My first published novel was, well, not my first published novel. I’ve been working as a ghostwriter behind the scenes for a decade, and have plenty of experience in a range of genres. Romances set in high schools, Regency-era tropes, supernatural tales of communities with superpowers – you name it. But when I wanted to publish something under my own name, I went with true crime. That’s when I really started to learn a lot about myself, thanks to writing…

Note: This is a guest post by: Rhiannon D’Averc, she is a crime writer based in the UK. You can follow her on Twitter and see the latest news and updates on her website. She is also the Chief Editor of London Runway, an indie fashion publication in the UK’s capital.

The result was Boy Under Water – Dennis Nilsen: The True Story of a Serial Killer. It’s based on a real series of murders, as the name suggests. While I might have had plenty of experience in other genres, true crime taught me some home truths that I might not otherwise have learned. Here’s what I picked up.

1. Why I write true crime

It might seem silly, but do we ever really question why we write?

Most of us just like telling stories (or harbor dreams of being the next multi-millionaire breakout author). But why do we tell the particular stories that we do?

If you explain to someone that you’re writing a romance novel, their questions will usually center around why you’ve chosen to write at all. But when I told people about the true crime novel that was burning a hole on my hard drive, they usually wanted to know why I would choose such a gruesome topic.

That led to some soul-searching.

When I peeled it all back, I realized that my lifelong fascination with true crime probably had a lot to do with the reason why I watch horror movies. I watch them, even though I often hate them, because I want to know. How do you get rid of ghosts that want to do you harm? How do you stop a cursed video from killing you? What kind of red flags should you avoid if you don’t want to get dismembered by hillbillies in a remote wooded area? (You need to know this!)

Knowing is magic. Knowing keeps you safe. If I ever did, say, end up in a situation where a ghost from inside a haunted videotape was trying to track me down, I now know just to show the video to someone else. That’s all it takes to stay safe.

Knowing about serial killers, murderers, and conmen is a similar concept. The more I learn and write about them, the less likely it is that I’ll end up a victim of one. Even though I have potentially raised the risk by becoming a true crime writer, if cinema has taught me anything!

2. What I might be capable of

Most of us consider ourselves to be normal, upstanding citizens. Maybe we break a parking law now and then or take the free samples out of our hotel rooms – they pretty much expect us to do that, right? But we’re not bad people. Not the kind of bad that might result in us murdering another human being… and then going on to do it again, and again, and again.

But then I started trying to get into the mind of a serial killer in order to write about him. I wanted the book to be as authentic as possible, so I dedicated a lot of time and effort to this realism. I devoured everything Nilsen had said or written in the public view. I got to know him, and his circumstances. I read views from people who knew him. I even exchanged a letter with the man himself, a short while before he died in prison.

What I discovered along this exploration was that there was no real particular trigger or abuse that turned Nilsen into a serial killer. I don’t think he was born evil. I don’t believe there’s a gene or a specific single incident which forced him to kill people.

What I found in my research was a lonely, sad, isolated man. He thought he was cleverer than he was, but also perhaps suspected somewhere in a dark corner of his mind that he wasn’t all that. He felt rejected, thrown away by the countless lovers who came and went in the space of a night. This built upon the rejection of a childhood spent in a poor Scottish family, and then the army, where a young, gay, slightly odd man was not cherished. It grew in the form of a fantasy that was deeply connected to the death of his grandfather and, left unchecked, evolved into something far more dangerous.

These are all human feelings. We might not call them ‘normal’, but we really mean not ‘healthy’ or ‘fitting society’. Actually, it’s very normal to feel different to others around us. It’s normal to have fantasies which grow and evolve as our sexuality develops – particularly if we aren’t able to engage in relationships with others, which might replace those fantasies.

The more I researched, the more I felt like any one of us could be subject to just the right (or wrong) kind of mix of experiences and feelings to become a killer. Maybe if Nilsen had been less lonely, or found a partner who wanted to stay with him, or not been frustrated with both his career and his personal life, the crimes would not have happened.

