics, in italics. It’s worth checking the style guide you’re using, though, since the rules can vary.

You’ll usually see the title written in italics when it comes to plays. The names of characters or speakers within the play are usually written with a mix of upper- and lowercase letters, without quotation marks.

Best Practices for Including Book Titles in Essays

Double-check formatting guidelines.

It’s super important to double-check the formatting rules for book titles when writing an essay since each style guide has its own rules. You need to make sure you’re following them properly.

Proofreading for Accuracy and Consistency

Look out for mistakes in how you’ve done the capitals, italics, and quotes. Double-check any extra rules that might apply to foreign language books, poems, plays, and other special cases.

Seek Assistance from Style Guides or Writing Resources

It’s a good idea to get help from style guides or writing tools when you are stuck with citations. You can also buy cheap essay from a well-reputed writing services provider.

It’s super important to get book titles in essays right. Not just for clarity but also to show you’re a pro. Ensure that you stick to the accurate style guide. It could be MLA, APA, or Chicago. Plus, there are special rules for poems and more.

Furthermore, if you need a professional to help you out with citations, do count on the expertise of  our writers . They are always available to get you out of your troubles of how to write book titles in essays.

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Blog • Perfecting your Craft

Last updated on Jun 23, 2023

How to Write a Novel: 13-Steps From a Bestselling Writer [+Templates]

This post is written by author, editor, and ghostwriter Tom Bromley. He is the instructor of Reedsy's 101-day course, How to Write a Novel .

Writing a novel is an exhilarating and daunting process. How do you go about transforming a simple idea into a powerful narrative that grips readers from start to finish? Crafting a long-form narrative can be challenging, and it requires skillfully weaving together various story elements.

In this article, we will break down the major steps of novel writing into manageable pieces, organized into three categories — before, during, and after you write your manuscript.

How to write a novel in 13 steps:

1. Pick a story idea with novel potential

2. develop your main characters, 3. establish a central conflict and stakes, 4. write a logline or synopsis, 5. structure your plot, 6. pick a point of view, 7. choose a setting that benefits your story , 8. establish a writing routine, 9. shut out your inner editor, 10. revise and rewrite your first draft, 11. share it with your first readers, 12. professionally edit your manuscript, 13. publish your novel.

Every story starts with an idea.

You might be lucky, like JRR Tolkien, who was marking exam papers when a thought popped into his head: ‘In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.’ You might be like Jennifer Egan, who saw a wallet left in a public bathroom and imagined the repercussions of a character stealing it, which set the Pulitzer prize-winner A Visit From the Goon Squad in process. Or you might follow Khaled Hosseini, whose The Kite Runner was sparked by watching a news report on TV.

Many novelists I know keep a notebook of ideas both large and small 一 sometimes the idea they pick up on they’ll have had much earlier, but whatever reason, now feels the time to write it. Certainly, the more ideas you have, the more options you’ll have to write. 

✍️ Need a little inspiration? Check our list of 30+ story ideas for fiction writing , our list of 300+ writing prompts , or even our plot generator .

Is your idea novel-worthy?

How do you know if what you’ve got is the inspiration for a novel, rather than a short story or a novella ? There’s no definitive answer here, but there are two things to look out for 

Firstly, a novel allows you the space to show how a character changes over time, whereas a short story is often more about a vignette or an individual moment. Secondly, if an idea is fit for a novel, it’ll nag away at you: a thread asking to be pulled to see where it goes. If you find yourself coming back to an idea, then that’s probably one to explore.

I expand on how to cultivate and nurture your ‘idea seeds’ in my free 10-day course on novel writing. 

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Another starting point (or essential element) for writing a novel will come in the form of the people who will populate your stories: the protagonists. 

My rule of thumb in writing is that a reader will read on for one of two reasons: either they care about the characters , or they want to know what happens next (or, in an ideal world, both). Now different people will tell you that character or plot are the most important element when writing. 

In truth, it’s a bit more complicated than that: in a good novel, the main character or protagonist should shape the plot, and the plot should shape the protagonist. So you need both core elements in there, and those two core elements are entwined rather than being separate entities. 

Characters matter because when written well, readers become invested in what happens to them. You can develop the most brilliant, twisty narrative, but if the reader doesn’t care how the protagonist ends up, you’re in trouble as a writer. 

As we said above, one of the strengths of the novel is that it gives you the space to show how characters change over time. How do characters change? 

Firstly, they do so by being put in a position where they have to make decisions, difficult decisions, and difficult decisions with consequences . That’s how we find out who they really are. 

Secondly, they need to start from somewhere where they need to change: give them flaws, vulnerabilities, and foibles for them to overcome. This is what makes them human — and the reason why readers respond to and care about them.

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As said earlier, it’s important to have both a great character and an interesting plot, which you can develop by making your character face some adversities.

That drama in the novel is usually built around some sort of central conflict . This conflict creates a dramatic tension that compels the reader to read on. They want to see the outcome of that conflict resolved: the ultimate resolution of the conflict (hopefully) creates a satisfying ending to the narrative.

A character changes, as we said above, when they are put in a position of making decisions with consequences. Those consequences are important. It isn’t enough for a character to have a goal or a dream or something they need to achieve (to slay the dragon): there also needs to be consequences if they don’t get what they’re after (the dragon burns their house down). Upping the stakes heightens the drama all round.

Now you have enough ingredients to start writing your novel, but before you do that, it can be useful to tighten them all up into a synopsis. 

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So far you’ve got your story idea, your central characters and your sense of conflict and stakes. Now is the time to distill this down into a narrative. Different writers approach this planning stage in different ways, as we’ll come to in a moment, but for anyone starting a novel, having a clear sense of what is at the heart of your story is crucial. 

There are a lot of different terms used here 一 pitch, elevator pitch , logline, shoutline, or the hook of your synopsis 一 but whatever the terminology the idea remains the same. This is to summarize your story in as few words as possible: a couple of dozen words, say, or perhaps a single sentence. 

This exercise will force you to think about what your novel is fundamentally about. What is the conflict at the core of the story? What are the challenges facing your main protagonist? What do they have at stake? 

📚 Check out these 48 irresistible  book hook examples  and get inspired to craft your own.

If you need some help, as you go through the steps in this guide, you can fill in this template:

My story is a [genre] novel. It’s told from [perspective] and is set in [place and time period] . It follows [protagonist] , who wants [goal] because [motivation] . But [conflict] doesn’t make that easy, putting [stake] at risk.

It's not an easy thing to do, to write this summarising sentence or two. In fact, they might be the most difficult sentences to get down in the whole writing process. But it is really useful in helping you to clarify what your book is about before you begin. When you’re stuck in the middle of the writing, it will be there for you to refer back to. And further down the line, when you’ve finished the novel, it will prove invaluable in pitching to agents , publishers, and readers. 

📼 Learn more about the process of writing a logline from professional editor Jeff Lyons. 

Another particularly important step to prepare for the writing part, is to outline your plot into different key story points. 

There’s no right answer here as to how much planning you should do before you write: it very much depends on the sort of writer you are. Some writers find planning out their novel before start gives them confidence and reassurance knowing where their book is going to go. But others find this level of detail restrictive: they’re driven more by the freedom of discovering where the writing might take them. 

This is sometimes described as a debate between ‘planners’ and ‘pantsers’ (those who fly by the seat of their pants). In reality, most writers sit somewhere on a sliding scale between the two extremes. Find your sweet spot and go from there!

If you’re a planning type, there’s plenty of established story structures out there to build your story around. Popular theories include the Save the Cat model and Christopher Vogler’s Hero’s Journey . Then there are books such as Christopher Booker’s The Seven Basic Plots , which suggests that all stories are one of, well, you can probably work that out.

Whatever the structure, most stories follow the underlying principle of having a beginning, middle and end (and one that usually results in a process of change). So even if you’re ‘pantsing’ rather than planning, it’s helpful to know your direction of travel, though you might not yet know how your story is going to get there. 

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Finally, remember what we said earlier about plot and character being entwined: your character’s journey shouldn’t be separate to what happens in the story. Indeed, sometimes it can be helpful to work out the character’s journey of change first, and shape the plot around that, rather than the other way round. 

Now, let’s consider which perspective you’re going to write your story from. 

However much plotting you decide to do before you start writing, there are two further elements to think about before you start putting pen to paper (or finger to keyboard). The first one is to think about which point of view you’re going to tell your story from. It is worth thinking about this before you start writing because deciding to change midway through your story is a horribly thankless task (I speak from bitter personal experience!)

Understanding Point of View

Learn to master different POVs and choose the best for your story.

Although there might seem a large number of viewpoints you could tell your story from, in reality, most fiction is told from two points of view 一 first person (the ‘I’ form) and third person ‘close’ (he/she/they). ‘Close’ third person is when the story is witnessed from one character’s view at a time (as opposed to third person ‘omniscient’ where the story can drop into lots of people’s thoughts).

Both of these viewpoints have advantages and disadvantages. First person is usually better for intimacy and getting into character’s thoughts: the flip side is that its voice can feel a bit claustrophobic and restrictive in the storytelling. Third person close offers you more options and more space to tell your story: but can feel less intimate as a result. 

There’s no right and wrong here in terms of which is the ‘best’ viewpoint. It depends on the particular demands of the story that you are wanting to write. And it also depends on what you most feel comfortable writing in. It can be a useful exercise to write a short section in both viewpoints to see which feels the best fit for you before starting to write. 

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Besides choosing a point of view, consider the setting you’re going to place your story in.

The final element to consider before beginning your story is to think about where your story is going to be located . Settings play a surprisingly important part in bringing a story to life. When done well, they add in mood and atmosphere, and can act almost like an additional character in your novel.

There are many questions to consider here. And again, it depends a bit on the demands of the story that you are writing. 

Is your setting going to a real place, a fictional one, or a real place with fictional elements? Is it going to be set in the present day, the past, or at an unspecified time? Are you going to set your story in somewhere you know, or need to research to capture properly? Finally, is your setting suited to the story you are telling, and serve to accentuate it, rather than just acting as a backdrop?

If you’re writing a novel in genres such as fantasy or science fiction , then you may well need to go into some additional world-building as well before you start writing. Here, you may have to consider everything from the rules and mores of society to the existence of magical powers, fantastic beasts, extraterrestrials, and futuristic technology. All of these can have a bearing on the story, so it is better to have a clear setup in your head before you start to write.

The Ultimate Worldbuilding Template

130 questions to help create a world readers want to visit again and again.

Whether your story is set in central London or the outer rings of the solar system, some elements of the descriptive detail remain the same. Think about the use of all the different senses — the sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and textures of where you’re writing about. Those sorts of small details can help to bring any setting to life, from the familiar to the imaginary. 

Alright, enough brainstorming and planning. It’s time to let the words flow on the page. 

Having done your prep — or as much prep and planning as you feel you need — it’s time to get down to business and write the thing. Getting a full draft of a novel is no easy task, but you can help yourself by setting out some goals before you start writing.

Firstly, think about how you write best. Are you a morning person or an evening person? Would you write better at home or out and about, in a café or a library, say? Do you need silence to write, or musical encouragement to get the juices flowing? Are you a regular writer, chipping away at the novel day by day, or more of a weekend splurger?

How to Build a Solid Writing Routine

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I’d always be wary of anyone who tells you how you should be writing. Find a routine and a setup that works for you . That might not always be the obvious one: the crime writer Jo Nesbø spent a while creating the perfect writing room but discovered he couldn’t write there and ended up in the café around the corner.

You might not keep the same way of writing throughout the novel: routines can help, but they can also become monotonous. You may need to find a way to shake things up to keep going.

Deadlines help here. If you’re writing a 75,000-word novel, then working at a pace of 5,000 words a week will take you 15 weeks (Monday to Friday, that’s 1000 words a day). Half the pace will take twice as long. Set yourself a realistic deadline to finish the book (and key points along the way). Without a deadline, the writing can end up drifting, but it needs to be realistic to avoid giving yourself a hard time. 

In my experience, writing speeds vary. I tend to start quite slowly on a book, and speed up towards the end. There are times when the tap is open, and the words are pouring out: make the most of those moments. There are times, too, when each extra sentence feels like torture: don’t beat yourself up here. Be kind to yourself: it’s a big, demanding project you’re undertaking.

Speaking of self-compassion, a word on that harsh editor inside your mind…

The other important piece of advice is to continue writing forward. It is very easy, and very tempting, to go back over what you’ve written and give it a quick edit. Once you start down that slippery slope, you end up rewriting and reworking the same scene and never get any further forwards in the text. I know of writers who spent months perfecting their first chapter before writing on, only to delete that beginning as the demands of the story changed.

The first draft of your novel isn’t about perfection; it’s about getting the words down. One writer I work with calls it the ‘vomit draft’ — getting everything out and onto the page. It’s only once you’ve got a full manuscript down that you can see your ideas in context and have the capacity to edit everything properly. So as much as your inner editor might be calling you, resist! They’ll have their moment in the sun later on. For now, it’s about getting a complete version down, that you can go on to work with and shape. 

By now, you’ve reached the end of your first draft (we might be glossing over the hard writing part just a little here: if you want more detail and help on how to get through to the end of your draft, our How to Write A Novel course is warmly recommended). 

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Reaching the end of your first draft is an important milestone in the journey of a book. Sadly for those who feel that this is the end of the story, it’s actually more of a stepping stone than the finish line.

In some ways, now the hard work begins. The difference between wannabe writers and those who get published can often be found in the amount of rewriting done. Professional writers will go back and back over what they’ve written, honing what they’ve created until the text is as tight and taut as it is possible to be.

How do you go about achieving this? The first thing to do upon finishing is to put the manuscript in a drawer. Leave it for a month or six weeks before you come back to it. That way, you’ll return the script with a fresh pair of eyes. Read it back through and be honest about what works and what doesn’t. As you read the script, think in particular about pace: are there sections in the novel that are too fast or too slow? Avoid the trap of the saggy middle . Then consider: is your character arc complete and coherent? Look at the big-picture stuff first before you tackle the smaller details. 

Edit your novel closely

On that note, here are a few things you might want to keep an eye out for:

Show, don’t tell. Sometimes, you just need to state something matter-of-factly in your novel, that’s fine. But, as much as you can, try to illustrate a point instead of just stating it . Keep in mind the words of Anton Chekhov: “Don’t tell me the moon is shining. Show me the glint of light on broken glass."

“Said” is your friend. When it comes to dialogue, there can be the temptation to spice things up a bit by using tags like “exclaimed,” “asserted,” or “remarked.” And while there might be a time and place for these, 90% of the time, “said” is the best tag to use. Anything else can feel distracting or forced. 

Stay away from purple prose. Purple prose is overly embellished language that doesn’t add much to the story. It convolutes the intended message and can be a real turn-off for readers.

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Once you feel it’s good enough for other people to lay their eyes on it, it’s time to ask for feedback.

Writing a novel is a two-way process: there’s you, the writer, and there’s the intended audience, the reader. The only way that you can find out if what you’ve written is successful is to ask people to read and get feedback.

Think about when to ask for feedback and who to ask it from. There are moments in the writing when feedback is useful and others where it gets in the way. To save time, I often ask for feedback in those six weeks when the script is in the drawer (though I don’t look at those comments until I’ve read back myself first). The best people to ask for feedback are fellow writers and beta readers : they know what you’re going through and will also be most likely to offer you constructive feedback. 

Also, consider working with sensitivity readers if you are writing about a place or culture outside your own. Friends and family can also be useful but are a riskier proposition: they might be really helpful, but equally, they might just tell you it’s great or terrible, neither of which is overly useful.

Feedbacking works best when you can find at least a few people to read, and you can pool their comments. My rule is that if more than one person is saying the same thing, they are probably right. If only one person is saying something, then you have a judgment call to make as to whether to take those comments further (though usually, you’ll know in your gut whether they are right or not.)

Overall, the best feedback you can receive is that of a professional editor…

Once you’ve completed your rewrites and taken in comments from your chosen feedbackers, it’s time to take a deep breath and seek outside opinions. What happens next here depends on which route you want to take to market:

If you want to go down the traditional publishing route , you’ll probably need to get a literary agent, which we’ll discuss in a moment.

If you’re going down the self-publishing route , you’ll need to do what would be done in a traditional publishing house and take your book through the editing process. This normally happens in three stages. 

Developmental editing. The first of these is to work with a development editor , who will read and critique your work primarily from a structural point of view. 

Copy-editing. Secondly, the book must be copy-edited , where an editor works more closely, line-by-line, on the script. 

Proofreading. Finally, usually once the script has been typeset, then the material should be professionally proofread , to spot any final mistakes or orrors. Sorry, errors!

Finding such people can sound like a daunting task. But fear not! Here at Reedsy, we have a fantastic fleet of editors of all shapes, sizes, and experiences. So whatever your needs or requirements, we should be able to pair you with an editor to suit.

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Now that you’ve ironed out all the wrinkles of your manuscript, it’s time to release it into the wild.

For those thinking about going the traditional publishing route , now’s the time for you to get to work. Most trade publishers will only accept work from a literary agent, so you’ll need to find a suitable literary agent to represent your work. 

The querying process is not always straightforward: it involves research, waiting and often a lot of rejections until you find the right person (I was rejected by 24 agents before I found my first agent). Usually, an agent will ask to see a synopsis and the first three chapters (check their websites for submission details). If they like what they read, they’ll ask to see the whole thing. 

If you’re self-publishing, you’ll need to think about getting your finished manuscript to market. You’ll need to get it typeset (laid out in book form) and find a cover designer . Do you want to sell printed copies or just ebooks? You’ll need to work out how to work Amazon , where a lot of your sales will come from, and also how you’ll market your book .

For those picked up by a traditional publisher, all the editing steps discussed will take place in-house. That might sound like a smoother process, but the flip side can be less control over the process: a publisher may have the final say in the cover or the title, and lead times (when the book is published) are usually much longer. So it’s worth thinking about which route to market works best for you.

Finally, you’re a published author! Congratulations. Now all you have to do is think about writing the next one… 

As an editor and publisher, Tom has worked on several hundred titles, again including many prize-winners and international bestsellers. 

8 responses

Sasha Winslow says:

14/05/2019 – 02:56

I started writing in February 2019. It was random, but there was an urge to the story I wanted to write. At first, I was all over the place. I knew the genre I wanted to write was Fantasy ( YA or Adult). That has been my only solid starting point the genre. From February to now, I've changed my story so many times, but I am happy to say by giving my characters names I kept them. I write this all to say is thank you for this comprehensive step by step. Definitely see where my issues are and ways to fix it. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Evelyn P. Norris says:

30/10/2019 – 14:18

My number one tip is to write in order. If you have a good idea for a future scene, write down the idea for the scene, but do NOT write it ahead of time. That's a major cause of writer's block that I discovered. Write sequentially. :) If you can't help yourself, make sure you at least write it in a different document, and just ignore that scene until you actually get to that part of the novel

Allen P. Wilkinson says:

28/01/2020 – 04:51

How can we take your advice seriously when you don’t even know the difference between stationary and stationery? Makes me wonder how competent your copy editors are.

↪️ Martin Cavannagh replied:

29/01/2020 – 15:37

Thanks for spotting the typo!

↪️ Chris Waite replied:

14/02/2020 – 13:17

IF you're referring to their use of 'stationery' under the section '1. Nail down the story idea' (it's the only reference on this page) then the fact that YOU don't know the difference between stationery and stationary and then bother to tell the author of this brilliant blog how useless they must be when it's YOU that is the thicko tells me everything I need to know about you and your use of a middle initial. Bellend springs to mind.

Sapei shimrah says:

18/03/2020 – 13:59

Thanks i will start writing now

Jeremy says:

25/03/2020 – 22:41

I’ve run the gamut between plotter and pantser, but lately I’ve settled on in-depth plotting before my novels. It’s hard for me to do focus wise, but I’m finding I’m spending less time in writer’s block. What trips me up more is finding the right voice for my characters. I’m currently working on a sci-fi YA novel and using the Save the Cat beat sheet for structure for the first time. Thank you for the article!

Nick Girdwood says:

29/04/2020 – 10:32

Can you not write a story without some huge theme?

Comments are currently closed.

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3 ways to stop a baby from vomiting, 3 ways to save instagram highlights, skills needed for reading comprehension: everything you need to know, how to change the language in android, 3 ways to permanently delete facebook messages, how to tie the sides of a shirt: 8 simple steps, phonics rules: everything you need to know, how to fill a flask: 8 steps, 3 ways to treat skin disease in hamsters, 4 ways to write a book name in an essay.

An essential aspect when mentioning a book in your essay is properly citing and formatting the title. Correctly writing the book’s name helps give appropriate credit to the author and ensures that any quotations or references you provide are aptly recognized. In this article, we will explore four different methods to include a book’s name in your essay.

Using italics is the most common method when writing a book’s title in an essay. This approach is suitable for various styles, including MLA, APA, and Chicago. To italicize the title, simply place it in italics by highlighting it and selecting the “italic” option in your word processor. For example:

In her groundbreaking work, *To Kill a Mockingbird*, Harper Lee explores themes of racism and social injustice.

2. Underlining

Similar to using italics, underlining can also be used to indicate a book’s title. This approach was more popular before word processors made italicizing text easier but remains acceptable if you are handwriting your essay or cannot use italics for any other reason. To underline the title, simply draw a line beneath the words in the title:

In his novel, A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens delves into the complexities of human nature during times of turmoil.

3. Quotation Marks

In some writing formats, especially when mentioning shorter works such as short stories, essays, or articles within a larger compilation, quotation marks are used instead of italics or underlining. However, using quotation marks for book titles is generally discouraged and should be avoided unless required by specific style guidelines.

