#helpforwriters

For starters, you want to have your magic system fleshed out really thoroughly. What good is teaching a bunch of kids how to use a magic system that you, the author, don't really know how it works, right!? If you haven't done this, you might check out my Brainstorming posts Here (Part 1) and Here (Part 2) to get started.

Beyond that, you need to think about some school basics:

Are all children educated in magic? Or only the most talented, the richest, or the poorest?

How does society at large feel about magic education and how does that impact the freedom and funds of the school?

(Related:) What kind of teachers are employed at the school? The best and brightest or the shlufs who couldn't make it in a "real" school? How does that affect the education of the students?

How does general education play into the lives of the students? Do they go to primary school first where they learn to read and write etc. or is that part of the their magic school curriculum?

How much danger is there in the day-to-day of the school? Is the magic difficult to use and therefore generally not a risk? Is it ubiquitous and therefore maintains some inherent balance? Is it difficult to use and therefore volatile and unpredictable?

What is the purpose of receiving a magic education and what do its students aspire to do after completing school?

I hope these help you out little bit. :)

{these are personal ways how i gained inspiration to write, so hopefully these methods can inspire you too!} - going for walks - this was a main one for me since i love nature and plants and stuff haha. this enables you to allow your surroundings to influence what you write and for some reason this makes my writing more lighthearted. this also is beneficial if you do it at different times or day, good for atmospheric reasons - reading - this is a fairly obvious one, this doesn’t mean reading a whole book. just reading one paragraph of your favourite or even a random book can give you ideas such as setting, structure or even character development - watching things - watching shows/movies that are the same genre of what you’re writing is always a good play. personally, i’m not too fond of watching tv often, but watching kdramas are always good for me especially since i write lighthearted romance. This helps with scenery settings and how characters interact with each other. - use your daily life - though to you, your daily life may seem boring, you can use some aspects of if into a great character. you could use your house as where your character lives or even your friends as characters. if you want your book to be realistic, this is a great starting point if you haven’t got any ideas! - use a prompt - this is more so if you don’t have an idea but you want to write something. this could be your main piece or your side piece to practice your writing! you can find these online and it is a great way to gain inspiration quickly as it’ll most likely give you one sentence and hour imagination does the rest for you!

As you walk this artistic world, you’ll encounter a lot of “rules.” You must do __, you may never do__.

It’s simple: the method that gets you CREATING is the one you need to use.

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It’s late. I’ve had no time (yet) to write today. In the past, this would have panicked me.

It no longer does. Here’s why.

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Writing. Its difficult right? The moment I decided that being a writer was what I wanted, I wondered whether I had made the right decision. The writing bit is always fun of course. But the editing, the proofreading, the marketing and the publishing. It sometimes makes me wonder if all this is worth it. I read yesterday that only 1 in 6,000 writers manage to get a literary agent. That is shocking! You see books in stores and you think it must be easy if so many people are publishing. It even makes me envious to see those authors books on the shelves when mine should be next to them. But its all a part of a journey. Only the dedicated survive and make it in the writer's world.

So...who am I?

As this is my first blog, not many people will know me. I'm not a famous author at all. I am just a young 22 year old woman who has a passion for writing and wants her stories to be known. I have self-published two novels on Amazon a few years back and its safe to say it didn't go so well. I believe my biggest mistake was releasing a book with no marketing before hand. Since following popular authors on social media, I noticed that marketing was the key to getting more traffic to your book. I was never popular at all and so I didn't have as much support as others might have when they published a book. Even three years later I have only sold about 10 copies of my first novel on Amazon. So this time I am willing to publish my 3rd novel traditionally. I know the journey ahead of me is far from easy. Everyone struggles to get the interest of top publishers but I am willing to put the hours in to get where I want to be.

Where am I currently at now?

At the moment, I am concentrating on growing my network. I am not a big fan of having a big online presence but I believe it is the key to success; I have to keep up with the times! I have signed up to LinkedIn, Twitter and now I have started a blog. I even put some unpublished stories onto Wattpad to get myself out there more. I am taking all the necessary steps before I dive into publishing my 3rd novel. Being on those social media platforms are working quite well. I have almost 500 connections on LinkedIn (which is quite impressive I must say) and I have 80 followers on Twitter after creating it just a few days ago. 

As for my writing, I have nearly finished one of my short stories that will be included in the collection but I still have another 2 to finish before I can even think of publishing. Then of course there is all the editing to do which has to be the most boring part of all. Who likes reading their own stories and admitting they worded something wrong? Definitely not me. There is something dissatisfying about admitting ones faults. I know it is quite empowering to know where you can improve but it also plays on my self-esteem and makes me think I am not good enough to write...so I guess I'll have to trust my reviewers!

Advice to other new writers...

Trying to be noticed as a writer is beyond difficult. There are already thousands of popular writers that you will be forced to compete with once you're published and known. What I have learnt so far is to never give up. Yes, a cliche never helped anyone but hear me out. Once I had published my first novel with Amazon and nobody seemed interested or even noticed, I knew I had made a big mistake. I am definitely not saying that Amazon writers cannot be successful because they can! I've seen it for myself. I just mean that Amazon publishing was not right for ME. But even when it wasn't successful and to be honest it was a huge flop (it wasn't my writing it was that nobody noticed it!)