I don’t mean to absolve his blame – he still took action, decisively and on his own. He has rightly been condemned for those actions. But it did make me think that perhaps, there but for the grace of God go we.

3. What I was aiming for

If you had asked me before I published the book what I wanted to come of it, I probably wouldn’t have been able to give a clear answer. There were wild dreams, of course – like being the next multi-millionaire author. But I didn’t really know how I would feel about any kind of result that happened.

Actually, I found that I was pretty satisfied with the modest sales that I got. I’m not a bestselling author just yet, and definitely not a millionaire. But I do feel happy with the response. Having friends, distant family members, and people I hadn’t spoken to in years tell me they’d read and enjoyed the book was pure reward.

More than anything, this experience has taught me that I’m happy to write, and ecstatic for people to read my work.

The money earned is more on the practical side of things, a necessity that cannot be ignored if I want to write full-time. But knowing I’m in it for the love of writing means that I can happily throw myself into another project, without fear that a failure to sell well would be a crushing disappointment.

So, why would I recommend true crime writing to any author?

Because I believe that it can teach you a lot, no matter what genre you normally write in. You can explore the human psyche at its worst, as well as examining the motivations that drive you to write. You also learn an invaluable skill in terms of research, which can stand you in good stead when it comes to adding realism to your work. And, like me, you might just find that it is the right genre for you.

What has writing taught you about yourself? Think about it, and if you like, leave a comment and share.

We’re already a whole month into the New Year, which can be a tricky time for people as we start to get busier and our carefully made resolutions start to drop off. Life gets in the way, and suddenly our good intentions become just that—intentions. Consider this your friendly reminder to remember what your goals are.

Note: This post is by Positive Writer contributor The Magic Violinist.

Not only should you remind yourself what goals you’ve set, but you should also try to think about what kind of person you want to be. What kind of writer you want to be. If you decide who you want to become, then you can make sure that all of your actions line up with your aspirations.

So what type of writer might you want to strive to be this year?

(You can pick more than one and mix them up however you like!)

A more productive writer

A productive writer makes the most of whatever time they have. Sometimes that time is four or five hours and sometimes it’s only a few minutes in the pickup zone at school. If you want to be more productive this new year, you’ll want to focus on carving out time in the day for yourself that’s for writing and writing alone.

It can help to have multiple projects in the works at once. If you only have a few minutes, you can continue working out a new idea in your head. If you have hours to yourself, that might be the time for heavy edits. Either way, a productive writer takes every opportunity to get things done.

A kinder writer

If you have the tendency to be hard on yourself, maybe this year is the time to be gentler. Don’t beat yourself up for mistakes you make. Try not to worry about the things that are out of your control, like whether or not you win a contest or how long it takes for an agent to respond to your query letter.

Writing is rewarding, but it’s also difficult. If you get bogged down in the hardships, it’s easy to forget why you started writing in the first place. Remind yourself why it makes you happy by writing what you’d love to read.

A more honest writer

I think we’re all guilty of falling into that trap of writing whatever we think is going to sell well. But the hard truth is, trends change all the time. It’s impossible to predict whether people are going to want to buy stories about vampires, societies in outer space, long-lost royalty, or feuding families. By focusing on what’s best for the market, we lose sense of who we are at our core.

Write what’s meaningful to you. There’s a reader out there for every book. Write for that reader by writing for you first. First drafts are meant to be creative and fun and low-stakes. Once you get into revisions, then you might look at your story with more of an eye toward publishing, but by staying true to yourself, your story will have that special spark.

A more disciplined writer 

Writers are always waiting for that elusive muse to come to them with a full-fledged story, but unfortunately, inspiration isn’t something we can wait for. When so much of publishing is centered around deadlines, we can’t afford to let inspiration come to us. We have to seek it out ourselves.

If you have a difficult time getting your butt in a chair or resisting the temptation of mindlessly scrolling through social media (and I’m guilty of this, too), make this the year you decide to be more disciplined about your writing. Create daily habits, even if it means you only get a little bit done each day. Commit to completing those half-finished projects sitting untouched in your files. You’ll be amazed at how much you can do with a little effort.