4. Capitalization

Regardless of whether you use italics, underlining or quotation marks for your book titles, capitalization remains an essential component of proper formatting. Ensure that all major words within the title are capitalized while leaving articles (a, an, the), prepositions (of, to, in), and coordinating conjunctions (and, but) in lowercase when they are not the first word.

In conclusion, appropriately writing a book’s name in your essay is crucial to provide proper credit and maintain academic integrity. Italicizing or underlining the title and capitalizing all major words are the most common ways to achieve this. Remember to consult your instructor or specific citation style guidelines to ensure that you are following the correct formatting required for your essay.

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How to Write a Book Title in an Essay (MLA, APA etc.)

Formatting your essay correctly ensures that you get full recognition for the hard work you put into it. Wondering what to do? There are two scenarios that lead you to the question of "how to write a book title in an essay":

• You have not been required to use a particular style guide, in which case consistency remains important.
• You have been instructed to use a particular style guide. You now simply need to ensure that you are familiar with its rules.

Regardless of which of these scenarios holds true for you, this guide is here to help.

How to Write a Book Title in an Essay

Many style manuals call on writers use title case and italics to format a book title. Title case rules vary slightly from one style guide to the next, but generally capitalize all important words — nouns, pronouns, verbs, and adverbs. Conjunctions and prepositions are not capitalized unless they are very long (generally more than four letters) or they appear at the beginning or end of a book title.

Writers who are not required to work with a specific style manual can't go wrong if they stick to this style. Some examples would be:

• To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
• The Gift of Fear and Other Survival Signals That Protect us From Violence by Gavin de Becker
• The Cat With a Feathery Tail and Other Stories by Enid Blyton

If, on the other hand, you're required to use a style guide, it will likely be one of these:

• MLA, commonly used in disciplines relating to literature and social sciences.
• APA, commonly used in psychology and other sciences.
• Chicago, often used in the publishing industry.
• Harvard style, commonly used in philosophy and social sciences.

These are certainly not the only "big players" in the style guide world, but they're ones it's good to be familiar with. There is overlap between these styles, but there are also major differences — so knowing one definitely does not mean you know the others, too.

Guidelines for Writing a Book Title in an Essay

Looking for a short and sharp answer, so you can get on with the rest of your essay? This is it.

This quick guide will help you reference the book title of your choosing in the body of your essay, but what about your Works Cited pages? Each style guide offers different rules, and we'll use the same book as an example to illustrate the differences.

• MLA uses the following format: Author Last Name, First Name. Title of Book . City of Publication, Publisher, Publication Year. Example: Card, Orson Scott. Ender's Game. Tor Books, 1985. (You only have to detail the city of publication if the book was published before 1900, the publisher has offices in many localities, or the publisher is not known in the US.)
• APA uses the following format: Author Last Name, First Name. (Year of Publication). Title of book. Example: Card, Orson Scott. (1985). Ender's game.
• Chicago style uses the following format: Author Last Name, First Name. Book Title: Subtitle . Place of publication: Publisher, Year. Example: Card, Orson Scott. Ender's Game . Tor Books, 1985.
• Harvard uses the following format: Author Last Name, First Initial. (Publication Year). Title . ed. City: Publisher. Example: Card, O. (1985). Ender's Game. Tor Books.

If, after researching, you cannot find relevant information about publication years, publishers, or the city in which a book was published, you may omit it. For a full guide, it is always best to have a physical copy of the latest edition of the style manual you are using. You can, however, get by without this if you need to.

Should you still not know what to do, it will be helpful for you to know that you can "generate" citations for a particular style manual with the help of online tools like Cite Me . These are not always accurate, so if you decide to use one, always check the citation manually.

Why Is Proper Formatting Important?

All of the well-known style manuals ultimately serve the very same set of purposes, although they were each developed for a particular niche. The goals of these style manuals are both explicit and implicit:

• Following a style guide ensures consistency throughout a document, in this case an essay.
• Consistency ensures that reader's understand precisely what the writer is talking about, without exerting any effort on figuring that out. Clarity is especially important in academic writing.
• By using a style guide within a certain discipline, you show that you understand the rules within that discipline. This adds credibility to your voice as a writer. You have done your homework, have ideally bought the style manual, and are part of the "in group".
• Sticking to a certain style guide makes it easier for relevant parties to check your references, which they can then use to perform further research.

Students are increasingly asked to refer to style guides at all levels, including in high school. In this case, formatting your essay correctly, in accordance with the right style manual, serves two additional purposes:

• You'll lose points if you don't do it right, offering you an additional reason to do your research.
• Getting used to these formats prepares you for further education. If you are in high school, it prepares you for college-level writing. If you are an undergraduate student, it prepares you for academic work at the graduate and post-graduate levels.

Can you start an essay with a book title?

Yes, you can start an essay with a book title. This is a valid stylistic choice, but you will always want to consider your introduction carefully.

How do you write a book title in handwriting?

Students sometimes ask whether it is acceptable to underline book titles instead of italicizing them. This practice indeed stems from a time in which most students wrote their essays by hand. Although it has largely fallen out of practice now, you can still underline a book title if you are handwriting your essay.

How do you write a book title and chapter in an essay?

You should mention the chapter title first: "Rat" from Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card. Consult the relevant style manual to ensure you get the formatting right.

Can you shorten a book title in an essay?

Yes, you can. Reference the full title the first time you mention it (for example: Furiously Happy: A Funny Book About Horrible Things ). The next time you mention the book, you may simply refer to Furiously Happy .

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Pen Names: What You Need To Know About Using A Pseudonym

by Writer's Relief Staff | Other Helpful Information , Pen Names And Pseudonyms | 86 comments

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Many writers use pen names—but there’s a right way and a wrong way to publish your book, stories, poems, or essays under a pseudonym. Actors and artists often use fictitious names, and writers sometimes choose to create under a different persona as well. So how do you know if you should use a pen name or not? What are the advantages and disadvantages of noms de plume for writers? At Writer’s Relief, we know there are several good reasons to use pseudonyms—and there are also some reasons not to.

Writing under a fictitious name was a very common practice in the eighteenth century, when writers and journalists used pseudonyms to pen controversial or even illegal articles and letters to the editor. Some examples of writers who use pen names: Ben Franklin used this practice extensively, and when he used a pen name, he often created an entire character to go along with it. Dean Koontz and Stephen King, both prolific writers, used pen names at the suggestion of their publishers to avoid overexposure. And George Eliot was actually Mary Ann Evans, who used a male pen name in order to be taken seriously in a male-dominated society.

These days we enjoy more freedom of expression than ever before, and writing under a pen name is more a choice than necessity. If you’re a new writer , making the decision to use a pen name is probably not top priority for you, unless you fall under one of the categories below. Your job is to focus on your work, not your name; and you want to get exposure, not hide your true identity. As you begin to build up writing credits , think of yourself as a product. Unless your “brand name” truly does not reflect what you want the world to see, there’s no good reason to protect your identity—unless, of course, you’re writing an exposé on the mob.

Why Use A Pen Name? 

There are several reasons why writers choose to adopt pen names.

Another author “owns” your name. Your mother was a big fan, and your name is Sylvia Plath.

Your name doesn’t fit the genre. Bruiser Ratchet or Belinda Blood may want to choose more romantic names to break into the romance genre. (However, Bruiser Ratchet would be a great name for a detective/suspense novel writer, and Ms. Blood’s name suits the horror genre to a tee.)

You want to conceal your real identity. You’re a prim and proper physics professor at a large university but write erotica on the side—under an assumed name, of course. A pen name would also protect the author from political persecution or prejudice. Imagine writing about homosexuality or even atheism from a personal perspective in the 1950s without using a pen name.

Your name is too hard to pronounce and/or spell. If your name contains ten syllables and several Xs and Zs, perhaps a shorter, easier-to-spell name would be in order. And if it can be pronounced correctly by the average reader, that would be good. Remember: easy to say, easy to spell, easy to remember.

You’ve been burdened with a truly bad name to begin with. Consider Adolf Mussolini. Ima Hogg. Mercedes Binns. Tanya Hyde. You get the picture.

You want to cross genres. Anne Rice, famous for her vampire series, uses pen names for her collections of erotica, and she would probably take up a new one if she wanted to move into Sci-Fi or Westerns.

The minute you decide to take on a nom de plume, be prepared to stick to that name in your correspondence and at writers’ conferences and book signings. You want people to associate that name with you, not give them a slew of different names to remember.

Hint: If you do choose to go with a pen name, choose a name that’s not too generic or linked to someone else. Try an online search of your prospective name to see what comes up. You don’t want your readers to confuse you with the famous foot fungus specialist of the same name.

Literary agents and editors will expect a certain protocol for writers using pen names, especially if submitting a  query using a pen name . When sending queries to editors or literary agents , use the name you want to publish under for the byline and use your real name in the information block. If you’ve been published frequently under another name, make reference to it in your query (“I’ve been published previously under the name ABC, but in my foray into Genre #2, I’ve decided to use the name XYZ”). In the submission process, you don’t want to confuse the editor or agent by using multiple names.

When you are ready to sign a contract, make sure your editor and agent know your real name and its correct spelling; your contract should include a space for both names as well. Also be sure that your bank and local post office are aware of all your personas, or you may have trouble cashing checks.

When filing for copyright protection for your writing , use your real name for “Copyright Claimant” and your pen name for “Name of Author.” If you do not want your legal name associated with the pen name, enter only the pen name under “Name of Author” and identify it as such ( Lucy Lychuzweckio writing as Lucy Smith ). Use your pen name for “Copyright Claimant” as well. However, if your copyright is held only under your pen name, you can run into legal disputes about copyright ownership—consult with an attorney.

Want to know more about the legal ramifications of pen names? Read Pen Names II .

Writer’s Relief has been working with authors who have pen names since 1994. We manage the submission process for writers of books, stories, poems, and essays. We help writers connect with literary agents and editors through careful, targeted submissions. We’ve seen some great pseudonyms over the years—and we welcome the opportunity to work with you, whether you have a pen name or not.

86 Comments

One reason I didn’t see in your article was a co-authorship situation. I’d be interested in your opinion on that. I have been writing with 2 other people, so listing a co-authorship or even subbing as 3 people starts to raise red flags. We have chosen a pen name for one group and a different one for another. I am the spokesperson for each group.

What would you advise your clients in a situation like this?

The following article sums it up pretty well:

Ask the Lawyer: Writing Together; Writing Sub Rosa Pinpoint issues to resolve before getting involved in a co-authoring situation, and learn how to write under a pseudonym. by Amy Cook

Writers who share the work of writing a book—researching, writing, revising—are joint authors and, under copyright law, the work is a joint work. You will share ownership of copyright, authorship credit, royalties and the right to sell the work. While no contract is required to create joint authorship, if you wish to remain friends with this person, it is wise to create an agreement before getting too involved in the project. Here are some of the issues to address:

Allocation of responsibility. The agreement should spell out the work of each collaborator. Is one person plotting the story line and the other writing dialogue? Are you alternating writing chapters? Is one more creatively inclined and the other a researcher?

Compensation. Revenue may be divided as you choose. If you choose an unequal split, it must be put into writing and signed by all co-authors.

Expenses. Expenses are usually shared in the same percentage as advances and royalties. However, you may want to include a clause that obliges each collaborator to get the other’s written permission before incurring a major expense.

Authorship credit. Whose name goes first if you each do roughly half the work? If one partner is doing more, will her name be in larger type or above the other’s name?

Termination. If things don’t work out, who keeps the writing that’s already been done? And what if "the big termination" were to happen—death of a co-author? Copyright law governs much of what happens after a project is completed, but what would happen before completion?

Control. You may assume that you will jointly decide all creative, legal and business issues that arise, but what if you are deadlocked? Some mechanism for decision-making should be included, such as mediation or arbitration.

This article appeared in the August 2002 issue of Writer’s Digest ( http://www.writersdigest.com/store/magdisplay.asp?id=WRDAUG02 ).

Thanks for that, Kriste, both the email and the response to the comment.

We do have a written agreement, so have that covered. I received a boilerplate ‘contract’ from the Australian Society of Authors and wrote one for our two separate projects/groups.

My question was more about the use of pen names for joint author projects. I note that the article you quote doesn’t mention that at all.

Any comments on the pen name for multiple people?

Collaborative authors often choose to use a single pen name, usually because it simplifies things. Ellery Queen, the “author” of mystery novels and stories, was actually a pen name for two authors (Frederic Dannay and Manfred Lee). Sometimes a book series starts out with one author but, for one reason or another, the original author is unable or unwilling to contribute to subsequent books. The authors of the rest of the series publish subsequent titles under the name of the original author. It is a common practice. It also eases transactions between editors/agents to work with a single name. The only sticky areas arise when matters of contracts and royalties and copyright emerge, and those are issues best discussed with an attorney.

I’m a forteen year old writer and was looking for a Pen name because of my young age. Would a publisher take me serousely? Would getting it published so young cause a lot of attention?

Kasha, Whether or not you use a pen name, you should always interact with publishing industry professionals (like literary agents and editors) using your real name. Having a pen name does hurt or help in terms of getting a publisher to take you seriously. The only thing that can help with that is good writing!

How much attention you get for publshing depends on where you publish, what genre you publish in, and how much advertising/marketing support your writing receives.

I’d like to use my own name for my writing, but another author has already taken it! (which is odd, because my name isn’t that common and I’m not named after anyone). Would it still be considered my real name if I went by my first name and middle name instead of first name and last name?

Blythe, absolutely! Upon publication, you can have your name written any way you want (for example: J.K. Rowling). However, you’ll still want to include your last name in all legal documentation.

I’m quite new at writing and was wondering for some time whether I should use a pen name. Thanks for pros and cons – they made my decision easier to make!

Hi, I’m Melonie, thats my real name. I was thinking of becoming an other when I’m older, and I TOTALLY am because of my true passion for writing. I also wanna illustrate my books as well because teachers and EVERYONE say I’m a great artist. Let’s get to the point…. I want to use a Pen name, Avaline Spirits. But I’m just afraid if one day I dislike that name but its too late. Or if people like my closer friends now its me and dont like my name. Suggestions?

I’m 10, and turning 11 June 22nd 2015, I want to be an author when I’m older and I know I will be. I have written a story, a 25 page story on a long piece of paper (about 30cm). I want to publish it because all my friends and teachers agreed it was a good story and leaving suspense here and there. I want to publish it, but will a publisher take me seriously? And I really wanna use a pen name, but will they accept me with a Pen Name? And can you list some publishers in Canada? Also, is there anyway you can SELF publish a book by yourself when you are young? Please, help my dreams come true…. Natalie.

Natalie, Unfortunately, there are not many publishers that would be willing to publish someone of your age at this point in time. We would suggest working on your writing and wait until you are of an old enough age to handle the business side of writing (both in traditional and self-publishing).

I’m a bit new to the writing scene and want to use a pen name. My name, as you can tell, is a bit unusual and I can’t begin to tell you how many mispronunciations I’ve gotten for it. My planned pen name would be Midnight O. Angell. I also want my work to speak for itself and honestly I would rather not have my family know exactly what I write since they don’t approve of me writing for a living in general. Would you recommend using a pen name for this situation or would it be better if I used my actual name?

I’m leaning more towards a pen name based on this article, but the legal ramifications are a bit intimidating. Any suggestions?

Ayla, Yes, a pen name seems appropriate in this situation.

Hi, my name is Joseph Perez. I am a white guy with no Hispanic or Latino heritage. Also both names are very common. Also on the back of a book written by a white guy and seeing my picture and the name Perez would seem confusing and maybe even deceitful to the audience. Do you think I should use a psuedonym?

Joseph, if you feel it is appropriate in your circumstance, then a pen name should be used.

What if you want to use a pen name to protect sensitive family, but you feel driven to write a memoir? Would it be better to just call it fiction (even if it is not) or to use a pen name so they aren’t obviously affiliated?

Those are two excellent strategies, Indigo. Here are some more ways to stay out of trouble when writing creative nonfiction: https://writersrelief.com/blog/2009/02/creative-nonfiction-how-to-stay-out-of-trouble/

Natalie, self publishing opportunities these days include just putting a blog up and/or making a .pdf of your work available for download.

Thanks, Kristin. Natalie, keep in mind, though, that most publishers, agents and journals consider work that has been published on a blog (or anywhere online) to be previously published. And most will not consider previously published work for traditional publication.

This article was very informative! I actually decided to use a pen name and have built many social media sites up surrounding that pen name, but I’m beginning to second guess that decision. I feel like I need to say that I’m writing under a pseudonym because I oddly feel like a fraud even though pen names are normal. With that being said, even though I like my pen name, should I continue to use it without having to say that it is a pen name?

Back in the “old days” before the digitalization of all of our personal information, pen names protected authors who spoke out against the government or wrote memoirs that included confessions of unlawful activity.

Is that even a possibility it today’s age? Or, does your true name ultimately HAVE to be linked to your pen name for payment and tax purposes? I assume the government could always find out the true identity of an author if they wanted to?

Hi! I’m interested in writing books, but a main concern of mine is my name. My first name is terribly common and generic, while my last name is horrendous and everyone always asks how to pronounce it. (I don’t think anyone would want the last name “Zacherl” stuck on their book, would they?) And while I despise my name, I’m having trouble finding a pseudonym. My top favorite is Jane Redd, a mix of my middle name and nickname I’ve had for six years now. However, I searched this and there is one other author using this as a pseudonym. What should I do?

Just wondering is it possible to “co-write” with yourself.

I have a large quantity of research done for a non-fiction. However, due to my sex I believe I have hit something of a “brick-wall” if you would in finding relation with some of the people I am questioning. This isn’t interviewing, per say as we will never meet face to face; this is emailing them questions.

So “co-write”. I have a pen name I have used prior, for other work, and am thinking because it is the opposite sex and will probably relate better to the interviewees [the research I am looking at is dominated by one sex over the other].

Or would that be treading some line somewhere as there isn’t actually a co-author.

James, we would advise just using your pen name. If people believe you are co-writing with yourself, people might not take the project seriously.

Hello~ I’m kinda new to the writing scene, and I expressed my interest with my family about it. Long story short, my parents don’t approve. I decided to use “Tsumiki” as an alias since they might get upset in the future. Is that okay? -Mikan Tsumiki

Hi, I want to choose a pen name, as my name is sort of hard to spell (Sumedha Korishetti). So I wanted to use an anime character’s name for my last name of my pseudonym. Is it legal? Will I have complications? Also, the name of the character is made – up, too, but sounds really common and familiar. What should I do?

Thank you for your inquiry. We are not lawyers, so we cannot give legal advice. Our recommendation would be to consult an attorney with expertise in publishing. You may find this article helpful: https://writersrelief.com/blog/2009/02/pen-names-ii/

Hi, I want to submit my work to a contest but you must submit via email. Should I use my email address even though it consists of my full, real name (like [email protected] ) or create a new email account under my pen name? I’ve tried to think of an email name that doesn’t have either name but it seems unprofessional.

You should mention your pen name in your cover letter. Other than that, you can use your usual email address.

Let’s talk about pen names today. Not the type of pen name you adopt because you need to hide your writing career from employers

As someone with the letter ñ on her last name and a pretty generic first name I’m glad you added some information on how to use the pen name regarding copy right, contracts, and bank problems. I’ll need to get in touch with an editor or publisher and explain this slowly (I have 0 experience in that)

I’m a Surgeon and I’m writing a novel because I love writing and I want to see myself as a successful and a famous novelist. I was considering to choose a pen name, but I can’t quite come to a decision. I don’t have issues regarding privacy, but I’m not sure whether my patients would find me a good doctor after they learn that I write thriller novels when I’m not operating someone’s bad appendix. Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks.

David, I would imagine that most of your patients would (even if they don’t read thrillers) be enthralled that they knew a published author AND that he was THEIR doctor. Plus, they probably try to give you additional ideas of what you could write about.It might be an opportunity for you to broaden your practice and marketing your book by giving it away within your office, say if a current patient sends you a referral and various other ways of marketing. And I’m sure you and your colleagues would have a lot to talk about on the golf course.

Hello, Your example of the Physics professor very closely describes BOTH myself and my co-author, we are writing about some very contentious societal issues and as we are both professionals with regular jobs, we do not want to jeopardize our day to day jobs, but ironically if things work out as planned we are working on potentially 10 books in total to be written and published over time. At some point during the 10 book period we do plan to finally use our actual names. Are there any potential problems of switching back to our real names at any point in the future or is it better to keep the pen name and maybe just add a clarification on the real names within the book? ior simple stick to the pen names from start to finish?

Hi, Timi– We would suggest sticking with the pen names throughout the series to maintain continuity and to avoid confusion.

I have written an erotica short story and trying my first attempt at publication. How do you suggest I go about finding a publisher for my genre?

Hi Carla. We recommend doing an internet search for journals that publish erotica and submitting to them.

I have a question regarding online publication.

I have recently opened a page on a popular social media site, and have published a few poems there under a pseudonym. I also have a few of them on another website and under another handle/pseudonym.

I know that, in theory, I am the owner of the material I write. Can I just continue as before and stick with the (new) penname of the recently opened page? Or am I leaving myself wide open to possible future copyright infringement? Should I copyright the actual pseudonym?

Thanks for you help and advice.

Hi Danny. You can continue using the pen name you wish to write under. The US Copyright Office states: An author of a copyrighted work can use a pseudonym or pen name. A work is pseudonymous if the author is identified on copies or phonorecords of the work by a fictitious name. Nick names and other diminutive forms of legal names are not considered fictitious. Copyright does not protect pseudonyms or other names.

If a group of authors are writing under a pen name and they have to refer to themselves, do they use ‘I’ or ‘We’?

