SOME GREAT WRITING Advice from Nicolas
Evans
The Horse Whisperer
Q: I want to be a novelist.
What advice would you give me?
A: Read, read, and read. Then, when you think you’ve read enough and might know how to do it, find a story that moves you and tell it from the heart. Try not to copy anyone’s style and don’t think about the reader, just write for yourself. Be your characters, inhabit their heads; never bend the characters to fit the story; write what is true to them. And remember this: any attempt to find the formula of what makes a bestseller is doomed to failure. There is no such thing as a formula. But if what you write moves and excited you, there is a chance it may move and excite others too.
A: Read, read, and read. Then, when you think you’ve read enough and might know how to do it, find a story that moves you and tell it from the heart. Try not to copy anyone’s style and don’t think about the reader, just write for yourself. Be your characters, inhabit their heads; never bend the characters to fit the story; write what is true to them. And remember this: any attempt to find the formula of what makes a bestseller is doomed to failure. There is no such thing as a formula. But if what you write moves and excited you, there is a chance it may move and excite others too.
Q: Do you always know the
start, middle and end of your story before you begin writing?
A: Yes. But things evolve and change. I do my research and during that time the outline of the story takes shape in my head. Starting to write is a bit like going for a hike in a place you have never before visited with people you know little about. Before you set out, you study the map and then you drive there, put on your boots and your backpack of research and set off up the trail.
A: Yes. But things evolve and change. I do my research and during that time the outline of the story takes shape in my head. Starting to write is a bit like going for a hike in a place you have never before visited with people you know little about. Before you set out, you study the map and then you drive there, put on your boots and your backpack of research and set off up the trail.
At first, the characters you are
hiking with will be like silhouettes; maybe you know just one or two key things
about them. Once you start walking, you have to ask yourself all kinds of
questions about them. Where was she born? What was his relationship like with
his father? Did she go to college? Can she catch a ball, sail, speak French? Who
was his first love? As you answer these questions, so the silhouettes begin to
fill in and after a few miles you are getting to know who they are.
And when you see the terrain you are
hiking through, you will maybe change your mind about the route you had planned
to take. You are headed in the same direction, but instead of walking up in the
trees, you decide to go lower along the river or maybe you’ll spend an extra
day camped by the waterfall. The characters will sometimes tell you to do this
kind of thing too.
2 comments:
Love this! So true!
So true.. Is there ever really a “gimmick” in life? I’ve found shortcuts to most often be dead ends in disguise.
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