A braver writer 

For some, showing work to others comes easily, but for others, the very thought has them crippled with fear. If you write just to make yourself happy and you’re perfectly content to never share it with anyone, then there’s no need to go any further than that. But if you have publishing aspirations of any kind, then at some point you’ll have to take the plunge.

Writing isn’t a solitary activity, though it may seem that way. Once you’ve written a story, it takes a team of several people to help you revise and polish your work, and that requires sharing it with other others. It will potentially be uncomfortable at first, but it will be ultimately rewarding once you’re able to collaborate with someone and make your writing better. Take it step by step. Share your story with a trusted friend first, then work your way to opening yourself up for criticism.

Always work toward the better

No matter what your area of focus is this year, remember that with every word you write, you’re growing as an artist. Practice will never make perfect, but it will get you pretty darn close. Set those lofty goals and do everything in your power to reach them. I know you can do it.

What kind of writer do you want to be this new year? Leave a comment!

We love shortcuts to success.

I can’t promise these will all be easy. But if you use them, I can promise you’ll make progress.

This post is by Positive Writer contributor Frank McKinley.

Momentum Requires Movement

Tomorrow is too late.

Momentum is like a fire. It needs you to feed it to live. And when it wanes, you’ve got to poke it to reinvigorate it.

Sometimes we confuse dreams with momentum.

“I want to write a novel next year.” 

“I want to become a bestselling author.” 

“I want to be the next James Patterson.” 

You could also add that you want to be the next person to fly to Mars.

Wanting isn’t doing. Dreams are great, but unless we pick up our pens, sit in our chairs, and write down some words, dreams are just smoke.

But Dreams Are Fun

So is visiting Disney World.

Or the beach.

Or your mountain cabin.

Dreams make sleeping memorable.

Action is what makes dreams come true. You’ve got to write it and share it to know if people will like it.

Will you fail? 

Maybe.

But only if you don’t learn something.

Tomorrow is another day. You can write something else. And as the days pass, you’ll forget about what didn’t work.

You’re a writer. Don’t just hypothesize. Test your assertions. Try them with real people. Something good will come from this eventually. You just have to keep putting words in front of people.

Here are the 7 hacks to transform you into an unstoppable writer!

1 Write down ideas whenever they come.

Keep a notebook or a page somewhere where you can record all those ideas that come to you.

If you can find them, you can do something with them. Maybe you use one and throw away another. Maybe you marry two of them and take a new slant on an old approach.

Just catch them before they get lost.

Writing them down ensures they stay.

You say you don’t have any ideas?

That’s a lie. Take out a piece of paper. Grab a pen. Set a timer for 10 minutes. Write the first word that pops into your head on the top of the page and spend the 10 minutes writing down whatever comes to mind.

Send your internal critic on a break while you fill the page with nonsense, profundity, and everything in between.

When you’re done, you’ll have something.

If you don’t like what you have, just do it again until you do.

2 If you don’t use an idea in a week, toss it.

Time kills momentum.

This approach may sound radical. But it’s not.

When you buy produce, you have to eat it soon or it will be rotten. When it’s rotten, you don’t save it for later, hoping it will taste better. In fact, the longer you keep it around the more it stinks.

Ideas are a lot like that. Act on them while they’re hot. Otherwise, you’re just stirring ashes.

You’re most creative when you write about something sooner than later. Later, you’ll have grown and maybe that thought won’t make sense anymore. Maybe you’ll have learned a lesson that made that idea irrelevant. A week is long enough.

If it’s a big idea, take some action on it now. Even if it’s just making plans. A long term project can take a year. There will be lots of parts. Small actions are movement that keep the idea alive.

Do something now to move that idea forward. If you can’t, you probably won’t.

3 Write daily and momentum will come, stay, and grow.

Your work won’t always be perfect.

In fact, it never will because it can’t be.

Don’t worry about it.

When a baby learns to walk, she doesn’t care about perfect. She cares about effective. She doesn’t care how she looks while she’s learning. She just cares about walking.