Hello, I had a few quick questions. I have an uncommon name, but I am a bit afraid of the judgement I may receive from those who know me about my poems (they are a bit silly at times, a bit personal at times, and a bit sad at times). Thus, I am thinking of using a pen name if I ever publish my poems. However before going forth, I wanted to post some on a social media page (ie. Twitter, Instagram) to get feedback and grow. I am thinking of using the pen name I would use if I published my poems. Do you think that would be a good idea? As well, is there a way to ensure that nobody copies the work that I post online (according to Canadian Law)? Thank you very much for your time and assistance.

Thank you for your comment. Showing your writing to others is a scary thing. While we are not experts in copyright law, we do advise that when you post your poetry online (regardless of whether it’s published under a pseudonym or not), most literary journals will consider your work previously published, which could severely limit your opportunities for publication. If you want feedback on your work, you could ask a trusted friend or family member to give you an honest critique. We also advise joining a writing group. You can find more information about that here: https://writersrelief.com/writing-groups-for-writers/

We hope this helps.

Hi. I just started writing a couple of years ago. I am working on a couple of things. I am currently using a pen name. I love writing but don’t want a lot of people to know it is me. I am quite and shy but have been told I have a knack for writing erotica and would love to continue using. I was looking into blogging but most of what I read states you need an author photo. How do you go about that when you want to stay unknown? Also, how does it work, if you get a book deal and have to do signings?

Hello, I am going to selfpublish under pen name but still I want to protect my copyrights. What to write in book? Like:

Author: Pen Name Copyright True Name, 2017

Author: Pen Name Copyright Pen Name, 2017 ????

Another option, but complicated, is to set up a company Pen Name LLC Author: Pen Name Copyright Pen Name LLC, 2017

I think I should register my book at copyright.gov with pen name for the autor and true name for copyrights, but do I even need this copyright.gov protection in case of publishing via amazon?

We would recommend contacting a lawyer who specializes in publishing.

I am an activist new to writing. I want to be taken seriously so I developed a pen name and character. The problem is, my character is based on some people in real life so I think this could be a legal issue.

We are not lawyers, so we cannot offer legal advice. We would recommend speaking with an attorney who specializes in publishing.

Hi! Should I include my pen name on my manuscript for a novel? So the agent can see? What I mean is like:

Real Name: (real name here)

Under The Pen Name Of: (pen name here)

On the manuscript, you would just use your pen name. Book Title by Pen Name. Your real name will be in your query letter and contact info.

I actually had an ancestor named, “Ima Hogg”. She was Ima and married a man with the last name Hogg. She took his name because it was the 1800s and anything else was not acceptable.

Hi I would like to reiterate Kitty Mocha’s query and ask if I want to use a pen name because I don’t want anyone I know to know it’s me writing, how do I protect my true identity when asked to do signings by my publisher and how do I avoid releasing a photo connecting with my writing??

These are issues that you would discuss with your publisher when the time comes.

I write new age type inspirational books, blogs as well as holistic/spiritual teachings under my legal name. I have been inspired to write fiction/fantasy with a little bit of erotica. I write through a self publishing site and would like to use a pseudonym/pen name to keep it separate from my other work and to keep my identity private others knowing I’m the one writing these books. This is all new to me. How do I go about using a pen name with this self publishing site that I use?

Hello, I have previously self-published books under a pseudonym that I no longer wish to be associated with. I only want to publish under my own name from now on, and would rather conceal my previous publications (that I wrote under the pseudonym) for the sake of privacy. Do I still have to inform a publisher or an agent I am querying about my pseudonym, especially if the books written under that pseudonym are still in the market? I am considering taking those books down if that makes my omission more ethical, but losing the royalties from those books would also be a disappointment. Regardless, I very much want to write only as myself now, and am willing to delete my previous pseudonym-written books if needed or recommended.

What do you recommend?

Please note that I do have a publishing history under my real name as well; I just wish to relinquish my history under the pseudonym.

To add to my previous question: I need to move away from my past pseudonym because I wrote erotica for an income, but now that I’ve finally written the children’s series I’ve always wanted to write, I want to do it under my real name and move away from my (checkered?) past.

Part of the reason I am hesitating to mention my former erotica pseudonym is that I’m afraid it will put off children’s publishers/agents to know that I wrote about such subject matter in the past. Are my worries justified or do people honestly not care nowadays? It is the stark difference between the children’s market and the erotica market that makes me hesitant about sharing my track record in the latter, especially when I am approaching publishers/agents in the former.

What do you think? (And yes, please do answer my previous comment as well!)

Many writers use pen names to keep separate author personas separate, including the same reason you have stated. So overall, agents and editors know and understand why you would use a pen name, and could advise you on how to handle it once you are in discussions. However, we can’t predict how individual agents and editors will react once you’ve mentioned the connection.

No matter what name you publish under if you are paid legitimately for your work, the IRS will have to get your real name from the tax forms you fill out with Amazon or any other book seller. The money gets deposited into your checking account under your real name. That is how you are covered legally. They don’t care what name your cover designer puts on the cover. The persona you present in your advertising is as much a part of what you sell as your characters are. Think it through just as thoroughly.

Lots of interesting commentary and food for thought for here, definitely. As for me …

…I divide things up this way: I put all my straight nonfiction and journalism stuff under my real name (Ralph Heibutzki), and put my various creative pursuits (artwork, music, poetry) under a pen name (well, a variation, really: Chairman Ralph).

That’s worked out fine for me, in terms of keeping both worlds separate, while carving out a distinct identity or persona, particularly for the latter side (since my surname is long, and I can’t somehow visualize that on the spine of a CD, or a record jacket).

Hi, what is the legal take on using an academic title as part of a pseudonym? Do the US, EU and Australia differ in their legal stances on the matter? Thanks.

Unfortunately, we are not lawyers, and therefore can’t offer legal advice. We recommend contacting a lawyer who works in publishing.

A reason why I’m considering having a pen name is that my own is extraordinarily plain and forgettable. The article makes note of it at the end but regarding pen names themselves, not the reason to change.

I want to use only my first name as the author for several reasons: (1) I want to title my books “Judy’s ________” in all cases. This is working out okay in lulu which asseses title. (2) It would relate me to all the books I put on Kindle. (3) My maiden name is an ethnic name that is unpronunciable and a pain to me. (4) I was not with my husband for many years and don’t want to use his name. (5) People who know I write and want to read what I write, know me as “Judy” more than either last name. Judy is not an especially familiar name these days so it wouldn’t be lumped in with Marys, for instance. What do you think? I really like this idea.

It’s not typical, but if it works for you then that’s what matters!

Thank you for another great post.

I belong to a religious community in which I’ve been known for nearly 40 years by a name other than the one my parents gave me, and wish to publish works in that field (I have 4 books in various stages of completion from “almost there” to “ha-ha-ha”)on Kindle and paperback. It’s important that my readers not associate my books with my legal name. I have formed a sole proprietorship, with a name that’s obviously not a person’s name, for tax purposes — can this entity be the copyright holder?

We are not lawyers so we cannot answer that question. We would recommend consulting an attorney with publishing industry experience.

Thanks for the insightful tips. I will use idioms, synonyms and bible verses to come up with my new pen name.

Do I need to give credit to previously published work identifying my real name if I’m republishing it under a pen name?

You should always give credit to the journals who have previously published your work, regardless of which name you published them under.

You wrote, “When filing for copyright protection for your writing, use your real name for “Copyright Claimant” and your pen name for “Name of Author.” If you do not want your legal name associated with the pen name, enter only the pen name under “Name of Author” and identify it as such (Lucy Lychuzweckio writing as Lucy Smith). Use your pen name for “Copyright Claimant” as well. However, if your copyright is held only under your pen name, you can run into legal disputes about copyright ownership—consult with an attorney.”

I want to make sure I am understanding correctly. If you write under a pen name, and would like to register a copyright using ONLY that pen name, and you do NOT want your legal name on this publicly accessible record, is your legal name entered as “copyright claimant”? Or only on the name of author but with the pseudonym as well? Say your pen name Pinkie Swear. Your legal name is Priscilla Smith. You don’t want your legal name (Priscilla Smith) to be on the resultant public record of your registered copyright. Would you fill in the blanks as: Copyright Claimant: Pinkie Swear. Name of Author: Priscilla Smith writing as Pinkie Swear. ??

One more question: if you register for a copyright on some writing, using your legal name, and later decide you want the copyright listed under a pseudonym you’ve adopted, will the Copyright Office allow such a change? Say you write a novel, you scramble to obtain a registered copyright for the work, you then choose to publish it under a pseudonym on amazon, and it is successful; you wish to revise the copyright record to reflect your pseudonym. I have tried to read the rules on copyright law, but I can only find directive for instances when someone wants to revise a registered work w/pseudonym, to now reflect their legal name — not the reverse. Any guidance appreciated.

We would recommend that you contact a lawyer with experience in the publishing industry for detailed answers to your questions

Hi there, I have a quick question. I am writing a “How to” book and would like to use my maiden name on it. My married name is m legal name. Do I need to follow a process to do that? Would that complicate sales? Where can I get that information. I am planning to self publish. Thanks a Lot!

Your maiden name would be treated as your pen name.

I didn’t see it as a reason, but wanted to ask because it’s similar to the “author already has your name” one, but not quite the same. I have a name that I share with at least 3 people who have made the news (one famous singer, though spelled slightly differently, one Playboy bunny, and one basketball star who made the news when she unfortunately passed away). I’ve never been able to get a URL or email address or social media page with my name on it, because yay, famous people. I thought about going by my first and middle name, but those are taken too (one homophone with a famous singer [just my luck!], and the .com with my actual spelling is taken – pretty sure the social media sites are as well, but I haven’t checked in a few years). I tried my middle and last, and that was taken too. I’m getting ready to start the agent-finding process and was thinking about getting a pen name so that I can develop an identity as an author, and not as an “Oh like the singer? Cool!” I looked up a couple domain names to check availability and found a couple I like, but one (my favorite, of course) is similar to an actress in another country – should I avoid that one, or is it okay since I’m in a different country doing something not acting?

Whatever pen name you choose is ultimately up to you.

Hi, if I register my copyright under my legal name in the copyright claimant field, can I use by pen name on my work as the person who owns the copyright? Example: Real name and listed as copyright claimant Laural Jones, but pen name and copyright on work under Laural Smithfield.

We are not lawyers and are not qualified to give legal advice. We recommend speaking with a lawyer who specializes in copyright law.

Should I use my pen or legal name when joining for paid literary membership?

Contracts are entered into using one’s legal name.

This is helpful article. Alas, when I chose my pen name, a play on my real first name and a nod to my horseback riding years, I hadn’t read your article. After guest-posting my serialized story under my pen name, (over 20 posts) I have discovered that online my pen name is attached to a well-promoted porn star. Oops.

Hi, I’m planning to try my hand at writing a novel under a pen name. My reason is that it’s going to be quite heavily based on my own life and expose a few dark-to-murky secrets of several characters from my past, all under fictitious names, of course. But I’m sure some of the people involved will be able to recognize themselves by personal details.

I’m a well-respected, married member of a squeaky-clean community and a mother of a teen. Concealing my identity is the only way I would dare publish this book.

Having never published any writing and having no business experience, I am a bit concerned about the legal and financial complications of using a noms de plume. Do you think it’s still justified in my case?

Hi Polaris,

You may find this article of interest: https://writersrelief.com/2019/10/18/4-things-you-should-know-when-writing-a-character-based-on-an-actual-person-writers-relief/

Hey, so I want to write under a pen name because I want my writing to be judged for what it is, with no judgment to ethnicity, religion or anything else. I know the common way of taking a pen name is to use another name of a person (fictional or real), but I want to go by Red Panda. Do you think it is a good idea?

If that pen name feels right to you, go for it!

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[7 Book Title Ideas] How To Name Your Fiction Novel

by Nicole C. W. | 10 Jul 2022 | Self-Publishing

Whether you’ve finished writing a book or just getting started, you must have spent some time deciding on your book title.

Well, fret not. I encountered the same problem as you: I can’t decide on the book title. In fact, I’ve listed down numerous book titles before deciding on one.

If you’ve been in the same situation as me or simply have trouble naming your fiction books, here are some book title ideas and bonus tips~

Disclosure: Some of the links below are affiliate links. I will earn a small commission, at no extra cost to you, if you purchase through these links. Your support encourages me to continue blogging and help with the costs of hosting this site. Thank you!

Table Of Contents

Purposes Of Book Titles

Before we check out naming tips for fiction books, let’s bear in mind the goals of book titles.

Book titles serve a variety of purposes

• Intrigue people so they’ll pick up the book & read the blurb
• Communicate what the book is about
• Convey the book genre

Simply put, your fiction book title needs to be attention-grabbing, memorable and informative .

Bear this in mind when shortlisting and deciding on your book title.

Photo by uroburos on Pixabay

1. Your Protagonist

First, you can name your books based on your protagonist.

Think “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone”, “Jane Eyre” and “Frankenstein”.

By naming your books after your protagonist, you’re making your protagonist the focal point of the story. This makes sense, especially if you’re writing a character-driven story where characters are the force driving the plot forward.

Such titles also work for stories that highlight your character’s growth . Meaning that as the story progresses, your protagonist also develops. They could become more mature or wise. The key is that there is progress or change from how they were like at the beginning and at the end of your novel.

Photo by SkadiArt on Pixabay

2. Your Protagonist’s Unique Trait

Besides naming your novel directly after your protagonist’s name, you could instead highlight something special about your protagonist .

Take for example, “The Time Traveler’s Wife” and “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”.

Notice how the character names aren’t included in the book title? Instead, there’s something relatable and yet, unique in these titles. “Wife” and “Girl” are common. In fact, it could be you or just anyone on the street. But what’s intriguing is that they’re paired with “Time Traveler” and “Dragon Tattoo”. I’m sure you’re raising a brow now and getting curious about the story (cause I definitely am!).

By naming your novel based on your protagonist’s unique trait, you’re building a connection with your readers while evoking curiosity in them . Again, this brings attention to the unique trait of your protagonist.

Photo by peter_pyw on Pixabay

3. Setting: Place & Time

If setting has significant importance in your novel, you can consider naming your book after that. Setting includes the place and time or when and where your story takes place .

In “Nineteen Eighty-Four”, the book title uses a certain year in the future to show a dystopian world. Such book titles inspired by the setting work well for dystopian and utopian fiction . It hints at this unknown time and world in the future. Also, such titles work well for time travel fiction where the traveler goes to the future and past.

In “Animal Farm”, the book title is inspired by the location. This hints at the unity or how united the animals are in the farm. It also forebodes how the farm animals will rebel against their human farmer. Setting is also great because of its symbolism . “Animal Farm” symbolizes human society where the animals represent humans.

Photo by Comfreak on Pixabay

4. The Main Event

If your novel revolves around an event or incident, you can name your book after it. This works well for event-driven plots and plot-driven stories .

An example would be “The Hunger Games” where the Hunger Games are the main plot event of the novel.

Besides bringing attention to the event, a novel named after the event emphasizes how the event affects various characters . In “The Hunger Games”, there’s an emphasis on this annual contest in which tributes must fight to their death. This contest affects everyone: teenagers are afraid of being selected while parents hope that their kids aren’t selected. Katniss, the protagonist, rebels against the Capitol at the end of the novel. In this case, the event also prompts the protagonist to grow .

This event doesn’t always have to be extraordinary. It could be an ordinary event that sheds light on how it affects someone. One example would be “The Trial” which depicts Josef K.’s struggles and encounters with the invisible Law and the untouchable Court. It’s not as extreme as “The Hunger Games”. The annual contest in “The Hunger Games” doesn’t exist in reality. But “The Trial” is something that could happen to you or me. You could have been an innocent man like the protagonist who is arrested and repeatedly interrogated for a crime that is never ever explained. By naming your novel behind this event, you’re magnifying the event and prompting people to rethink how this ordinary event could make such a huge impact on someone’s life .

Therefore, for such novels, you should highlight the event as well as the impact and consequences .

Photo by InspiredImages on Pixabay

5. The Important Object

In addition to naming your book based on VIP (the very important protagonist), you can name it based on the important object.

Just think about “The Mortal Instruments”. I understand that each book title is named after a city. For example, “City of Bones” and “City of Ashes”. But the series title “The Mortal Instruments” is the one that ties all these novels together. And they revolve around these three divine items given by the Angel Raziel to Jonathan Shadowhunter, the first of the Nephilim.

By bringing attention to this important object, you demonstrate how this item can be used for good as well as bad purposes (depending on who gets their hands on it) and its special functions if any . This object could be a key or trigger to something bigger . Or it could be a symbol for something that is highly desired by the protagonist or all characters.

Photo by qimono on Pixabay

A theme is the central idea or ideas explored in the story . It could be a certain subject matter or a message within the story. You can also consider naming your book based on the theme.

Here are 2 examples. “The Unbearable Lightness of Being” revolves around the philosophical discussion of lightness versus heaviness. “Love in the Time of Cholera” illustrates love as an emotional and physical plague where lovesickness is a literal illness, a plague comparable to cholera.

By using the theme as your fiction book title, you hint at the central idea that your story will explore and also remind readers to bear this in mind when reading your book. No matter if your theme is simple or complex, using such book titles will already prompt readers to rethink this idea and make them curious about your perspective and thoughts on this idea.

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels

7. Pronouns: You, Me, Our etc.

When writing ad copy, the golden tip is to use “you” so you engage your target audience. (Trust me, I’ve worked in the marketing industry for years 😉)

Likewise, you can include pronouns in the title of your books like “Me Before You” and “The Fault in Our Stars”.

By including these pronouns like “you”, “me” and “our”, you’re closing the distance between your readers and characters . In fact, you’re pulling them in right from the book cover! This works well with first-person narrative where your protagonist is recounting events from his or her point of view. But even if you use third-person narrative, it still works. Readers will find the book title relatable because “you” and “me” could mean them. Then, as they read your novel, they’ll slowly discover who the “you” and “me” are.

Another reason why I like such book titles is that it closes the distance between the protagonist and characters . “Our” refers to Hazel and Gus in “The Fault in Our Stars”. And the story focuses on the love, friendship and support between Hazel and Gus. “Our” is thus like a clue to their upcoming relationship which will get stronger as the story progresses. This is a stark contrast to “Me Before You” where there’s a separation of identities. There’s no togetherness. It also forebodes the ending where Will still intends to end his life despite his relationship with Louisa.

Photo by sweetlouise on Pexels

Bonus Tip: Think About Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

As a digital marketing specialist and a blogger, I do read up and research about Search Engine Optimization (SEO). I think it’s a good idea to think about SEO when crafting your fiction book title.

Okay, this might come as a surprise, especially when SEO seems more suitable for non-fiction book titles. However, SEO also has benefits for fiction books.

Firstly, it allows people to easily find your book . Let’s imagine when people search for “romance books” on Amazon, your book might appear on the first page of Amazon’s search results because you included “A Small Town Love Story” somewhere in your book title.

But more importantly, it’s for the sake of readability . If you spent a lot of time on worldbuilding and included made-up invented words in your book title, most readers wouldn’t understand what those words mean and might actually choose to not even take the book off the shelf to look at the blurb. Therefore, it’s better to include at least a few familiar terms. For example, you could include genre-related words in your title.

In my case, Asphodelus is the name of the ghost school in the fictional world I created. However, readers who have not read the book or blurb will not know this. Hence, I added “School For Ghosts” in the book title so readers know what Asphodelus is. Plus, if they search “ghost school books” on Amazon, hopefully my book will appear on the first page due to SEO.

Photo by janjf93 on Pixabay

Bonus Tip: No Maximum Or Minimum Word Count

Bear in mind that there are no hard and fast rules. Your book title can be a one-word title or include many words (although non-fiction books are likely to have longer titles due to subtitles for SEO).

Think “It” and “No Matter How Much You Promise to Cook or Pay the Rent You Blew It Cauze Bill Bailey Ain’t Never Coming Home Again”.

What matters is whether you as the author like the book title. But of course, you can always ask fellow authors and readers how they feel about your book title. Or even better, you can list a few book titles and ask them which title they prefer and why.

Photo by Studio 7042 on Pexels

Bonus Tip: Brainstorm & Shortlist Book Titles

Just list down all the book titles you’ve thought of . Even if they’re book titles that suddenly popped up when you’re showering (this happens to me quite often 😅).

From this list, you might notice a pattern or trend . Perhaps, there’s a word that appears frequently. You can then consider including this in your book title.

Next, shortlist those that you like (you can bold or change them to a different color). Read them aloud. How does the book title sound? Does it roll off your tongue?

You might be able to choose one from the list and decide on the book title. But as mentioned earlier, if you’re still unsure, you can ask for opinions from authors and readers . Find out why they prefer certain book titles from the list, how they feel about the book titles and what they imagined the book to be like from the title. From their replies, you might have a better idea of which book title is more suitable.

Photo by TeroVesalainen on Pixabay

Bonus Tip: Take A Break & Revisit Later

And one last tip, you can always take a break and revisit later.

As a writer, I understand what it’s like during writer’s block. During such times when you don’t know what to write, it’s recommended to just walk away and do something else then return to your manuscript again.

Likewise, if you can’t think of suitable book titles or can’t decide on one, you can always take a break and revisit later. This break gives you time to recharge and refresh your mind . This way, you can figure it out more easily.

Photo by Kaylah Otto on Unsplash

Now It’s Your Turn

How do you name your fiction books? Do you have any tips for fellow authors?

Do consider getting novel planning worksheets.  Etsy  has many such printables, including word count trackers, novel outlines, character profiles, worldbuilding basics and more.

For more book publishing and marketing tips, consider joining classes like  How To Write And Publish An eBook  and  Sell Your First 1000 Books . Or watch streaming broadcasts of  free online classes at CreativeLive !

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I’m Nicole, a fantasy and paranormal author who blogs about starting an online business, marketing your brand/products/services and self-publishing books.

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How to Write a Novel (Without Fail): The Ultimate 20-Step Guide

by Joe Bunting | 0 comments

What if you could learn how to write a novel without fail? What if you had a process so foolproof, you knew you would finish no matter what writer's block throws at you? The zombie apocalypse could finally strike and you’d still face the blank page to finish your novel.

Every day I talk to writers who don’t know how to write a novel. They worry they don’t have what it takes, and honestly, they’re right to worry.

Writing a novel, especially for the first time, is hard work, and the desk drawers and hard drives of many a great writer are filled with the skeletons of incomplete and failed books.

The good news is you don't have to be one of those failed writers.

You can be a writer that writes to the end.

You can be the kind of writer who masters how to write a novel.

Table of Contents

Looking for something specific? Jump straight to it here:

1. Get a great idea 2. Write your idea as a premise 3. Set a deadline 4. Set smaller deadlines building to the final deadline 5. Create a consequence 6. Strive for “good enough” and embrace imperfection 7. Figure out what kind of story you’re trying to tell 8. Read novels and watch films that are similar to yours 9. Structure, structure, structure! 10. Find the climactic moment in your novel 11. Consider the conventions 12. Set your intention 13. Picture your reader 14. Build your team 15. Plan the publishing process 16. Write (with low expectations) 17. Trust the process and don’t quit 118. Keep going, even when it hurts 19. Finish Draft One . . . then onward to the next 20. Draft 2, 3, 4, 5 Writers’ Best Tips on How to Write a Novel FAQ

My Journey to Learn How to Write a Novel

My name is Joe Bunting .

I used to worry I would never write a novel. Growing up, I dreamed about becoming a great novelist, writing books like the ones I loved to read. I had even tried writing novels, but I failed again and again.

So I decided to study creative writing in college. I wrote poems and short stories. I read books on writing. I earned an expensive degree.

But still, I didn’t know how to write a novel.

After college I started blogging, which led to a few gigs at a local newspaper and then a national magazine. I got a chance to ghostwrite a nonfiction book (and get paid for it!). I became a full-time, professional writer.

But even after writing a few books, I worried I didn’t have what it takes to write a novel. Novels just seemed different, harder somehow. No writing advice seemed to make it less daunting. 

Maybe it was because they were so precious to me, but while writing a nonfiction book no longer intimidated me—writing a novel terrified me.

Write a novel? I didn’t know how to do it.

Until, one year later, I decided it was time. I needed to stop stalling and finally take on the process.

I crafted a plan to finish a novel using everything I’d ever learned about the book writing process. Every trick, hack, and technique I knew.

And the process worked.

I finished my novel in 100 days.

Today, I’m a Wall Street Journal bestselling author of thirteen books, and I'm passionate about teaching writers how to write and finish their books. (FINISH being the key word here.)

I’ve taught this process to hundreds of other writers who have used it to draft and complete their novels.

And today, I'm going to teach my “how to write a novel” process to you, too. In twenty manageable steps !

As I do this, I’ll share the single best novel writing tips from thirty-seven other fiction writers that you can use in your novel writing journey—

All of which is now compiled and constructed into The Write Planner : our tangible planning guide for writers that gives you this entire process in a clear, actionable, and manageable way.

If you’ve ever felt discouraged about not finishing your novel, like I did, or afraid that you don’t have what it takes to build a writing career, I’m here to tell you that you can.

There's a way to make your writing easier.

Smarter, even.

You just need to have the “write” process.

How to Write a Novel: The Foolproof, 20-Step Plan

Below, I’m going to share a foolproof process that anyone can use to write a novel, the same process I used to write my novels and books, and that hundreds of other writers have used to finish their novels too.

1. Get a Great Idea

Maybe you have a novel idea already. Maybe you have twenty ideas.

If you do, that’s awesome. Now, do this for me: Pat yourself on the back, and then forget any feeling of joy or accomplishment you have.

Here’s the thing: an idea alone, even a great idea, is just the first baby step in writing your book. There are nineteen more steps, and almost all of them are more difficult than coming up with your initial idea.

I love what George R.R. Martin said:

“Ideas are useless. Execution is everything.”

You have an idea. Now learn how to execute, starting with step two.

(And if you don’t have a novel idea yet, here’s a list of 100 story ideas that will help, or you can view our genre specific lists here: sci-fi ideas , thriller ideas , mystery ideas , romance ideas , and fantasy ideas . You can also look at the Ten Best Novel Ideas here . Check those out, then choose an idea or make up one of your own, When you're ready, come back for step two.)

2. Write Your Idea As a Premise

Now that you have a novel idea , write it out as a single-sentence premise.

What is a premise, and why do you need one?

A premise distills your novel idea down to a single sentence. This sentence will guide your entire writing and publishing process from beginning to end. It hooks the reader and captures the high stakes (and other major details) that advance and challenge the protagonist and plot.

It can also be a bit like an elevator pitch for your book. If someone asks you what your novel is about, you can share your premise to explain your story—you don't need a lengthy description.

Also, a premise is the most important part of a query letter or book proposal, so a good premise can actually help you get published.

What’s an example of a novel premise ?

Here’s an example from The Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum:

A young girl is swept away to a magical land by a tornado and must embark on a quest to see the wizard who can help her return home.

Do you see the hooks? Young girl, magical land, embark on a quest (to see the wizard)—and don't forget her goal to return home.

This premise example very clearly contains the three elements every premise needs in order to stand out:

• A protagonist described in two words, e.g. a young girl or a world-weary witch.
• A goal. What the protagonist wants or needs.
• A situation or crisis the protagonist must face.

Ready to write your premise? We have a free worksheet that will guide you through writing a publishable premise: Download the worksheet here.

3. Set a Deadline

Before you do anything else, you need to set a deadline for when you’re going to finish the first draft of your novel.

Stephen King said a first draft should be written in no more than a season, so ninety days. National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo, exists to encourage people to write a book in just thirty days.

In our 100 Day Book Program, we give people a little longer than that, 100 days, which seems like a good length of time for most people (me included!).

I recommend setting your deadline no longer than four months. If it’s longer than that, you’ll procrastinate. A good length of time to write a book is something that makes you a little nervous, but not outright terrified.

Mark the deadline date in your calendar, kneel on the floor, close your eyes, and make a vow to yourself and your book idea that you will write the first draft novel by then, no matter what.

4. Set Smaller Deadlines Building to the Final Deadline

A novel can’t be written in a day. There’s no way to “cram” for a novel. The key to writing (and finishing) a novel is to make a little progress every day.

If you write a thousand words a day, something most people are capable of doing in an hour or two, for 100 days , by the end you’ll have a 100,000 word novel—which is a pretty long novel!

So set smaller, weekly deadlines that break up your book into pieces. I recommend trying to write 5,000 to 6,000 words per week by each Friday or Sunday, whichever works best for you. Your writing routine can be as flexible as you like, as long as you are hitting those smaller deadlines. 

If you can hit all of your weekly deadlines, you know you’ll make your final deadline at the end.

As long as you hold yourself accountable to your smaller, feasible, and prioritized writing benchmarks.

5. Create a Consequence

You might think, “Setting a deadline is fine, but how do I actually hit my deadline?” Here’s a secret I learned from my friend Tim Grahl :

You need to create a consequence.

Try by taking these steps:

• Set your deadline.
• Write a check to an organization or nonprofit you hate (I did this during the 2016 U.S. presidential election by writing a check to the campaign of the candidate I liked least, whom shall remain nameless).
• Think of two other, minor consequences (like giving up your favorite TV show for a month or having to buy ice cream for everyone at work).
• Give your check, plus your list of two minor consequences, to a friend you trust with firm instructions to hold you to your consequences if you don’t meet your deadlines.
• If you miss one of your weekly deadlines, suffer one of your minor consequences (e.g. give up your favorite TV show).
• If you miss THREE weekly deadlines OR if you miss the final deadline, send your check to that organization you hate.
• Finally, write! I promise that if you complete steps one through six, you'll be incredibly focused.

When I took these steps while writing my seventh book, I finished it in sixty-three days. Sixty-three days!

It was the most focused I’ve ever been in my life.

Writing a book is hard work. Setting reasonable consequences make it harder to NOT finish than to finish.

Watch me walk a Wattpad famous writer through this process:

6. Strive for “Good Enough” and Embrace Imperfection

The next few points are all about how to write a good story.

The reason we set a deadline before we consider how to write a story that stands out is because we could spend our entire lives learning how write a great story, but never actually write the actual story (and it’s in the writing process that you learn how to make your story great).

So learn how to make it great between writing sessions, but only good enough for the draft you’re currently writing. If you focus too much on this, it will ruin everything and you’ll never finish.

Writing a perfect novel, a novel like the one you have in your imagination, is an exercise in futility.

First drafts are inevitably horrible. Second drafts are a little better. Third drafts are better still.

But I'd bet none of these drafts approach the perfection that you built up in your head when you first considered your novel idea.

And yet, even if you know that, you’ll still try to write a perfect novel.

So remind yourself constantly, “This first draft doesn’t have to be perfect. It just has to be good enough for now.”

And good enough for now, when you’re starting your first draft, just means you have words on a page that faintly resemble a story.

Writing is an iterative process. The purpose of your first draft is to have something you can improve in your second draft. Don’t overthink. Just do. (I’ll remind you of this later, in case you forget, and if you’re like me, you probably will.)

Ready to look at what makes a good story? Let’s jump into the next few points—but don’t forget your goal: to get your whole book, the complete story, on the page, no matter how messy your first draft reads.

7. Figure Out What Kind of Story You’re Trying to Tell

Now that you have a deadline, you can start to think more deeply about what your protagonist really wants.

A good story focuses primarily on just one core thing that the protagonist wants or needs, and the place where your protagonist’s want or need meets the reader’s expectations dictates your story's genre.

Plot type is a big subject, and for the purposes of this post, we don’t have time to fully explore it (check out my book The Write Structure here ).

But story type is about more than what shelf your book sits on at the bookstore.

The book type gets to the heart, the foundational values, of what your story is about. In my book The Write Structure , I define ten plot types, which correspond to six value scales. I’ll give an abbreviated version below:

External Values (What Your Protagonist Wants)

• Life vs. Death: Action, Adventure
• Life vs. a Fate Worse Than Death: Horror, Thriller, Mystery
• Love vs. Hate: Love, Romance
• Esteem: Performance, Sports

Internal Values (What Your Protagonist Needs)

Internal plot types work slightly different than external plot types. These are essential for your character's transformation from page one to the end and deal with either a character's shift in their black-and-white view, a character's moral compass, or a character's rise or fall in social status.

For more, check out The Write Structure .

The most common internal plot types are bulleted quickly below.

• Maturity/Sophistication vs. Immaturity/Naiveté: Coming of Age
• Good/Sacrifice vs. Evil/Selfishness: Morality, Temptation/Testing

Choosing Your External and Internal Plot Types Will Set You Up for Success

You can mix and match these genres to some extent. For your book to be commercially successful, you must have an external genre.

For your book to be considered more “character driven”—or a story that connects with the reader on a universal level—you should have an internal genre, too. (I highly recommend having both.)

You can also have a subplot. So that’s three genres that you can potentially incorporate into your novel.

For example, you might have an action plot with a love story subplot and a worldview education internal genre. Or a horror plot with a love story subplot and a morality internal genre. There’s a lot of room to maneuver.

Regardless of what you choose, the balance of the three will give your protagonist plenty of obstacles to face as they strive to achieve their goal from beginning to end. (For best results when you go to publish, though, make sure you have an external genre.)

If you want to have solid preparation to write you book, I highly recommend grabbing a copy of The Write Structure .

What two or three values are foundational to your story? Spend some time brainstorming what your book is really about. Even better, use our Write Structure worksheet to get to the heart of your story type.

8. Read Novels and Watch Films That Are Similar to Yours

“The hard truth is that books are made from books.”

I like to remember this quote from Cormac McCarthy when considering what my next novel is really about.

Now that you’ve thought about your novel's plot, it’s time to see how other great writers have pulled off the impossible and crafted a great story from the glimmer of an idea.

You might think, “My story is completely unique. There are no other stories similar to mine.”

If that’s you, then one small word of warning. If there are no books that are similar to yours, maybe there’s a reason for that.

Personally, I’ve read a lot of great books that were a lot of fun to read and were similar to other books. I’ve also read a lot of bad books that were completely unique.

Even precious, unique snowflakes look more or less like other snowflakes.

If you found your content genre in step three, select three to five novels and films that are in the same genre as yours and study them.

Don’t read/watch for pleasure. Instead, try to figure out the conventions, key scenes, and the way the author/filmmaker moves you through the story.

There's great strength in understanding how your story is the same but different.

9. STRUCTURE, STRUCTURE, STRUCTURE!

Those were the three words my college screenwriting professor, a successful Hollywood TV producer, wrote across the blackboard nearly every class. Your creative process doesn't matter without structure.

You can be a pantser , someone who writes by the seat of their pants.

You can be a plotter , someone who needs to have a detailed outline for each of the plot points in their novel.

You can even be a plantser , somewhere in between the two (like most writers, including me).

It doesn’t matter. You still have to know your story structure .

Here are a few important structural elements you’ll want to figure out for your novel before moving forward:

6 Key Moments of Story Structure

There are six required moments in every story, scene, and act. They are:

• Exposition : Introducing the world and the characters.
• Inciting incident : There’s a problem.
• Rising Action/Progressive complications : The problem gets worse, usually due to external conflict.
• Dilemma : The problem gets so bad that the character has no choice but to deal with it. Usually this happens off screen.
• Climax : The character makes their choice and the climax is the action that follows.
• Denouement : The problem is resolved (for now at least).

If you're unfamiliar with these terms, I recommend studying each of them, especially dilemma, which we'll talk about more in a moment. Mastering these will be a huge aid to your writing process.

For your first few scenes, try plotting out each of these six moments, focusing especially on the dilemma.

Better yet, download our story structure worksheet to guide you through the story structure process, from crafting your initial idea through to writing the synopsis.

I've included some more detailed thoughts (and must-knows) about structure briefly below:

Three Act Structure

The classic writing advice describes the three act structure well:

In the first act, put your character up a tree. In the second act, throw rocks at them. In the third act, bring them down.

Do you wonder whether you should use three act structure or five act structure? (Hint: you probably don't want to use the five act structure. Learn more about this type with our full guide on the five act structure here .)

Note that each of these acts should have the six key moments listed above.

The Dilemma

I mentioned the importance of a character undergoing a crisis, but it bears repeating since, for me, it completely transformed my writing process.

In every act, your protagonist must face an impossible choice. It is THIS choice that creates drama in your story. THIS is how your plot moves forward. If you don’t have a dilemma, if your character doesn’t choose, your scenes won’t work, nor will your acts or story.

In my writing, when I’m working on a first draft, I don’t focus on figuring out all five key moments every time (since I’ve internalized them by now), but I do try to figure out the crisis before I start writing .

I begin with that end in mind, and figure out how I can put the protagonist into a situation where they must make a difficult choice.

One that will have consequences even if they decide to do nothing.

When you do that, your scene works. When you don’t, it falls flat. The protagonist looks like a weak-willed observer of their own life, and ultimately your story will feel boring. Effective character development requires difficult choices.

Find the dilemma every time.

Write out a brief three-act outline with each of the six key moments for each act. It’s okay to leave those moments blank if you don’t know them right now. Fill in what you do know, and come back to it.

Point of View

Point of view, or POV, in a story refers to the narrator’s position in the description of events. There are four types of point of view, but there are only two main options used by most writers:

• Third-person limited point of view is the most common and easiest to use, especially for new writers. In this POV, the characters are referred to in third person (he/she/they) and the narrator has access to the thoughts and feelings to a maximum of one character at a time (and likely one character for the duration of the narrative). You can read more about how to use third-person limited here .
• First-person point of view is also very common and only slightly more difficult. In this POV, the narrator is a character in the story and uses first person pronouns (I/me/mine/we/ours) and has access only to their own thoughts and feelings. This point of view requires an especially strong style, one that shows the narrator's distinct attitude and voice as they tell the story.

The third option is used much less common, though is still found occasionally, especially in older works:

• Third-person omniscient point of view is much more difficult to pull off well and isn't recommended for first time authors. In this POV, the characters are referred to in third-person (he/she/him/her/they/them), but the narrator has access to the thoughts and feelings of any and all characters at the same time. This is a difficult narrative to pull off because of how disorienting it can be for the reader. Readers are placed “in the heads” of so many characters, which can easily destroy the drama of a story because of the lack of mystery.

One final option:

• Second-person point of view is the most difficult to pull off and isn't recommended for most authors. In this POV, the characters are referred to in second person (you/your). This choice is rarely (although not never) found in novels.

Get The Write Structure here »

10. Find the Climactic Moment in Your Novel

Every great novel has a climactic moment that the whole story builds up to—it's the whole reason a reader purchases a book and reads it to the end.

In Moby Dick , it’s the final showdown with the white whale.

In Pride and Prejudice , it’s Lizzie accepting Mr. Darcy’s proposal after discovering the lengths he went to in order to save her family.

In the final Harry Potter novel (spoiler alert!), it’s Harry offering himself up as a sacrifice to Voldemort to destroy the final Horcrux.

To be clear, you don’t have to have your climactic moment all planned out before you start writing your book . (Although knowing this might make writing and finishing your novel easier and more focused.)

But it IS a good idea to know what novels and films similar to yours have done.

For example, if you’re writing a performance story about a violinist, as I am, you need to have some kind of big violin competition at the end of your book.

If you’re writing a police procedural crime novel, you need to have a scene where the detective unmasks the murderer and explains the rationale behind the murder.

Think about the climactic moment your novel builds up before the final showdown at the end. This climactic moment will usually occur in the climax of the second or third act.

If you know this, fill in your outline with the climactic moment, then write out the five key moments of the scene for that moment.

If you don’t know them, just leave them blank. You can always come back to it.

11. Consider the Conventions

Readers are sophisticated. They’ve been taking in stories for years, since they were children, and they have deep expectations for what should be in your story.

That means if you want readers to like your story, you need to meet and even exceed some of those expectations.

Stories do this constantly. We call them conventions, or tropes, and they’re patterns that storytellers throughout history have found make for a good story.

In the romantic comedy (love) genre, for example, there is almost always the sidekick best friend, some kind of love triangle, and a meet cute moment where the two potential lovers meet.

In the mystery genre, the story always begins with a murder, there are one or more red herrings , and there’s a final unveiling of the murder at the end.

Think through the three to five novels and films you read/watched. What conventions and tropes did they have in common?

12. Set Your Intention

You’re almost ready to start writing. Before you do, set your intention.

Researchers have found that when you’re trying to create a new habit, if you imagine where and when you will participate in that habit, you’re far more likely to follow through.

For your writing, imagine where, when, and how much you will write each day. For example, you might imagine that you will write 1,000 words at your favorite coffee shop each afternoon during your lunch break.

As you imagine, picture your location and the writing space clearly in your mind. Watch yourself sitting down to work, typing on your laptop. Imagine your word count tracker going from 999 to 1,002 words.

When it’s time to write , you’ll be ready to go do it.

13. Picture Your Reader

The definition of a story is a narrative meant to entertain, amuse, or instruct. That implies there is someone being entertained, amused, or instructed!

I think it’s helpful to picture one person in your mind as you write (instead of an entire target audience). Then, as you write, you can better understand what would interest, amuse, or instruct them.

By picturing them, you will end up writing better stories.

Create a reader avatar.

Choose someone you know, or make up someone who would love your story. Describe them in terms of demographics and interests. Consider the question, “Why would this reader love my novel?”

When you write, write for them.

14. Build Your Team

Most people think they can write a novel on their own, that they need to stick themselves in some cabin in upstate New York or an attic apartment in Paris and just focus on writing their novel for a few months or decades.

And that’s why most people fail to finish writing a book .

As I’ve studied the lives of great writers, I’ve found that they all had a team. None of them did it all on their own. They all had people who supported and encouraged them as they wrote.

A team can look like:

• An editor with a publishing house
• A writing group
• An author mentor or coach
• An online writing course or community

Whatever you find, if you want to finish your novel, don’t make the mistake of believing you can do it all on your own (or that you have to do it on your own).

Find a writing group. Take an online writing class . Or hire a developmental editor .

Whatever you do, don’t keep trying to do everything by yourself.

15. Plan the Publishing Process

One thing I’ve found is that when successful people take on a task, they think through every part of the process from beginning to end. They create a plan. Their plan might change, but starting with a plan gives them clear focus for what they’re setting out to accomplish.

Most of the steps we’ve been talking about in this post involve planning (writing is coming up next, don’t worry), but in your plan, it’s important to think through things all the way to the end—the publishing and marketing process.

So spend ten or twenty minutes dreaming about how you’ll publish your novel (self-publishing vs. traditional publishing) and how you’ll promote it (to your email list, on social media, via Amazon ads, etc.).

By brainstorming about the publishing and marketing process, you’ll make it much more likely to actually finish your novel because you're eager for (and know what you want to do when you're at) the end.

Have no idea how to get published? Check out our 10-step book publishing and launch guide here .

16. Write (With Low Expectations)

You’ve created a plan. You know what you’re going to write, when you’re going to write it, and how you’re going to write.

Now it’s time to actually write it.

Sit down at the blank page. Take a deep breath. Write your very first chapter.

Don’t forget, your first draft is supposed to be bad.

Write anyway.

17. Trust the Process and Don’t Quit

As I’ve trained writers through the novel writing process in our 100 Day Book Program, inevitably around day sixty, they tell me how hard the process is, how tired they are of their story, how they have a new idea for a novel, and they want to work on that instead.

“Don’t quit,” I tell them. Trust the process. You’re so much closer than you think.

Then, miraculously, two or three weeks later, they’re emailing me to say they’re about to finish their books. They’re so grateful they didn’t quit.