Write every day. Do the best you can. Do something better tomorrow than you did it today. But don’t spend all day today worrying about tomorrow.

Just pick up your pen and make some magic.

The trick is just doing the work.

4 Print out a calendar and record your progress.

It’s great to have an accountability partner if you can get one.

But honestly, you are your best motivator.

Hang a calendar on your wall. Get one in December if you can. If not, print one out on your computer. If you don’t have a computer, draw a calendar.

Every day, check the box to signal to yourself that you wrote something.

When you’re feeling like nothing you do matters, the calendar will remind you that you’re making progress. You’re writing. You’re testing the boundaries. You’re doing the work.

You’ll only reach your destination when you take the steps every day to get there.

5 As soon as you reach one goal, set another.

Just take time to celebrate your wins.

You’ve probably figured it out by now. I’m urging you to keep moving.

Life is meaningless without a map.

We all want maps because we all have dreams we want to come true.

Maps show the territory in front of you. Goals are the cities you want to visit on a map. You pave the road with the steps you take to get there.

NaNoWriMo is a great example of how this works. You have 30 days to write 50,000 words. You know you’re writing a story that you hope becomes a published novel. At worst, if you keep moving you’ll have a draft you can refine.

The key is:

• You know WHAT you need to write.
• You know HOW MUCH writing is required.
• You have a DEADLINE.

When that’s novel’s done, you write another one if you want to call yourself a novelist.

Writing every day is a goal. Writing a novel is a goal. If you want to move forward every day, you’ve got to set a goal every day.

Then you’ve got to do the work, which is far easier when you’ve drawn a map.

6 It’s great to have lots of ideas. It’s better to turn them into reality.

All your ideas won’t work.

That’s why you need lots of them.

You can also tweak your ideas and effectively turn them into new ones. Your pen is your friend here. Every morning play around with your thoughts. Take them in whatever direction your mind leads them to. There might be gold in the shadows.

You don’t have to publish and share all your thoughts. But you do need to explore the ones that stick around and keep popping up in your idea notebook. There’s probably a golden thread running through them that is calling you to your purpose as a writer.

It’s your responsibility to discover what that is, and take it to the people who need it.

Unrealized ideas are cinders that turn to ashes and never warm anyone.

Don’t let your good ideas suffer that fate.

7 Keep experimenting. It’s better to learn than to guess.

Seth Godin wrote the foreword to a marketing textbook I found online.

He wrote, “This textbook probably won’t be any good for you.”

Why would he say something like that?

Because if all you do is read it, you’ll be wasting your time.

Read it. Learn it. Then go do something with it.

Market.

Test.

Learn.

Build.

Reading this post won’t help you either. So go. Use what you’ve just read. Write something. Now. Today. Tomorrow. Forever.

Go Make Magic

The magic of writing is in the doing.

When you do it daily, and give it your all, you’ll get better. Your message will matter. And people will read your stories.

Your message is your story. It’s the hope you sell to your readers. It’s the secret that, when revealed, frees them to be their best selves, achieve the status they want, and make their dreams real.

What will you write today?

For the Thanksgiving and Black Friday weekend, Writer’s Doubt, Inspired Writer and The Audacity to be a Writer are on special for 99 cents each!

   

Also, my good friend Jeff Goins’ book is on sale as well for 99 cents:

Click the cover of each book to go to it on Amazon.

The SALE ENDS Midnight, Sunday 25 Nov.

It’s been said that if you do what you love you’ll never work another day in your life.

I wonder, as a fellow writer – a scribbler in arms, as it were, do you agree?

Yesterday I was on a call with a student and she was telling me about how she’s waiting on a new laptop so that she can finally get started writing. She said she doesn’t feel comfortable with the PC she currently has because it’s old and slow. I feel for her. I hate slow computers too. They should be outlawed.

If you, like me, have dealt with this issue, or you are currently waiting on the “right” tools, this article is for you. I’m sure we can all relate to some degree, but it can become a catastrophic problem when it stops us from creating.