This is the process. This is how it always goes.

Just when you think you’re not going to make it, you’re almost there.

Just when you most want to quit, that’s when you’re closest to a breakthrough.

Trust the process. Don’t quit. You’re going to make it.

Just keep showing up and doing the work (and remember, doing the work means writing imperfectly).

18. Keep Going, Even When It Hurts

Appliances always break when you’re writing a book.

Someone always gets sick making writing nearly impossible (either you or your spouse or all your kids or all of the above).

One writer told us recently a high-speed car chase ended with the car crashing into a building close to her house.

I’m not superstitious, but stuff like this always happens when you’re writing a book.

Expect it. Things will not go according to plan. Major real life problems will occur.

It will be really hard to stay focused for weeks on end.

This is where it’s so important to have a team (step fourteen). When life happens, you’ll need someone to vent to, to encourage you, and to support you.

No matter what, write anyway. This is what separates you from all the aspiring writers out there. You do the work even when it’s hard.

Keep going.

19. Finish Draft One… Then Onward to the Next

I followed this process, and then one day, I realized I’d written the second to last scene. And then the next day, my novel was finished.

It felt kind of anticlimactic.

I had wanted to write a novel for years, more than a decade. I had done it. And it wasn’t as big of a deal as I thought.

Amazing, without question.

But also just normal.

After all, I had been doing this, writing every day for ninety-nine days. Finishing was just another day.

But the journey itself? 100 days for writing a novel? That was amazing.

That was worth it.

And it will be worth it again and again.

Maybe it will be like that for you. You might finish your book and feel amazing and proud and relieved. You might also feel normal. It’s the difference between being an aspiring writer and being a real writer.

Real writers realize the joy is in the work, not in having a finished book .

When you get to this point, I just want to say, “Congratulations!”

You did it.

You finished a book. I’m so excited for you!

But also, as you will know when you get to this point, this is really just the beginning of your journey.

Your book isn’t nearly ready to publish yet.

So celebrate. Throw a party for yourself. Say thank you to all your team members. You finished. You should be proud!

After this celebratory breather, move on to your last step.

20. Next Drafts: Draft Two…Three…Four…Five

This is a novel writing guide, not a novel revising guide (that is coming soon!). But I’ll give you a few pointers on what to do after you write your novel:

• Rest. Take a break. You earned it. Resting also lets you get distance on your book, which you need right now.
• Read without revising. Most people jump right into the proofreading and line editing process. This is the worst thing you could do. Instead, read your novel from beginning to end without making revisions. You can take notes, but the goal for this is to create a plan for your next draft, not fix all your typos and misplaced commas . This step will usually reveal plot holes, character inconsistencies, and other high-level problems.
• Get feedback. Then, share your book with your team: editors and fellow writers (not friends and family yet). Ask for constructive feedback, especially structural feedback, not on typos for now.
• Next, rewrite for structure. Your second draft is all about fixing the structure of your novel. Revisit steps seven through eleven for help.
• Last, polish your prose. Your third (and additional) draft(s) is for fixing typos, line editing, and making your sentences sound nice. Save this for the end, because if you polish too soon, you might have to delete a whole scene that you spent hours rewriting.

Want to know more about what to do next? Check out our guide on what to do AFTER you finish your book here .

Writers’ Best Tips on How to Write a Novel

I’ve also asked the writers I’ve coached for their single tips on how to write a novel. These are from writers in our community who have followed this process and finished novels of their own. Here are their best novel writing tips:

“Get it out of your head and onto the page, because you can’t improve what’s not been written.” Imogen Mann

“What gets scheduled, gets done. Block time in your day to write. Set a time of day, place and duration that you will write 4-7 days/week until it becomes habit. It’s most effective if it’s the same time of day, in the same place. Then set your duration to a number of minutes or a number of words: 60 minutes, 500 words, whatever. Slowly but surely, those words string together into a piece of work!” Stacey Watkins

“Honestly? And nobody paid me for this one—enroll in the 100 Day Book challenge at The Write Practice. I had been writing around in my novel for years and it wasn’t until I took the challenge did I actually write it chapter by chapter from beginning to end in 80,000 words. Of course I now have to revise, revise, revise.” Madeline Slovenz

“I try to write for at least an hour every day. Some days I feel like the creativity flows out of me and others it’s awkward and slow. But yes, my advice is to write for at least one hour every day. It really helps.” Kurt Paulsen

“Be patient, be humble, be forgiving. Patient, because writing a novel well will take longer than you ever imagined. Humble, because being awake to your strengths and your weaknesses is the only way to grow as a writer. And forgiveness, for the days when nothing seems to work. Stay the course, and the reward at the end — whenever that comes — will be priceless. Because it will be all yours.” Erin Halden

“Single best tip I can recommend is the development of a plan. My early writing, historical stories for my world, was done as a pantser. But, when I took the 100 Day Book challenge , one of the steps was to produce an outline. Mine started as the briefest list of chapters. But, as I thought about it, the outline expanded to cover what was happening and who was in it. That lead to a pattern for the chapters, a timeline, and greater detail in the outline. I had always hated outlines, but like Patrick Rothfuss said in one of his interviews, that hatred may have been because of the way it was taught when I was in school (long ago.) I know I will use one for the second book (if I decide to go forward with it.) Just remember the plan is there for your needs. It doesn’t need to be a formal I. A. 1. a. format. It can simply be a set of notecards with general ideas you want to include in your story.” Patrick Macy

“Everybody who writes does so on faith and guts and determination. Just write one line. Just write one scene. Just write one page. And if you write more that day consider yourself fortunate. The more you do, the stronger the writing muscle gets. But don’t do a project; just break things down into small manageable bits.” Joe Hanzlik

“When you’re sending your novel out to beta readers , keep in mind some people‘s feedback may not resonate or be true for your vision of the work. Also, just because you’ve handed off a copy for beta reading doesn’t mean you don’t have control over how people give you feedback. For instance, if you don’t want line editing, ask them not to give paragraph and sentence corrections. Instead, ask for more general feedback on the character arcs, particular scenes in the story, the genre, ideal reader , etc. Be proactive about getting the kind of response you want and need.” B.E. Jackson

“Become your main character. Begin to think and act the way they would.” Valda Dracopoulos

“I write for minimum 3 hours starting 4 a.m. Mind is uncluttered and fresh with ideas. Daily issues and commitment can wait. Make a plan and stick to the basic plan.” R.B. Smith

“Stick to the plan (which includes writing an outline, puttin your butt in the chair and shipping). I’m trying to keep it simple!” Carole Wolf

“Have a spot where you write, get some bum glue, sit and write. I usually have a starting point, a flexible endpoint and the middle works itself out.” Vuyo Ngcakani

“Before I begin, I write down the ten key scenes that must be in the novel. What is the thing that must happen, who is there when it happens, where does it take place. Once I have those key scenes, I begin.” Cathy Ryan

“In my English classes, I was told to ‘show, don’t tell,' which is the most vague rule I’ve ever heard when it comes to writing. Until I saw a post that expanded upon this concept saying to ‘ show emotion, tell feelings …’. Showing emotion will bring the reader closer to the characters, to understand their actions better. But I don’t need to read about how slow she was moving due to tiredness.” Bryan Coulter

“For me, it’s the interaction between all of the characters. It drives almost all of my novels no matter how good or bad the plot may be .” Jonathan Srock

“Rules don’t apply in the first draft; they only apply when you begin to play with it in the second draft.” Victor Paul Scerri

“My best advice to you is: Just Write. No matter if you are not inspired, maybe you are writing how you can’t think of something to write or wrote something that sucks. But just having words written down gets you going and soon you’ll find yourself inspired. You just have to write.” Mony Martinez

“As Joseph Campbell said, “find your bliss.” Tap into a vein of whatever it is that “fills your glass” and take a ride on a stream of happy, joyful verbiage.” Jarrett Wilson

“Show don’t tell is the most cited rule in the history of fiction writing, but if you only show, you won’t get past ch. 1. Learn to master the other forms of narration as well.” Rebecka Jäger

“We’ve all been trained jump when the phone rings, or worse, to continually check in with social media. Good work requires focus, but I’ve had to adopt some hacks to achieve it. 1) Get up an hour before the rest of the household and start writing. Don’t check email, Facebook, Instagram, anything – just start working. 2) Use a timer app, to help keep you honest. I set it for 30 minutes, then it gives me a 5-minute break (when things are really humming, I ignore the breaks altogether). During that time, I don’t allow anything to interrupt me if I can help it. 3) Finally, set a 3-tiered word count goal: Good, Great, Amazing. Good is the number of words you need to generate in order to feel like you’ve accomplished something (1000 words, for example). Great would be a higher number, (say, 2000 words). 3000 words could be Amazing. What I love about this strategy is that it’s forgiving and inspiring at the same time.” Dave Strand

“My advice comes in two parts. First, I think it’s important to breathe life into characters, to give them emotions and personalities and quirks. Make them flawed so that they have plenty of room to grow. Make them feel real to the reader, so when they overcome the obstacles you throw in their way, or they don’t overcome them, the reader feels all the more connected and invested in their journey. Second, I think there’s just something so magical about a scene that transports me, as a reader, to the characters’ world; that allows me to see, feel, smell, and touch what the characters are experiencing. So, the second part of my advice is to describe the character’s experience of their surroundings keeping all of their senses in mind. Don’t stop simply with what they see.” Jennifer Baker

“Start with an outline (it can always be changed), set writing goals and stick to them, write every day, know that your first draft is going to suck and embrace that knowledge, and seek honest feedback. Oh, and celebrate milestones, especially when you type ‘The End’. Take a break from your novel (but don’t stop writing something — short stories, blog posts, articles, etc.) and then dive head-first into draft 2!” Jen Horgan O’Rourke

“I write in fits and spurts of inspiration and insights. Much of my ‘writing’ occurs when I am trying to fall asleep at night or weeding in the garden. I carry my stories and essays in my head, and when I sit down to start writing, I don’t like to ‘turn off the tap.’ My most important principle is that when I write a draft, I put it out of my mind for a few days before coming back to see what it sounds like when I read it aloud.” Gayle Woodson

“My stories almost always start from a single image… someone in a situation, a setting, with or without other people… there is a problem to be solved, a decision to make, some action being taken. Often that first image becomes the central point of the story but sometimes it is simply the kick-off point for something else. Once I’ve ‘seen’ my image clearly I sit down at the computer and start writing. More images appear as I write and the story evolves. Once the rough sketch has developed through a few chapters I may go back and fill in holes and round things out. Sometimes I even sketch a rough map of my setting or the ‘world’ I’m building. With first drafts I never worry about the grammatical and other writing ‘rules.’ Those things get ironed out in the second round.” Karin Weiss

“What it took to get my first novel drafted: the outline of a story idea, sitting in chair, DEADLINES, helpful feedback from the beginning so I could learn along the way.” Joan Cory

“I write a chapter in longhand and then later that day or the next morning type it and revise. The ideas seem to flow from mind to finger to pen to paper.” Al Rutgers

“Getting up early and write for a couple of hours from 6 am is my preferred choice as my mind is uncluttered with daily issues. Stick to the basic plan and learning to ‘show’ and ‘not tell’ has been hard but very beneficial.” Abe Tse

If you're ready to get serious about finishing your novel, I love for you to join us!

And if you want help getting organized and going, I greatly recommend purchasing The Write Planner and/or our 100 Day Book Program .

Frequently Asked Questions

If you're working on your first-ever novel, congratulations! Here are answers to frequently asked questions new (and even experienced) writers often ask me about what it takes to write a book.

How long should a novel be?

First, novel manuscripts are measured in words, not pages. A standard length for a novel is 85,000 words. The sweet number for literary agents is 90,000 words. Science fiction and fantasy tend to be around the 100,000 word range. And mystery and YA tend to be shorter, likely 65,000 words.

Over 120,000 words is usually too long, especially for traditional publishing. Under 60,000 words is a bit short, and might feel incomplete to the reader.

Of course, these are guidelines, not rules.

They exist for a reason, but that doesn’t mean you have to follow them if you have a good reason. For a more complete guide to best word count for novels, check out my guide here .

How long does it take to write a novel?

Each draft can take about the same amount of time as the first draft, or about 100 days. I recommend writing at least three drafts with a few breaks between drafts, which means you can have a finished, published novel in a little less than a year using this process.

Many people have finished novels faster. My friend and bestseller Carlos Cooper finishes four novels a year, and another bestselling author friend Stacy Claflin is working on her sixty-second book (and she’s not close to being sixty-two years old).

If you'd like, you can write faster.

If you take longer breaks between drafts or write more drafts, it might take longer.

Whatever you decide, I don’t recommend taking much longer than 100 days to finish your first draft. After that, you can lose your momentum and it becomes much harder to finish.

That’s It! The Foolproof Template for How to Write a Novel

Writing a novel isn’t easy. But it is possible with the write process (sorry, I had to do it). If you follow each step above, you will finish a novel.

Your novel may not be perfect, but it will be what you need on your road to making it great.

Good luck and happy writing!

Discover The Write Plan Planner »

Which steps of this process do you follow? Which steps are new or challenging for you? Let us know in the comments !

Writing your novel idea in the form of a single-sentence premise is the first step to finishing your novel . So let’s do that today!

Download our premise worksheet. Follow it to construct your single sentence premise.

Then post your premise  in the Pro Practice Workshop (and if you’re not a member yet, you can join here ). If you post, please be sure to leave feedback on premises by at least three other writers.

Maybe you'll start finding your writing team right here!

Happy writing!

Joe Bunting

Joe Bunting is an author and the leader of The Write Practice community. He is also the author of the new book Crowdsourcing Paris , a real life adventure story set in France. It was a #1 New Release on Amazon. Follow him on Instagram (@jhbunting).

Want best-seller coaching? Book Joe here.

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How to Write an Essay about a Novel – Step by Step Guide

Writing about literature used to scare the heck out of me. I really couldn’t wrap my mind around analyzing a novel. You have the story. You have the characters. But so what? I had no idea what to write.

Luckily, a brilliant professor I had as an undergrad taught me how to analyze a novel in an essay. I taught this process in the university and as a tutor for many years. It’s simple, and it works. And in this tutorial, I’ll show it to you. So, let’s go!

Writing an essay about a novel or any work of fiction is a 6-step process. Steps 1-3 are the analysis part. Steps 4-6 are the writing part.

Step 1. create a list of elements of the novel .

Ask yourself, “What are the elements of this book?”

Well, here is a list of elements present in any work of fiction, any novel:

Here is a table of literary elements along with their descriptions. 

In this step, you simply pick 3-6 elements from the list I just gave you and arrange them as bullet points. You just want to make sure you pick elements that you are most familiar or comfortable with.

For example, you can create the following list:

This is just for you to capture the possibilities of what you can write about. It’s a very simple and quick step because I already gave you a list of elements. 

Step 2. Pick 3 elements you are most comfortable with

In this step, we’ll use what I call The Power of Three . You don’t need more than three elements to write an excellent essay about a novel or a book. 

Just pick three from the list you just created with which you are most familiar or that you understand the best. These will correspond to three sections in your essay. 

If you’re an English major, you’ll be a lot more familiar with the term “metaphor” than if you major in Accounting. 

But even if you’re a Math major, you are at least probably already familiar with what a story or a character is. And you’ve probably had a takeaway or a lesson from stories you’ve read or seen on screen.

Just pick what you can relate to most readily and easily. 

For example, you can pick Characters , Symbols , and Takeaways . Great!

You Can Also Pick Examples of an Element 

Let’s say that you are really unfamiliar with most of the elements. In that case, you can just pick one and then list three examples of it.

For example, you can pick the element of Characters . And now all you need to do is choose three of the most memorable characters. You can do this with many of the elements of a novel.

You can pick three themes , such as Romance, Envy, and Adultery. 

You can pick three symbols , such as a rose, a ring, and a boat. These can represent love, marriage, and departure. 

Okay, great job picking your elements or examples of them. 

For the rest of this tutorial, I chose to write about a novel by Fedor Dostoyevskiy, The Brothers Karamazov. This will be our example. 

It is one of the greatest novels ever written. And it’s a mystery novel, too, which makes it fun. 

So now, let’s choose either three elements of this novel or three examples of an element. I find that one of the easiest ways to do this is to pick one element – Characters – and three examples of it. 

In other words, I’m picking three characters. And the entire essay will be about these three characters.

Now, you may ask, if I write only about the characters, am I really writing an essay about the novel? 

And the answer is, Yes. Because you can’t write about everything at once. You must pick something. Pick your battles. 

And by doing that, you will have plenty of opportunities to make a statement about the whole novel. Does that make sense? 

Just trust the process, and it will all become clear in the next steps. 

Let’s pick the three brothers – Alexei, Dmitriy, and Ivan. 

And don’t worry – I won’t assume that you have read the book. And I won’t spoil it for you if you’re planning to. 

So we have the three brothers. We’re ready to move on to the next step.

Step 3. Identify a relationship among these elements

In this step, you want to think about how these three elements that you picked are related to one another. 

In this particular case, the three brothers are obviously related because they are brothers. But I want you to dig deeper and see if there is perhaps a theme in the novel that may be connecting the elements.

And, yes, I am using another element – theme – just to help me think about the book. Be creative and use whatever is available to you. It just so happens that religion is a very strong theme in this novel. 

What do the three brothers have in common? 

• They have the same father.
• Each one has a romantic interest (meaning, a beloved woman).
• All three have some kind of a relationship with God. 

These are three ways in which the brothers are related to one another. All we need is one type of a relationship among them to write this essay. 

This is a religious novel, and yes, some of the characters will be linked to a form of a divinity. In this case, the religion is Christianity.

Note: there are many ways in which you can play with elements of a novel and examples of them. Here’s a detailed video I made about this process:

Let’s see if we can pick the best relationship of those we just enumerated.  

They all have the same father. 

This relationship is only factual. It is not very interesting in any way. So we move on to the next one.

They all have women they love.

Each brother has a romantic interest, to use a literary term. We can examine each of the brothers as a lover. 

Who is the most fervent lover? Who is perhaps more distant and closed? This is an interesting connecting relationship to explore. 

One of them is the most passionate about his woman, but so is another one – I won’t say who so I don’t spoil the novel for you. The third brother seems rather intellectual about his love interest. 

So, romantic interest is a good candidate for a connecting relationship. Let’s explore the next connection candidate. 

They all relate to God in one way or another. 

Let’s see if we can put the brothers’ relationships with God in some sort of an order. Well, Alexei is a monk in learning. He lives at the monastery and studies Christianity. He is the closest to God.

Dmitriy is a believer, but he is more distant from God due to his passionate affair with his woman. He loses his head many times and does things that are ungodly, according to the author. So, although he is a believer, he is more distant from God than is Alexei.

Finally, Ivan is a self-proclaimed atheist. Therefore, he is the farthest away from God.

It looks like we got ourselves a nice sequence, or progression, which we can probably use to write this essay about this novel. 

What is the sequence? The sequence is: 

Alexei is the closest to God, Dmitriy is second closest, and Ivan is pretty far away.

It looks like we have a pattern here. 

If we look at the brothers in the book and watch their emotions closely, we’ll come to the conclusion that they go from blissful to very emotionally unstable to downright miserable to the point of insanity.

Here’s the conclusion we must make: 

The closer the character’s relationship with God, the happier he is, and the farther away he is from God, the more miserable he appears to be.

Wow. This is quite a conclusion. It looks like we have just uncovered one of Dostoyevskiy’s main arguments in this novel, if not the main point he is trying to make.

Now that we’ve identified our three elements (examples) and a strong connecting relationship among them, we can move on to Step 4.

Step 4. Take a stand and write your thesis statement

Now we’re ready to formulate our thesis statement. It consists of two parts:

• Your Thesis (your main argument)
• Your Outline of Support (how you plan to support your main point)

By now, we have everything we need to write a very clear and strong thesis statement. 

First, let’s state our thesis as clearly and succinctly as possible, based on what we already know:

“In his novel Brothers Karamazov , Dostoyevskiy describes a world in which happiness is directly proportional to proximity to God. The closer to God a character is, the happier and more emotionally stable he is, and vice versa.”

See how clear this is? And most importantly, this is clear not only to the reader, but also to you as the writer. Now you know exactly what statement you will be supporting in the body of the essay. 

Are we finished with the thesis statement? Not yet. The second part consists of your supporting points. And again, we have everything we need to write it. Let’s do it.

“Alexei’s state of mind is ultimately blissful, because he is a true and observant believer. Dmitriy’s faith is upstaged by his passion for a woman, and he suffers a lot as a result. Ivan’s renunciation of God makes him the unhappiest of the brothers and eventually leads him to insanity.”

Guess what – we have just written our complete thesis statement. And it’s also our whole first paragraph. 

We are ready for Step 5. 

Step 5. Write the body of the essay

Again, just like in the previous step, you have everything you need to structure and write out the body of this essay.

How many main sections will this essay have? Because we are writing about three brothers, it only makes sense that our essay will have three main sections.

Each section may have one or more paragraphs. So, here’s an important question to consider:

How many words or pages do you have to write? 

Let’s say your teacher or professor wants you to write 2,000 words on this topic. Then, here is your strategic breakdown:

• Thesis Statement (first paragraph) = 100 words
• Conclusion (last paragraph) = 100 words
• Body of the Essay = 1,800 words

Let me show you how easy it is to subdivide the body of the essay into sections and subsections.

We already know that we have three sections. And we need 1,800 words total for the body. This leads us to 600 words per main section (meaning, per brother). 

Can we subdivide further? Yes, we can. And we should.

When discussing each of the brothers, we connect two subjects: his relationship with God AND his psychological state. That’s how we make those connections. 

So, we should simply subdivide each section of 600 words into two subsections of 300 words each. And now all we need to do is to write each part as if it were a standalone 300-word essay.

Does this make sense? See how simple and clear this is?

Writing Your Paragraphs

Writing good paragraphs is a topic for an entire article of its own. It is a science and an art.

In essence, you start your paragraph with a good lead sentence in which you make one point. Then, you provide reasons, explanations, and examples to support it. 

Here is an article I wrote on how to write great paragraphs .

Once you’ve written the body of the essay, one last step remains. 

Step 6. Add an introduction and a conclusion 

Introductions and conclusions are those little parts of an essay that your teachers and professors will want you to write. 

Introduction

In our example, we already have a full opening paragraph going. It’s our thesis statement. 

To write an introduction, all you need to do is add one or two sentences above the thesis statement. 

Here is our thesis statement:

“In his novel Brothers Karamazov, Dostoyevskiy describes a world in which happiness is directly proportional to proximity to God. The closer to God a character is, the happier and more emotionally stable he is, and vice versa. Alexei’s state of mind is ultimately blissful, because he is a true and observant believer. Dmitriy’s faith is upstaged by his passion for a woman, and he suffers a lot as a result. Ivan’s renunciation of God makes him the unhappiest of the brothers and eventually leads him to insanity.”

As you can see, it is a complete paragraph that doesn’t lack anything. But because we need to have an introduction, here is a sentence with which we can open this paragraph:

“Dostoyevskiy is a great Russian novelist who explores the theme of religion in many of his books.”

And then just proceed with the rest of the paragraph. Read this sentence followed by the thesis statement, and you see that it works great. And it took me about 30 seconds to write this introductory sentence. 

You can write conclusions in several different ways. But the most time-proven way is to simply restate your thesis. 

If you write your thesis statement the way I teach, you will have a really strong opening paragraph that can be easily reworded to craft a good conclusion. 

Here is an article I wrote (which includes a video) on how to write conclusions .

Congratulations!

You’ve made it to the end, and now you know exactly how to write an essay about a novel or any work of fiction!

Tutor Phil is an e-learning professional who helps adult learners finish their degrees by teaching them academic writing skills.

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• Knowledge Base
• How to write a literary analysis essay | A step-by-step guide

How to Write a Literary Analysis Essay | A Step-by-Step Guide

Published on January 30, 2020 by Jack Caulfield . Revised on August 14, 2023.

Literary analysis means closely studying a text, interpreting its meanings, and exploring why the author made certain choices. It can be applied to novels, short stories, plays, poems, or any other form of literary writing.

A literary analysis essay is not a rhetorical analysis , nor is it just a summary of the plot or a book review. Instead, it is a type of argumentative essay where you need to analyze elements such as the language, perspective, and structure of the text, and explain how the author uses literary devices to create effects and convey ideas.

Before beginning a literary analysis essay, it’s essential to carefully read the text and c ome up with a thesis statement to keep your essay focused. As you write, follow the standard structure of an academic essay :

• An introduction that tells the reader what your essay will focus on.
• A main body, divided into paragraphs , that builds an argument using evidence from the text.
• A conclusion that clearly states the main point that you have shown with your analysis.

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Table of contents

Step 1: reading the text and identifying literary devices, step 2: coming up with a thesis, step 3: writing a title and introduction, step 4: writing the body of the essay, step 5: writing a conclusion, other interesting articles.

The first step is to carefully read the text(s) and take initial notes. As you read, pay attention to the things that are most intriguing, surprising, or even confusing in the writing—these are things you can dig into in your analysis.

Your goal in literary analysis is not simply to explain the events described in the text, but to analyze the writing itself and discuss how the text works on a deeper level. Primarily, you’re looking out for literary devices —textual elements that writers use to convey meaning and create effects. If you’re comparing and contrasting multiple texts, you can also look for connections between different texts.

To get started with your analysis, there are several key areas that you can focus on. As you analyze each aspect of the text, try to think about how they all relate to each other. You can use highlights or notes to keep track of important passages and quotes.

Language choices

Consider what style of language the author uses. Are the sentences short and simple or more complex and poetic?

What word choices stand out as interesting or unusual? Are words used figuratively to mean something other than their literal definition? Figurative language includes things like metaphor (e.g. “her eyes were oceans”) and simile (e.g. “her eyes were like oceans”).

Also keep an eye out for imagery in the text—recurring images that create a certain atmosphere or symbolize something important. Remember that language is used in literary texts to say more than it means on the surface.

Narrative voice

Ask yourself:

• Who is telling the story?
• How are they telling it?

Is it a first-person narrator (“I”) who is personally involved in the story, or a third-person narrator who tells us about the characters from a distance?

Consider the narrator’s perspective . Is the narrator omniscient (where they know everything about all the characters and events), or do they only have partial knowledge? Are they an unreliable narrator who we are not supposed to take at face value? Authors often hint that their narrator might be giving us a distorted or dishonest version of events.

The tone of the text is also worth considering. Is the story intended to be comic, tragic, or something else? Are usually serious topics treated as funny, or vice versa ? Is the story realistic or fantastical (or somewhere in between)?

Consider how the text is structured, and how the structure relates to the story being told.

• Novels are often divided into chapters and parts.
• Poems are divided into lines, stanzas, and sometime cantos.
• Plays are divided into scenes and acts.

Think about why the author chose to divide the different parts of the text in the way they did.

There are also less formal structural elements to take into account. Does the story unfold in chronological order, or does it jump back and forth in time? Does it begin in medias res —in the middle of the action? Does the plot advance towards a clearly defined climax?

With poetry, consider how the rhyme and meter shape your understanding of the text and your impression of the tone. Try reading the poem aloud to get a sense of this.

In a play, you might consider how relationships between characters are built up through different scenes, and how the setting relates to the action. Watch out for  dramatic irony , where the audience knows some detail that the characters don’t, creating a double meaning in their words, thoughts, or actions.

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Your thesis in a literary analysis essay is the point you want to make about the text. It’s the core argument that gives your essay direction and prevents it from just being a collection of random observations about a text.

If you’re given a prompt for your essay, your thesis must answer or relate to the prompt. For example:

Essay question example

Is Franz Kafka’s “Before the Law” a religious parable?

Your thesis statement should be an answer to this question—not a simple yes or no, but a statement of why this is or isn’t the case:

Thesis statement example

Franz Kafka’s “Before the Law” is not a religious parable, but a story about bureaucratic alienation.

Sometimes you’ll be given freedom to choose your own topic; in this case, you’ll have to come up with an original thesis. Consider what stood out to you in the text; ask yourself questions about the elements that interested you, and consider how you might answer them.

Your thesis should be something arguable—that is, something that you think is true about the text, but which is not a simple matter of fact. It must be complex enough to develop through evidence and arguments across the course of your essay.

Say you’re analyzing the novel Frankenstein . You could start by asking yourself:

Your initial answer might be a surface-level description:

The character Frankenstein is portrayed negatively in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein .

However, this statement is too simple to be an interesting thesis. After reading the text and analyzing its narrative voice and structure, you can develop the answer into a more nuanced and arguable thesis statement:

Mary Shelley uses shifting narrative perspectives to portray Frankenstein in an increasingly negative light as the novel goes on. While he initially appears to be a naive but sympathetic idealist, after the creature’s narrative Frankenstein begins to resemble—even in his own telling—the thoughtlessly cruel figure the creature represents him as.

Remember that you can revise your thesis statement throughout the writing process , so it doesn’t need to be perfectly formulated at this stage. The aim is to keep you focused as you analyze the text.

Finding textual evidence

To support your thesis statement, your essay will build an argument using textual evidence —specific parts of the text that demonstrate your point. This evidence is quoted and analyzed throughout your essay to explain your argument to the reader.

It can be useful to comb through the text in search of relevant quotations before you start writing. You might not end up using everything you find, and you may have to return to the text for more evidence as you write, but collecting textual evidence from the beginning will help you to structure your arguments and assess whether they’re convincing.

To start your literary analysis paper, you’ll need two things: a good title, and an introduction.

Your title should clearly indicate what your analysis will focus on. It usually contains the name of the author and text(s) you’re analyzing. Keep it as concise and engaging as possible.

A common approach to the title is to use a relevant quote from the text, followed by a colon and then the rest of your title.

If you struggle to come up with a good title at first, don’t worry—this will be easier once you’ve begun writing the essay and have a better sense of your arguments.

“Fearful symmetry” : The violence of creation in William Blake’s “The Tyger”

The introduction

The essay introduction provides a quick overview of where your argument is going. It should include your thesis statement and a summary of the essay’s structure.

A typical structure for an introduction is to begin with a general statement about the text and author, using this to lead into your thesis statement. You might refer to a commonly held idea about the text and show how your thesis will contradict it, or zoom in on a particular device you intend to focus on.

Then you can end with a brief indication of what’s coming up in the main body of the essay. This is called signposting. It will be more elaborate in longer essays, but in a short five-paragraph essay structure, it shouldn’t be more than one sentence.

Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is often read as a crude cautionary tale about the dangers of scientific advancement unrestrained by ethical considerations. In this reading, protagonist Victor Frankenstein is a stable representation of the callous ambition of modern science throughout the novel. This essay, however, argues that far from providing a stable image of the character, Shelley uses shifting narrative perspectives to portray Frankenstein in an increasingly negative light as the novel goes on. While he initially appears to be a naive but sympathetic idealist, after the creature’s narrative Frankenstein begins to resemble—even in his own telling—the thoughtlessly cruel figure the creature represents him as. This essay begins by exploring the positive portrayal of Frankenstein in the first volume, then moves on to the creature’s perception of him, and finally discusses the third volume’s narrative shift toward viewing Frankenstein as the creature views him.

Some students prefer to write the introduction later in the process, and it’s not a bad idea. After all, you’ll have a clearer idea of the overall shape of your arguments once you’ve begun writing them!

If you do write the introduction first, you should still return to it later to make sure it lines up with what you ended up writing, and edit as necessary.

The body of your essay is everything between the introduction and conclusion. It contains your arguments and the textual evidence that supports them.

Paragraph structure

A typical structure for a high school literary analysis essay consists of five paragraphs : the three paragraphs of the body, plus the introduction and conclusion.

Each paragraph in the main body should focus on one topic. In the five-paragraph model, try to divide your argument into three main areas of analysis, all linked to your thesis. Don’t try to include everything you can think of to say about the text—only analysis that drives your argument.

In longer essays, the same principle applies on a broader scale. For example, you might have two or three sections in your main body, each with multiple paragraphs. Within these sections, you still want to begin new paragraphs at logical moments—a turn in the argument or the introduction of a new idea.

Robert’s first encounter with Gil-Martin suggests something of his sinister power. Robert feels “a sort of invisible power that drew me towards him.” He identifies the moment of their meeting as “the beginning of a series of adventures which has puzzled myself, and will puzzle the world when I am no more in it” (p. 89). Gil-Martin’s “invisible power” seems to be at work even at this distance from the moment described; before continuing the story, Robert feels compelled to anticipate at length what readers will make of his narrative after his approaching death. With this interjection, Hogg emphasizes the fatal influence Gil-Martin exercises from his first appearance.

Topic sentences

To keep your points focused, it’s important to use a topic sentence at the beginning of each paragraph.

A good topic sentence allows a reader to see at a glance what the paragraph is about. It can introduce a new line of argument and connect or contrast it with the previous paragraph. Transition words like “however” or “moreover” are useful for creating smooth transitions:

… The story’s focus, therefore, is not upon the divine revelation that may be waiting beyond the door, but upon the mundane process of aging undergone by the man as he waits.

Nevertheless, the “radiance” that appears to stream from the door is typically treated as religious symbolism.

This topic sentence signals that the paragraph will address the question of religious symbolism, while the linking word “nevertheless” points out a contrast with the previous paragraph’s conclusion.

Using textual evidence

A key part of literary analysis is backing up your arguments with relevant evidence from the text. This involves introducing quotes from the text and explaining their significance to your point.

It’s important to contextualize quotes and explain why you’re using them; they should be properly introduced and analyzed, not treated as self-explanatory:

It isn’t always necessary to use a quote. Quoting is useful when you’re discussing the author’s language, but sometimes you’ll have to refer to plot points or structural elements that can’t be captured in a short quote.

In these cases, it’s more appropriate to paraphrase or summarize parts of the text—that is, to describe the relevant part in your own words:

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The conclusion of your analysis shouldn’t introduce any new quotations or arguments. Instead, it’s about wrapping up the essay. Here, you summarize your key points and try to emphasize their significance to the reader.

A good way to approach this is to briefly summarize your key arguments, and then stress the conclusion they’ve led you to, highlighting the new perspective your thesis provides on the text as a whole:

If you want to know more about AI tools , college essays , or fallacies make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples or go directly to our tools!

• Ad hominem fallacy
• Post hoc fallacy
• Appeal to authority fallacy
• False cause fallacy
• Sunk cost fallacy

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• Choosing Essay Topic
• Write a College Essay
• Write a Diversity Essay
• College Essay Format & Structure
• Comparing and Contrasting in an Essay

 (AI) Tools

• Grammar Checker
• Paraphrasing Tool
• Text Summarizer
• AI Detector
• Plagiarism Checker
• Citation Generator

By tracing the depiction of Frankenstein through the novel’s three volumes, I have demonstrated how the narrative structure shifts our perception of the character. While the Frankenstein of the first volume is depicted as having innocent intentions, the second and third volumes—first in the creature’s accusatory voice, and then in his own voice—increasingly undermine him, causing him to appear alternately ridiculous and vindictive. Far from the one-dimensional villain he is often taken to be, the character of Frankenstein is compelling because of the dynamic narrative frame in which he is placed. In this frame, Frankenstein’s narrative self-presentation responds to the images of him we see from others’ perspectives. This conclusion sheds new light on the novel, foregrounding Shelley’s unique layering of narrative perspectives and its importance for the depiction of character.

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How to Write A Novel: A Very Complete Guide for Aspiring Authors

Writing novels is incredibly rewarding. And like most rewarding things, it can be difficult. It takes hard work, perseverance, and a whole lot of time. But if you’re ready to take the plunge or continue on your work in progress, we’ll walk you through every step.

This guide will cover each part of the process—from coming up with your initial story idea to getting feedback and revising to finally publishing your finished work. 

Whether you're participating in NaNoWriMo and need to know how to write a novel or wrapping up your fifth draft, these tips will help you bring your story to life. Let's get started!

The Prewriting: 6 Steps to Write a Book 

Some writers have an idea and dive right into getting words on the page without ever looking back. Other writers get 20,000 words in and then realize they have no idea how to write a novel. Still others like to know their plot, outline, and character or world details before they begin. 

Basically, are you a plotter or pantser? Whatever your preferred path, getting through these steps to write a book will make sure you’re in a good place to begin or to revise. 

Step 1: Come Up With a Novel Idea

Every good novel starts with a compelling premise. This could be a unique plot twist, fascinating character, or intriguing setting. Here are five ways to brainstorm your next big idea:

1. Use writing prompts: Collections of prompts or writing exercises like in The 3 A.M. Epiphany or 642 Things to Write About offer thought-provoking or playful story ideas.

2. Adapt real life: Draw inspiration from your own experiences, interests, or observations. Pull from historical or current events. Fictionalize them by changing names and places.

3. Flip genres: Take a classic story structure and give it a twist, like sci-fi Pride and Prejudice or paranormal romance Gone with the Wind.

4. Explore "what if" scenarios: Imagine how roles like time travelers, psychics, or vampires would unfold in your everyday world. Or consider how characters might crossover into each other’s worlds. For example, what if Gandalf had to solve crimes with Sherlock Holmes?

5. Study story structure: Understanding the parts of a story can help you create an engaging concept. 

Once you have an idea for your story, expand on it. Outline basic characters, settings, and potential plot points. Brainstorming early helps avoid writer's block down the line.

Step 2: Choose the Right Genre 

After you have a premise, choose the fiction genre you want to write a novel in. This might come naturally from your story idea, or you might have a range of options. Either way, writing novels is easier when you understand the characteristics of your genre. Plus, it will help you find the right readers later on. 

Popular fiction genres include:

• Mystery: A puzzle to be solved, often a murder or disappearance. Agatha Christie is the master.
• Romance: Love stories with happy endings. See Nicholas Sparks. 
• Sci-fi: Speculative stories involving technology, space, or time travel. Think Star Wars .
• Fantasy: Magical or supernatural elements like quests and mythical creatures. Example: Harry Potter .
• Thrillers: Fast-paced, suspenseful plots with high stakes. See Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn. 
• Historical Fiction: Stories set in real historical settings or taken from historical events. The Outlander series transports readers to Scotland.
• Literary Fiction: Character-driven stories with elegant writing. Often explores social commentary. Example: The Great Gatsby.

The best way to choose genre? Pick one you enjoy reading that also fits your story idea. You can always crossover or blend genres later on. Knowing your genre can guide you towards the best tone and plot structure for your novel.

Step 3: Sketch Out Your Story Elements 

Before you dive into deep character development or setting descriptions, it helps to plan a few story elements to give your story direction. Here are some tips:

First, sketch the major plot points of your story from beginning to end. Don't worry about connecting tissue yet. Try writing a logline, a.k.a. summarize your story premise in one to two sentences. This can give you an idea of whether it will be enough to hit your target word count.

Then, outline characters. Jot down who the main characters are, and a few key traits or background details. Just enough to take you into the next step of the prewriting process.

Do the same thing with settings. Note where your story takes place and the time period. Location often shapes events and mood.

Finally, list themes. Determine what your novel is really about, such as undying love or moral awakening.

These story elements will give you a roadmap so you don't get lost, and you can take the outlines to develop the pieces in more detail. 

Step 4: Develop Your Characters

Character development is crucial for crafting vivid, multi-dimensional characters your readers will care about. Bring yours to life by digging deep into the details for all your major characters:

• Background : Figure out their age, family, education, major life events. This informs their voice and worldview.
• Physical Description : Describe them in detail and include distinguishing features like scars or unique traits. Help readers visualize them.
• Relationships : Explore how they interact with others. Their relationships to friends, family, and rivals all say something about who they are.
• Quirks : Give them hobbies, interests, or tics like knitting or snacking preferences to add individuality. 
• Motivations: Explore their goals and what’s driving them. This will help you understand how they’ll grow over the course of the story and the actions they’ll take to achieve what they want.

It can help to keep character info handy while writing so you develop their arcs naturally. 

‍ Use Motif to create Story Elements like characters that you can access in a side pane while you’re writing. Sign up .

Step 5: Describe Your Setting 

The setting of your story establishes mood, reveals character, and impacts plot direction. 

If you already sketched out your time and place in step three, now consider going in depth. Write out details on your world, like landmarks, weather, geography, or architecture. This will help readers feel transported.

Some stories can benefit from maps—such as a story that takes place in a school or an epic fantasy kingdom. If it helps you keep your locations straight, diagram them. 

When you’re writing a novel, you should always set the scene to match your setting. Use rich sensory details, such as sounds, smells, and textures that would be common in your place and time. This can also help create a tone for your work that ties into the theme. A dark, gloomy castle heightens mystery. A harsh desert underscores struggle. 

And lastly, don’t forget how your setting will impact your characters. It can change them over time, such as a timid country mouse that must become brave to navigate a big city. And similarly, your setting can also reflect the change or emotional state of your characters. You see this often in stories when the conflict is over and winter turns to spring or a character is in despair and it’s pouring rain.

With thoughtful settings, you make readers feel a location as vividly as characters.

Step 6: Outline Your Plot 

When it comes to developing plot, most writers generally fall into one of two camps:

• Pantsers: They "write by the seat of their pants", letting the story unfold spontaneously. Pantsers may start with just a premise, characters, or opening scene. They discover the plot as they draft, following where the story takes them.
• Plotters : They carefully plot out the entire story beforehand. Plotters often create chapter outlines and character arcs. They like having an endpoint in mind before starting their manuscript.

So should you plot or go by instinct? There are benefits to both approaches. Plotting avoids narrative dead-ends and loose plot holes. But your story could feel formulaic. Meanwhile, pantsing breeds creative twists since you don't know what's next. But you may write yourself into a corner.

Many writers find that a blend of these two approaches works best. But you know yourself better than anyone and should do what works for you.

If you’re a planner that already made a brief outline in step three, this is the moment when you should detail all the connecting tissue and plot points in your story. If you find yourself getting stuck, try a common story structure to create an engaging arc.

If you didn’t do step three and want to pants it, go ahead. The pre-writing above can still help.

If you want to take a blended approach, sketch a basic plot roadmap so you don't meander, but leave wiggle room for spontaneity. Outline the beginning, middle, and end points so you have direction as you pants the details. This "plantser" combo builds in creative space within structure.

Once you settle on your process, it's time to start writing!

The First Draft: How to Start a Novel 

You've got your story idea, characters, setting, and plot approach. Now the real work begins: writing that first draft word by word. 

There’s not much to say on how to write a novel at this point, other than you need to start putting pen to paper or typing away. However, we do have a few tips, software suggestions, and ideas to make it easier and get you motivated.

First, let’s go through our top tips to turn your vision into an actual manuscript:

7 Novel Writing Tips

With regular practice, creating something from nothing becomes a little less daunting. Here’s a few more tips on how to write a story:

1. Set a consistent schedule.  

Whether it's an hour a day or 500 words a week, goals keep you motivated. Consistency is important to building a habit and finishing your draft.

2. Find your space.

Have a designated writing spot to get in working mode, even if it's just a corner of your bedroom. For some, this might include their ideal lighting or favorite playlist—whatever works to keep your fingers on the keys.

3. Tune out distractions.

This is hard, but keep your phone in another room or silence notifications. If you’re writing on your computer, close tabs. If you’re easily distracted by the internet, you can try some of the distraction-blocking software below.

4. Start where it flows.

Many writers like to write chronologically, but sometimes this can lead to writer’s block. Don't get stuck forcing yourself to start at chapter one. Instead, write an easy or exciting scene first each day to get you motivated. Yes, this might result in a lot more restructuring later. It’s okay.

5. Power through writer’s block.

Push past spots where you get stuck. Highlight, take notes, or leave comments on frustrating scenes and come back to them later. 

6. Accept the mess.  

The revision and feedback stages are for polishing and perfecting later. Just get words down when you’re on the first draft.

7. Be kind to yourself.

Some days the writing flows, some days it doesn't. Celebrate small successes and don’t let off days stop you from writing altogether.

With regular practice, creating something from nothing becomes a little less daunting.

Novel Writing Software to Help You Draft 

There are a lot of free writing software and tools out there that can guide you on how to write a novel, plot your story, or block out distractions. Here’s a few of our favorites:

We’re obviously biased, but we think our free, online, and easy-to-use writing platform is the best place to start. You can use our modern word processor to write and organize chapters, our planning tab to outline and create story elements, and our research organizer to collect your links and documents. You can also take notes in it, track word count goals, and more. Join free .

Scrivener is one of the most well-known writing softwares out there besides Google Docs and Microsoft Word. It’s a robust program that lets you view research, outlines, and drafts in one place. It also has organization features like binders, notecards, and templates. However, it’s an offline desktop app, so you have to pay to download it, and you’re unable to access your story from other computers.

This one’s for writers who like markdown or those who are easily distracted. This app removes all clutter, so you can focus on the words and the words only. It also has formatting presets for both screenplays and novels. This is a paid app you have to download as well.

This app is designed specifically to block distracting websites and apps so you can focus on writing. It works by letting you customize a list of sites or apps to block, as well as the length of time you want them blocked for. Its trial gives you seven distraction-blocking sessions for free.

Finding Motivation to Write: NaNoWriMo 

If you’re struggling to finish that first draft, we highly recommend trying NaNoWriMo! Short for National Novel Writing Month , NaNoWriMo challenges writers worldwide to write a 50,000 word novel draft in November. 

Participants tap into the communal creativity for encouragement and accountability. With word count deadlines and write-ins, NaNoWriMo helps you make progress. Whether you "win" by hitting 50K or not, completing NaNoWriMo can give you a major sense of accomplishment to carry you through the rest of the draft.

A Little Help Along the Way: Books on Writing Fiction

Still not sure how to write a novel, or stuck on a specific plot point? Try learning from the masters with fiction writing books or classes. Some stellar writing resources include:

Fiction Writing Books

• Save the Cat! Writes a Novel by Jessica Brody: A screenwriting book adapted for novelists with plot point breakdowns. 
• On Writing by Stephen King: Part memoir, part how-to guide from the legendary horror author.
• The Emotional Craft of Fiction by Donald Maass: Techniques to make your characters and scenes resonate more deeply.
• Writing Fiction For Dummies by Randy Ingermanson: A 101 guide covering the entire novel writing process.

Creative Writing Courses

MasterClass, Gotham Writers Workshop, and even local community colleges or bookstores can offer virtual or in-person novel writing classes. Guidance from published authors in these classes can give you the tools you need to feel confident in your own writing. 

Remember writing your first book takes time, sometimes even years. But by putting in consistent effort, you can go from idea to completed draft. At which point, it’s time for the next big step in the process.

From Drafting to Beta Readers

Once you’ve written those magical words ("The End"), it’s time to take the next step. No, it’s not querying or self-publishing yet. Before that, you should get feedback from beta readers. 

Recruit trustworthy friends or acquaintances willing to read your manuscript with fresh eyes. Try to make sure they already read your book’s genre for the most valuable feedback. 

Then ask them specific questions like:

• Did the premise pull you in?
• Are the characters believable?
• Were there issues with dialogue?
• Does the pacing feel sluggish or rushed?
• Are there any big plot holes?
• What are your favorite parts?
• What’s confusing you as you read?

It also helps to find fellow writers, through a workshop or online group, to exchange thorough critiques focused on helping each other improve. 

Beta reader perspectives pinpoint which parts of your draft are working well and which need polishing. Their feedback will help you answer “how to write a novel” with the next step in the process.

How to Revise a Novel: From Feedback to Editing

Thought you were done writing? Nope. Armed with beta reader feedback, it's time to dive back in for serious editing and rewriting. And there’s a few types of editing and tips that can help you along the way.

Types of Editing for Fiction Novels

Revising a draft often means intensive editing at both a macro and micro level. Here are the main types of editing you can do:

Developmental Editing

This is for substantive revision, where you need to identify major areas for deeper development like strengthening a character’s motivation or adjusting the arc. Look at the big picture elements like plot, pacing, and characterization. Assess whether the overall premise and structure work. 

Line Editing

This type of editing is stylistic. Tighten the writing itself sentence-by-sentence. Check for flow, clarity, grammar, and concision. Look at your overall voice and tone. Do word choices and sentence structures enhance the style?

Copy Editing

Fix inconsistencies, continuity errors, spelling mistakes, and punctuation problems. Verify that any facts you’ve laid out are accurate.

Proofreading

Do a final edit to polish up any typos, formatting issues, or spacing problems. Fine tune all details.

Diving into each of these editing layers ensures you refine both the technical and creative aspects of your manuscript. Revision takes your first draft into a polished final novel ready for readers.

Tips for Revising a Novel

When you’re going from how to write a novel to how to revise a novel, following these tips can help: 

1. Let the manuscript rest before revising, even just a few weeks can give you some emotional and critical distance. 

2. Focus first on big picture elements: structure, plot holes, and pacing issues. Save line edits for later.

3. Print it out to edit on paper. Screens can hide mistakes and you’ll catch for line and copy edits this way.

4. Kill your darlings. Be merciless cutting unnecessary scenes!

5. Strengthen imagery and cut your filler adjectives or adverbs. Every single word should count.  

6. Read dialogue aloud to improve the flow and highlight awkward phrasing.

7. Pay attention to repetition. Remove redundant descriptions, words, or sentence structures that are bogging your work down.

8. Verify continuity and consistency. Double check your timelines, character details, and setting facts or descriptions. 

9. Revise the beginning and ending. These are crucial first and last impressions, and the beginning may be the only thing an agent sees when you’re ready to send it out.

How to Publish a Book: Choose Your Publishing Path  

Your manuscript is polished to perfection and you’re done dealing with how to write a novel. Now the question becomes: “How do I publish a book?”

Should you submit to literary agents? Self-publish? Find a hybrid solution? Here's an overview of your options:

Submit to Literary Agents

The traditional publishing route involves signing with a literary agent who pitches your manuscript to publishers. If a publisher acquires your book, they handle editing, publication, marketing, distribution, and sales.

The Pros of Traditional Publishing:

1. Your literary agent handles pitching to publishers and negotiating contracts for you so you can focus just on writing.

2. Large, traditional publishers like Penguin Random House or Simon & Schuster (known as the "Big Five") have wide distribution reach and bigger marketing budgets to promote your book.

3. You typically receive an advance payment when you sign the publishing contract, followed by royalty payments on each book sold. Advances can range from a few thousand dollars for debut authors to millions for established authors.

4. There is prestige associated with being published by one of the major publishing houses. It's seen as an endorsement of your work.

The Cons of Traditional Publishing:

1. Landing a literary agent is very difficult for debut authors. Agents reject the vast majority of manuscripts. Be prepared for lots of rejection letters before securing representation.  

2. The traditional publishing process is slow. It can take over a year from agent submission to hitting bookshelves. And you’re not guaranteed that your agent will be able to get your book picked up by a publisher.

3. You have less control over cover design, title, and other creative aspects. The publisher makes the major decisions.

If you want to traditionally publish, thoroughly research literary agents who represent your specific genre before querying. Make sure to follow each agent's submission guidelines. With perseverance and a strong manuscript, traditional publishing is possible for new authors too.

Self-Publish Your Novel

Self-publishing means you handle everything yourself: professional editing, cover design, formatting, distribution, sales, and marketing. 

The Pros of Self-Publishing:

1. You have full creative control over every aspect of your book. You choose the title, cover design, release date, and more.

2. You keep a much larger royalty percentage, averaging 70% or more of each sale depending on the self-publishing channel (e.g. Amazon). With traditional publishing, you typically get around 10 to 15% in royalties.

3. The publication process is much faster, usually three to six months instead of over a year. You can release your book as soon as it’s ready rather than waiting for agent submission and contract negotiation.

4. Self-publishing allows you to start building your author brand and fanbase early. You own the relationship with your readers.

The Cons of Self-Publishing:

1. You take on all the work and cost of editing, distribution, marketing, and promotion. The learning curve is steep and the costs can be high without guaranteed sales.

2. Without a major publisher’s marketing budget and connections, you likely won’t get your book into brick-and-mortar bookstores. Promotion is primarily online. TikTok’s BookTok and Instagram is key for this.

3. There’s still a stigma among some that self-publishing means lower quality, though this is changing.

For many authors, the freedom and higher royalties of self-publishing outweigh the heavy workload. It gives you full control of your book’s destiny.

Also keep in mind that some authors begin with self-publishing, and then later use their success to attract agents. Every author's path is unique, so do what feels right for you and your book!

Start Your Novel Writing Journey

We hope this guide gives you a clear process for how to write a novel, from generating concepts, to writing your first draft, to revising, and finally publishing. While writing a story takes dedication, know that each step you take brings you closer to holding a finished book in your hands.

What story ideas are simmering in your mind? What tools will help you craft that page-turning premise into an incredible book? What publishing approach best fits your writerly dreams? This is just the beginning of your journey. Now go write that future bestseller!

Motif is the only writing platform designed to help writers of all genres and experience levels to craft and publish captivating stories. Our platform delivers a focused, intuitive writing experience, complete with story planning, plotting, and research tools, to guide you towards success.

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How to Write a Novel: A 12-Step Guide

You’ve always wanted to write a novel. But something’s stopped you.

Maybe you’ve tried before, only to get a few, or several, pages in and lose steam because:

• Your story idea didn’t hold up
• You couldn’t overcome procrastination
• You feared your writing wasn’t good enough
• You ran out of ideas and had no clue what to do next

You may be surprised that even after writing 200 books (two-thirds of those novels) over the last 45+ years, including several New York Times bestsellers (most notably the Left Behind Series), I face those same problems every time .

So how do I overcome them and succeed?

I use a repeatable novel-writing plan — one that helps me smash through those obstacles. And that’s what I reveal to you in this definitive guide.

Imagine finishing your first draft. Better yet, imagine a finished manuscript . Or, best of all, your name on the cover of a newly published book — does that excite you?

Imagine letters from readers telling you your novel changed their lives, gave them a new perspective, renewed hope.

If other writers enjoy such things, why can’t you?

Of course this goes without saying, but first you must finish a novel manuscript.

This guide shows you how to write a novel (based on the process I use to write mine). I hope you enjoy it and can apply it to your own writing!

• How to Write a Novel in 12 Steps
• Nail down a winning story idea .
• Determine whether you’re an Outliner or a Pantser .
• Create an unforgettable main character .
• Expand your idea into a plot .
• Research, research, research .
• Choose your Voice and Point of View .
• Start in medias res (in the midst of things) .
• Engage the theater of the reader’s mind .
• Intensify your main character’s problems .
• Make the predicament appear hopeless .
• Bring it all to a climax .
• Leave readers wholly satisfied .
• Step 1: Nail-down a winning story idea.

Is your novel concept special?

• Big enough to warrant 75,000 to 100,000 words?
• Powerful enough to hold the reader all the way?

Come up with a story laden with conflict — the engine that will drive your plot .

I based my first novel, Margo , on this idea: A judge tries a man for a murder the judge committed .

Take whatever time you need to prioritize your story ideas and choose the one you would most want to read — the one about which you’re most passionate and which would keep you eagerly returning to the keyboard every day.

It must capture YOU so completely you can’t get it out of your head. Only that kind of an idea will inspire you to write the novel you’ve always dreamed of.

• Step 2: Determine whether you’re an Outliner or a Pantser.

If you’re an Outliner, you prefer to map out everything before you start writing your novel. You want to know your characters and what happens to them from beginning to end.

If you’re a Pantser, meaning you write by the seat of your pants, you begin with the germ of an idea and write as a process of discovery.

As Stephen King says, “Put interesting characters in difficult situations and write to find out what happens.”

One or the other of these approaches will simply feel most natural to you.

But, in truth, many of us are hybrids, some combination of the two — needing the security of an outline and the freedom to let the story take us where it will.

So do what makes the most sense to you and don’t fret if that means incorporating both Outlining and Pantsing.

(I cover strategies for both types and talk about how to structure a novel here .)

Regardless, you need some form of structure to keep from burning out after so many pages.

I’m a Pantser with a hint of Outlining thrown in, but I never start writing a novel without an idea where I’m going — or think I’m going.

• Step 3: Create an unforgettable main character.

Your most important character will be your protagonist, also known as your lead or your hero/heroine.

This main character must experience a life arc — in other words, be a different, better or worse, stronger or weaker person by the end. (I use “he” inclusively to mean hero or heroine)

For most novels, that means he must bear potentially heroic qualities that emerge in the climax.

For readers to be able to relate to him, he should also exhibit human flaws.

So resist the temptation to create a perfect lead. Who can relate to perfection?

You’ll also have an antagonist (also known as the villain ) who should be every bit as formidable and compelling as your hero. Make sure the bad guy isn’t bad just because he’s the bad guy. 😊

He must be able to justify — if only in his own mind — why he does what he does to make him a worthy foe, realistic and memorable.

You may also need important orbital cast members.

For each character, ask:

• Who are they?
• What do they want?
• Why do they want it?
• What or who is keeping them from it?
• What will they do about it?

Use distinct names (even distinct initials) for every character — and make them look and sound different from each other too, so your reader won’t confuse them.

Limit how many you introduce early. If your reader needs a program to keep them straight, you may not have him for long.

Naturally, your lead character will face an outward problem — a quest, a challenge, a journey, a cause… But he also must face inner turmoil to make him really relatable to the reader and come alive on the page.

Heroic, inventive, morally upright, and physically strong? Of course. But your protagonist must also face fear, insecurity, self-doubt.

The more challenges he faces, the more potential he has to grow and develop.

Much as in real life, the tougher the challenges, the greater the potential transformation.

For more on developing your characters, check out my blog posts Your Ultimate Guide to Character Development: 9 Steps to Creating Memorable Heroes , How to Create a Powerful Character Arc , and Character Motivation: How to Craft Realistic Characters .

• Step 4: Expand your idea into a plot.

True Pantsers — yes, even some bestselling novelists — don’t plot. Here’s the downside:

Like me, you might love being a Pantser and writing as a process of discovery, BUT — even we non-Outliners need some modicum of structure.

Discovering what bestselling novelist Dean Koontz calls the Classic Story Structure (in his How to Write Best-Selling Fiction ) changed my writing forever . My book sales took off when I started following his advice:

• Plunge your main character into terrible trouble as soon as possible.
• Everything your character does to try to get out of that trouble makes it only progressively worse…
• …until his predicament appears hopeless.
• Finally, everything your hero learns from trying to get out of the terrible trouble builds in him what he needs to succeed in the end.

Want to download this 12-step guide to refer to whenever you wish? Click here.

Plot Elements

Writing coaches call by different names their own suggested story structures , but the basic sequence is largely common. They all include some variation of:

• The Inciting Incident that changes everything
• A series of crises that build tension
• A Conclusion

Regardless how you plot your novel, your primary goal must be to grab readers by the throat from the get-go and never let go.

For more on developing your plot, visit my blog post The Writer’s Guide to Creating the Plot of a Story .

More in-depth plotting resources:

• Plot and Structure by James Scott Bell
• The Secrets of Story Structure by K. M. Weiland
• The Snowflake Method by Randy Ingermanson
• Step 5: Research, research, research.

Though fiction, by definition, is made up, to succeed it must be believable. Even fantasies need to make sense.

You must research to avoid errors that render your story unbelievable.

Once a reader has bought into your premise, what follows must be logical. Effective research allows you to add the specificity necessary to make this work .

When my character uses a weapon, I learn everything I can about it. I’ll hear about it from readers if I refer to a pistol as a revolver or if my protagonist shoots 12 bullets from a gun that holds only 8 rounds.

Accurate details add flavor and authenticity.

Get details wrong and your reader loses confidence — and interest — in your story.

Research essentials:

• Consult Atlases and World Almanacs to confirm geography and cultural norms and find character names that align with the setting, period, and customs . If your Middle Eastern character flashes someone a thumbs up, be sure that means the same in his culture as it does in yours.
• Encyclopedias. If you don’t own a set, access one at your local library or online .
• YouTube and online search engines can yield tens of thousands of results. (Just be careful to avoid wasting time getting drawn into clickbait videos.)
• Use a Thesaurus while writing your novel, but not to find the most exotic word. I most often a thesaurus to find that normal word that’s on the tip of my tongue.
• There’s no substitute for in-person interviews with experts. People love to talk about their work, and often such conversations lead to more story ideas.

Resist the urge to shortchange the research process.

Readers notice geographical, cultural, and technological blunders and trust me, they’ll let you know.

Even sci-fi or fantasy readers demand believability within the parameters of the world you’ve established .

One caveat: Don’t overload your story with all the esoteric facts you’ve learned, just to show off your research. Add specifics the way you would add seasoning to food. It enhances the experience, but it’s not the main course.

• Step 6: Choose your point of view.

The perspective from which you write your novel can be complicated because it encompasses so much.

Your Point of View (POV) is more than simply deciding what voice to use: First Person ( I, me ), Second Person ( you, your ), or Third Person ( he, she, or it ).

It also involves deciding who will be your POV character, serving as your story’s camera.

The cardinal rule is one perspective character per scene , but I prefer only one per chapter, and ideally one per novel.

Readers experience everything in your story from this character’s perspective.

No hopping into the heads of other characters. What your POV character sees, hears, touches, smells, tastes, and thinks is all you can convey.

Some writers think that limits them to First Person, but it doesn’t. Most novels are written in Third Person Limited.

That means limited to one perspective character at a time, and that character ought to be the one with the most at stake in each scene.

Writing your novel in First Person makes it easiest to limit yourself to that one perspective character, but Third-Person Limited is the most common.

I’m often asked how other characters can be revealed or developed without switching to them as the perspective character.

Read current popular fiction to see how the bestsellers do it.

(One example: the main character hears what another character says, reads his tone and his expression and his body language, and comes to a conclusion. Then he finds out that person told someone else something entirely different, proving he was lying to one of them.)

For a more in-depth explanation of Voice and Point of View, read my post A Writer’s Guide to Point of View .

Step 7: Begin in medias res (in the midst of things) .

You must grab your reader by the throat on page one.

That doesn’t necessarily mean bullets flying or a high speed chase, though that might work for a thriller. It means avoiding too much scene setting and description and, rather, getting to the good stuff — the guts of the story .

Les Edgerton, a gritty writer who writes big boy novels (don’t say I didn’t warn you) says beginning writers worry too much about explaining all the backstory to the reader first.

He’s saying, in essence, get on with it and trust your reader to deduce what’s going on.

The goal of every sentence, in fact of every word , is to compel the reader to read the next.

• Step 8: Engage the theater of the reader’s mind.

Don’t moviegoers often say they liked the book better?

The reason is obvious: Even with all its high-tech computer-generated imagery , Hollywood cannot compete with the theater of the reader’s mind.

The images our mind’s eye evokes are far more imaginative and dramatic than anything Hollywood can produce.

Your job as a writer is not to make readers imagine things as you see them, but to trigger the theaters of their minds.

Give them just enough to engage their mental projectors. That’s where the magic happens.

For more, visit my post on What Is Imagery? and Show, Don’t Tell: What You Need to Know .

• Step 9: Intensify your main character’s problems.

You’ve grabbed your reader with a riveting opener and plunged your hero into terrible trouble.

Now, everything he does to get out of that terrible trouble must make it progressively worse.

Do not give him a break.

Too many amateurs render their hero’s life too easy.

They give a private eye a nice car, a great weapon, a beautiful girlfriend, an upscale apartment, a fancy office, and a rich client. Rather, pull out from under him anything that makes his life easy.

Have his car break down, his weapon get stolen, his girlfriend leave, his landlord evict him, his office burn, and his client go broke. Now thrust him into a dangerous case.

Conflict is the engine of fiction .

(For more on conflict, read my post Internal and External Conflict: Tips for Creating Unforgettable Characters )

His trouble should escalate logically with his every successive attempt to fix it.

You can hint that he’s growing, developing, changing, getting stronger, and adding more to his skillset through his trials, but his trouble should become increasingly terrible until you…

• Step 10: Make his predicament appear hopeless.

Writing coaches have various labels for this crucial plot point.

Novelist Angela Hunt refers to this as The Bleakest Moment. It’s where even you wonder how you’re going to write your way out of this.

The once-reprobate lover who has become a changed man and a loving fiance suddenly falls off the wagon the night before the wedding.

Caught red-handed doing drugs and drinking with another woman, he sees his true love storm off, vowing to never speak to him again.

Imagine the nadir, the low point, the bleakest moment for your lead character. Your ability to mine this can make or break you as a novelist.

This is not easy, believe me. You’ll be tempted to give your protagonist a break, invent an escape, or inject a miracle. Don’t you dare!

The Bleakest Moment forces your hero to take action, to use every new muscle and technique gained from facing a book full of obstacles to prove that things only appeared beyond repair.

The more hopeless the situation, the more powerful your climax and ending will be.

• Step 11: Bring it all to a climax.

The ultimate resolution, the peak emotional point of your story, comes when your hero faces his toughest test yet. The stakes must be dire and failure catastrophic.

The conflict that has been building throughout now crescendos to a final, ultimate confrontation, and all the major book-length setups are paid off.

Star Wars: A New Hope climaxes with the rebels forced to destroy the Death Star.

In the original version of the movie, that scene felt flat. So the filmmakers added that the Death Star was on the verge of destroying the rebel base.

That skyrocketed the tension and sent the stakes over the top.

Give readers the payoff they’ve been set up for. Reward their sticking with you and let them experience the fireworks.

But remember, the climax is not the end. The real conclusion ties up loose ends and puts everything into perspective.

• Step 12: Leave readers wholly satisfied.

A great ending :

• Honors the reader for his investment of time and money.
• Is the best of all your options. If it comes down to clever, quirky, or emotional, always aim for the heart.
• Keeps your hero on stage till the last word.

Because climaxes are so dramatic, endings often just peter out. Don’t let that happen.

Your ending might not be as dramatic or action-filled as the climax, but it must be every bit as provocative and riveting.

Don’t rush it. Rewrite it until it shines. I’ve long been on record that all writing is rewriting, and this is never more true than at the end of your novel.

When do you know it’s been rewritten enough? When you’ve gone from making it better to merely making it different.

Write a fully satisfying ending that drops the curtain with a resounding thud. Your readers will thank you for it.

• Frequently Asked Questions and Novel Writing Tips

1. How long does it take to write a novel?

A lifetime. It will pull from you everything you know and everything you are.

It takes as long as necessary.

I know those answers sound flippant, but remember, speed is not the point.

Quality is the point.

Spend as much time as it takes for you to be happy with every word before you start pitching your manuscript to the market.

How long writing a novel will take you depends on your goals and your schedule.

A manuscript of a 100,000 words, including revision, should be doable — even for a beginner — in six to nine months.

Develop and practice the right habits , set a regular writing schedule, and stick to it.

2. How hard is it to write a novel?

If you’re anything like me, it will prove the hardest thing you have ever done. If it was easy, everyone would do it.

Every published novelist (yes, even any big name you can think of) was once right where you are — unpublished and unknown. They ultimately succeeded because they didn’t quit.

Resolve to not quit, and you will write a novel. I can’t guarantee it will become a bestseller, but I can guarantee it won’t if you don’t finish it.

3. How do I know if my story idea has potential?

You’ll know your story has legs if it stays in your mind, growing and developing every time you think of it.

The right concept simply feels right. You’ll know it when you land on it. Most importantly, your idea must compel you to write it.

Tell your story idea to someone whose opinion you trust.

You should be able to tell by their expression and their tone of voice whether they really like it or are just being polite.

• You Can Do This

If you want to write a novel, don’t allow the magnitude of the writing process to overwhelm you.

Attack it the way you would eat an elephant — one bite at a time. 😊

Don’t let fear stop you. Use it as motivation to do your best work.

Avoid wondering What if…?

Take the leap.

Stay focused on why you started this journey in the first place.

Follow the steps I’ve given you, and you may find that this time next year, you’re holding in your hands a manuscript that could become a published novel with your name on the cover.

• Step 7: Begin in medias res (in the midst of things).

Are You Making This #1 Amateur Writing Mistake?

Faith-Based Words and Phrases

What You and I Can Learn From Patricia Raybon

Before you go, be sure to grab my FREE guide:

How to Write a Book: Everything You Need to Know in 20 Steps

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Reading, Writing & Creating with the Eclipse in Mind

Ohio writing project and the dayton aviation heritage national historical park.

A MADRIGAL Dream days of fond delight and hours As rosy-hued as dawn, are mine. Love’s drowsy wine, Brewed from the heart of Passion flowers, Flows softly o’er my lips And save thee, all the world is in eclipse.   There were no light if thou wert not; The sun would be too sad to shine, And all the line Of hours from dawn would be a blot; And Night would haunt the skies, An unlaid ghost with staring dark-ringed eyes.   Oh, love, if thou wert not my love, And I perchance not thine—what then? Could gift of men Or favor of the God above, Plant aught in this bare heart Or teach this tongue the singer’s soulful art?   Ah, no! ‘Tis love, and love alone That spurs my soul so surely on; Turns night to dawn, And thorns to roses fairest blown; And winter drear to spring— Oh, were it not for love I could not sing! —Paul Laurence Dunbar

In this video, Ohio Writing Project director Beth Rimer invites us all to join in the fun and gives a walk-through of the set of resources gathered here:

Reading with the Eclipse in Mind

• Solar Eclipse Mini-Research Text Set (PDF) : Engage with an image and then conduct short research around questions.
• Paul Laurence Dunbar’s “A Madrigal” : Follow this teacher’s short explication of Dunbar’s “A Madrigal” and then write or add your own analysis.

Writing with the Eclipse in Mind

• Quickwrite prompt with Dunbar’s “A Madrigal” (PDF) : Read and respond to Dunbar’s “A Madrigal” with quickwrite prompts.
• Blackout Poetry (PDF) : Use Dunbar’s “A Madrigal” to create an original poem through blackout or erasure poetry. Share your poem too! You can also blackout “A Madrigal” digitally via the Shared Sky project.

• Six Word memoir bookmark (PDF) : Write a six-word memoir after experiencing or researching the eclipse.
• Writing & Creating Prompts (PDF) : Use these prompts to inspire writing or art.

Creating with the Eclipse in Mind

• All The World is in Eclipse Teacher Art & Writing Resource (PDF) : Create a piece of art or writing inspired by eclipse art.
• Negative Space Art (PDF) : Create a piece of art with negative space as the focus.

More Related Resources

• Shared Sky is an interactive online poetry project celebrating the science and wonder of the 2024 Total Solar Eclipse by the Wick Poetry Center
• Paul Lawrence Dunbar: A Resource Guide compiled by the Library of Congress
• Paul Lawrence Dunbar at the Poetry Foundation

Topics/tags:

Also recommended, the write time with songwriter/storyteller rob rokicki and educator kevin hodgson, teachers writing for civic engagement, intersections of poetry, prose, and place.

More From Forbes

Ai and the author: how ai is transforming book writing.

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Miles Rote is the Chief of Author Strategy at KAA, empowering authors through book writing, editing & publishing navigation. See our books.

Many people want to write a book, but few actually do it because of how difficult the process can be. I’ve interviewed thousands of business professionals and thought leaders about their books, and consistent themes resonate through them all.

It’s not a lack of desire or inspiration that keeps them from doing it. It’s lack of time, unfamiliarity with the industry, and the intimidation of a blank page. But in the age of generative AI and modern publishing, the arduous journey from a blank page to a published book is no longer what it used to be.

How To Use AI To Enhance The Book-Writing Process

Many of the titles we know and love are ghostwritten by other people. That doesn’t mean the book isn’t from the author or isn’t their words. On the contrary, a talented ghostwriter amplifies the author’s voice.

AI can do something similar: Help us extract the ideas we have in our head and piece them together for a book. AI's role is therefore less about writing the book and more about enhancing the ability to start and finish one.

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Aaron lewis hits a new career low with his new album, 10 billion productivity startup notion wants to build your ai everything app.

Can it replace high-quality ghostwriters or editors? No, but here are a few strategies to use AI to help with the book-writing process.

• Ideation: AI can help overcome the dreaded blank page syndrome. By inputting a theme or a basic premise, AI can suggest creative ideas, character arcs or even entire story outlines to kickstart the creative process.

• Structuring: Organizing a book can be daunting. AI can help in outlining chapters, suggesting narrative structures and even advising on pacing and plot progression.

• Research: AI can swiftly summarize relevant information, provide historical context or even suggest thematic material, significantly reducing the time spent on research. It can also review your writing and poke holes in your arguments.

• Language And Style: For those struggling with grammar, sentence structure or stylistic elements, AI tools offer real-time suggestions for improvement, enhancing the readability and professionalism of the text.

• Character And Plot Development: Especially in fiction, crafting compelling characters and plots is vital. AI can suggest character traits, plot twists or even dialogue options, enriching the narrative.

AI Tools To Help Write Your Book

The market has become saturated with AI writing aids, each offering unique features. You can do some online research to discover many more, but I'll focus on three of my recommendations below.

Use Perplexity For Research

While Perplexity AI utilizes a combination of its own proprietary and existing AI models to power its services, its real strength is providing the most current information available, making it akin to having an up-to-date news reporter at your disposal. It’s like having a team of virtual assistants Googling and researching on your behalf.

• Pros: Fast and reliable research with citations, real-time information, contextual understanding, versatility.

• Cons: Content creation, rewriting, chain prompting.

Use ChatGPT For Writing

The paid version of ChatGPT continues to be a leading tool for a variety of writing tasks. It’s easy to use and is the most popular tool, in part because of its Custom GPTs feature.

• Pros: Content creation, ideation, rewriting, plot structure, chain prompting, custom GPTs.

• Cons: Can’t analyze large amounts of text, not great at research.

Pro tip: Check out the Creative Writing Coach custom GPT to assist with fiction writing.

Use Claude For Analysis

Claude is unique in that it has a very large context window, allowing you to enter more than 5X the information compared to ChatGPT. This means you can reference significant portions of your manuscript for consistency, coherence and plot holes so you can make improvements on pacing and structure. Claude can also analyze large PDF files (think ebooks) to assist with research.

• Pros: Analyzing large chunks of text, analyzing PDFs, character development, consistency.

• Cons: Content creation, rewriting, less well-known.

Tips for Using AI To Help Write Your Book

Get good at prompting..

The quality of your prompt will define the quality of the output. The better you get at prompting AI with the right questions, the better answers you’ll receive.

Blend AI suggestions with your creativity.

AI tools provide suggestions; it's your job to select, refine and integrate these into your book. Use AI-generated ideas as a springboard for your creativity, not a replacement.

Maintain authenticity.

While using AI, it's essential to retain your voice and ensure the story reflects your vision. AI should augment your narrative, not define it. When overused, generative AI tends to flatten your voice, not enhance it.

Integrate with traditional writing practices.

AI tools are most effective when used in conjunction with human intuition, creativity and editorial judgment. Regular writing routines, feedback from peers or mentors and personal reflections are just as crucial in the writing process as AI assistance.

Embracing AI As A Collaborative Partner In Writing

AI in book writing offers a new way to enhance your creative process, break through barriers and bring about more efficiency. However, the heart of your book—its message, emotion and connection with readers—comes from you, the author.

Over-reliance on AI can lead to homogenized content that doesn’t interest or help readers. Even when used appropriately, it’s still important to work with professional editors to elevate your manuscript from good to great. Looking ahead, AI's role in writing is poised to grow. We can anticipate more sophisticated AI tools that offer even more nuanced suggestions and insights. However, the essence of storytelling will still remain a profoundly human endeavor.

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Before He Died in Prison, Aleksei Navalny Wrote a Memoir. It’s Coming This Fall.

In the book, Navalny tells his story in his own words, chronicling his life, his rise as an opposition leader, and the attempts on his life.

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By Alexandra Alter

During the years leading up to his death in a Russian prison, Aleksei A. Navalny , the Russian opposition leader, was writing a memoir about his life and work as a pro-democracy activist.

Titled “Patriot,” the memoir will be published in the United States by Knopf on Oct. 22, with a first printing of half a million copies, and a simultaneous release in multiple countries.

Navalny, who rose to global prominence as a fierce critic of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, resisted the Kremlin’s repeated attempts to silence him through physical harm, arrests and imprisonment in a remote Arctic penal colony, where he died in February , at age 47.

The book, telling his story in his own words, comes as a final show of defiance, his widow, Yulia Navalnaya, said in a statement, and could have a galvanizing effect on his followers.

“This book is a testament not only to Aleksei’s life, but to his unwavering commitment to the fight against dictatorship — a fight he gave everything for, including his life,” Navalnaya said. “Through its pages, readers will come to know the man I loved deeply — a man of profound integrity and unyielding courage. Sharing his story will not only honor his memory but also inspire others to stand up for what is right and to never lose sight of the values that truly matter.”

In a news release, Knopf said that the memoir “expresses Navalny’s total conviction that change cannot be resisted and will come.”

Navalny wrote the entire memoir himself, dictating some parts, and Yulia Navalnaya is working with the publisher to edit and finalize the manuscript, according to a Knopf representative. The book has already been translated into 11 languages, Navalnaya wrote on X , and a Russian-language edition of the book will be available.

The project is a more sensitive endeavor than most memoirs by high profile political figures. Navalny’s supporters and his team, which has carried on his work, continue to draw the scrutiny of Russian authorities as they direct criticism at the Kremlin against the backdrop of the war in Ukraine.

Navalny began working on his memoir in 2020, after surviving a near-fatal poisoning with a nerve agent, an attack that Western intelligence officials believed was a state-sponsored assassination attempt . The book covers his youth, his rise as a political activist, his marriage and family, his political career as an opposition leader, and the attempts on his life and attacks on those close to him, according to the publisher.

Navalny had political aspirations, but was barred from a presidential run following a conviction on fraud charges by a Russian court, widely seen as politically motivated. He exerted his political influence in other ways: organizing protests against Putin and building offices and investigative teams across the country to uncover corruption.

Navalny wrote much of the memoir while he was in Germany and recovering from poisoning. In February 2021, he returned to Russia, knowing that he would likely be detained or attacked again. He was arrested at the airport, and was later charged with embezzlement and fraud in a trial that international observers concluded was also politically motivated. In August 2023, he was charged with “extremism” and given a 19-year sentence. His harsh treatment in Russia’s severe penal colonies included lack of medical care and many stints in solitary confinement.

Addressing why he chose to go back to Russia to face almost certain imprisonment and possible death, Navalny said remaining in exile felt like a betrayal of his cause.

“I don’t want to give up either my country or my beliefs,” Navalny wrote in a Facebook post in January, shortly before his death. “I cannot betray either the first or the second. If your beliefs are worth something, you must be willing to stand up for them. And if necessary, make some sacrifices.”

Navalny’s return to Russia led to weeks of protests around the country, but they were eventually quashed in a fierce crackdown by the Kremlin. Even as Russia has shut down or driven away independent news media outlets and silenced many of its internal critics in an effort to smother political opposition, Navalny remained a vocal and influential figure who came to embody the country’s beleaguered pro-democracy movement.

Navalny maintained a presence on social media even behind bars, and remained a ferocious critic of Putin. His team, which was living and working in exile, continued to release exposés on corruption in Russia. He also kept working on the book, which includes never-before-seen correspondence from prison, according to the publisher.

Within Russia, thousands of his followers gathered for his funeral, despite the risk of being arrested by Russian authorities. Outside the church on the outskirts of Moscow where the service was held, people in the crowd chanted phrases like “Love is stronger than fear” and “Thank you, Aleksei.”

Even after his death, those who seek to carry on Navalny’s work and extend his legacy face threats and attacks. Last month, Leonid Volkov, who served as one of Navalny’s top organizers, was attacked with a hammer and tear gas outside his home in Lithuania’s capital.

Navalny was well aware that his activism put him at risk, but remained cheerfully defiant, with a wry, prankster-like persona that helped drive some of his viral online activism.

“I’m trying not to think about it a lot,” he said in an interview with CBS News in 2017. “If you start to think about what kind of risks I have, you cannot do anything.”

Alexandra Alter writes about books, publishing and the literary world for The Times. More about Alexandra Alter

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The Best Writing Conferences and Workshops to Attend in 2024

• on Jan 02, 2024
• in International Writing Events
• Last update: January 28th, 2024
• at 10:10 am

Writing is more than just putting words on a page. To become a successful author, you need to learn about both the writing and the publishing processes, and network with publishers and other authors. Attending writing conferences and workshops is one of the best ways to accomplish this.

If you’re serious about becoming a successful author, then attending writing conferences and workshops is a must. These events can provide you with the knowledge, skills, and connections you need to take your writing to the next level.

To find the best writing conferences and workshops to attend in 2024, use our filtering tools below to browse through our list.

Key West Literary Seminar Writers’ Workshop Program

Key West Literary Seminar

Winter Poetry & Prose Getaway

Colrain Classic

Writers in Paradise Conference

Digital Book World

Writing By Writers Get The Lead Out! Generative Workshop

Hay Festival Jericó

Hay Festival Medellín

Hay Festival Cartagena

National Cowboy Poetry Gathering

Todos Santos Writers Workshop

Codex: Biennial Book Art Fair and Symposium

Big Sur Children’s Writers Workshops

The AWP Conference & Bookfair

Society of Children’s Book Writers & Illustrators Annual Conference

Writing Day Workshops: Boston

San Francisco Writers Conference

Southern California Writers’ Conference

Southern California Writers Conference – San Diego

International Writers’ Conference & Literary Festival

Coastal Magic Convention

Writing Day Workshops – Indiana

Gotham Writers Nonfiction Writers Conference

Writing Day Workshops – Austin

Writing Day Workshops – Houston

Breakout Novel Intensive Workshop

Writing and Well-Being

Writing Day Workshops – Colorado

Writing Day Workshops – Carolina

Bay To Ocean Writers Conference

The New York Pitch Conference

Writing Day Workshops – Alabama

Writing By Writers Boulder Generative Workshop

Writing Day Workshops – Kansas

Writing Day Workshops – Atlanta

National Black Writers Conference

Moravian Writers’ Conference: Voices of War

Writing Day Workshops – Virginia

The Power of Narrative Conference

Scottish Association of Writers Conference

Let’s Just Write! An Uncommon Writers Conference

Liberty States Fiction Writers Conference

Writing Day Workshops – Chesapeake

National Undergraduate Literature Conference

Tennessee Mountain Writers

Writing Day Workshops – San Francisco (Online)

Writing Day Workshops – Buffalo

Erma Bombeck Writers’ Workshop

Writing Day Workshops – Minnesota

Writing Day Workshops – Toronto

Festival of Faith & Writing

The Las Vegas Writers Conference

Writing Day Workshops – Florida

A rally of writers conference.

Chanticleer Authors Conference

Writing Day Workshops – Kentucky

Authors’ Salon at Clockwork Alchemy

Poetry At Round Up Festival

Writing Day Workshops – Tennessee

Writing Day Workshops – San Diego

Independent Publishers Book Association University

Nebraska Writers Guild Conference

Pikes Peak Writers Conference

The Creativity Workshop in New York

Writing Day Workshops – Philadelphia

The Annual Gold Rush Writers Conference

The Lakefly Writers Conference

Atlanta Writers Conference

Writing Day Workshops – Michigan

Writing Day Workshops – Los Angeles

EMWA Cascais Conference

Nonfiction Writers Conference

Storymakers Conference

The Muse & the Marketplace

Writing Day Workshops – Ohio

Writing Day Workshops – Portland

Writing Day Workshops – Seattle

Longleaf Writers Conference

Florida Writing Workshop

Fiction Readers Summit

Looking Glass Rock Writers’ Conference

Biographers International Organization Conference

Word on the Lake Writers’ Festival

Poetry by the Sea: A Global Poetry Conference

Hay Festival Wales

Asian Festival of Children’s Content

The Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing

Thrillerfest

Writing the Midwest: A Symposium of Scholars and Writers

North Words Writers Symposium

Wyoming Writers Conference

Writing Day Workshops – Pittsburgh

Clarksville Writers Conference

TWH Maine “Mini Mfa” All-Fiction Writers Conference

Reader & Author Get Together

Lit Camp Conference

Indiana University Writers’ Conference

Paris Cafe Writing

Juniper Summer Writing Institute

Writing By Writers Mont Blanc workshop

Bread Loaf Translators’ Conference

Bread Loaf Environmental Writers’ Conference

Write-to-Publish Conference

Youth Workshops and Activities

Orion Environmental Writers’ Workshop

The Creativity Workshop in Barcelona

Chautauqua Writers’ Festival

Agents & Editors Conference

Writing Day Workshops – Milwaukee

Writing Day Workshops – Chicago

Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers’ Workshop

Disquiet International Literary Program

Aspen Summer Words Writing Conference

Minnesota Northwoods Writers Conference

The Creativity Workshop in Florence

Information, Medium & Society: International Conference on Publishing Studies

Writing Day Workshops – Texas

Chuckanut Writers Conference

The Creativity Workshop in Prague

Canterbury Arts Conference

Readercon 33

Midwest Writers Workshop Super Mini-Conference

International Creative Writing Conference

Tin House Summer Writers’ Workshop

Sewanee Writers Conference

Writing Heights Writers Conference

Taos Writers Conference

Imaginarium Convention

Sun Valley Writers’ Conference

Macondo Writers Workshop

Writing Through The Lifespan

Taylor University’s ​Professional Writers’ Conference

National Writers’ Conference

Romance Writers of America Annual Conference

Willamette Writers Conference

Author Advantage Live

Mendocino Coast Writers’ Conference

National Book Club Conference

FAPA Conference

Swanwick Writers’ Summer School

Bread Loaf Environmental Writers’ Conference

When Words Collide

Nashville’s 18th Annual Writers’ Conference

Bouchercon, the World Mystery Convention

Hay Festival Queretaro

Creatures, Crimes & Creativity Con

Milford Writer’s Workshop

Kingston WritersFest

Writing Sisters Summit in the Hills

Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers

Western Literature Association Conference

The DFW Writers Conference

Women Writing the West Annual Conference

Orlando Reads Books

Steamboat Springs Writers Conference

Iota Short Forms Conference

Medical Writing & Communication Conference

Surrey International Writers Conference

Hay Festival Arequipa

Kauai Writers Conference

Hay Festival Winter Weekend

Writing can be a solitary process, but it doesn’t have to be! Attending a writing conference or workshop can help you hone your craft, connect with other writers, and learn from industry professionals. There are many events to choose from in 2024, so you’re sure to find one that suits your interests and schedule.

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The 2024 International Book Fairs Calendar

The Comprehensive List of 2024 Writing Contests

Best Writing Residencies in 2024 for Emerging Writers

The Most Vibrant Literary Festivals Happening in 2024

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