New Daily Writing Guides from The Write Practice

10 Writing Hacks to Actually Finish Your Book

by Joe Bunting | 42 Comments

Are you struggling to write? Read on for my best writing hacks to get you writing now.

There’s no getting around it. Writing is hard. Whether you’re writing your first book, crafting an essay for school, blogging, or just writing for fun, there are so many things against you.

First is the time itself. What you could say in five minutes takes a huge amount of time to write into coherent, grammatically sound sentences.

Then there are the distractions: social media, video games, endless sudoku puzzles (my personal kryptonite).

Finally, and perhaps worst of all, there is writer’s block, which can vary from a general aversion to writing to crippling self-doubt and an inability to put any words on a page, let alone something good.

Yes, writing is hard. So hard it’s amazing people write at all, some for fun no less!

The good news is that if you’re having a hard time writing, you’re not alone. Even great writers struggle with distraction and writer’s block. To be honest, I struggle too. I’ve written 15 books and still struggle on a daily basis to write.

At the same time, writing can be amazing, inspiring, fulfilling, even life changing. If you’re struggling to write, in this article I’m going to share all the writing tips to help you get focused that I know. Hopefully at least one of these tricks will get your creativity thrumming, get the words moving, and help you finally get to writing.

So grab a cup of coffee, open up a blank page, and get ready to write.

Fear Setting: How to Overcome Your Fear of Writing

by David Safford | 0 Comments

If you’re not finishing your writing, it’s because of fear. Fear is far more influential than we like to think. We like to believe that we’re not succumbing to fears because we are good at goal-setting, or perhaps we stick to a writing schedule of some kind.

Yet fear is insidious. It is subtle. It speaks with voices you can’t hear, and unless you weed those voices from your psyche, they will forever impede your writing dreams.

Here’s how to overcome your fears and finish your writing with confidence!

It Bears Repeating: Is It Bears or Bares?

by Alice Sudlow | 30 Comments

It bears repeating that the English language is full of odd sayings. Never fear, though—we’re here to break them down.

Today, we’re taking on a hairy turn of phrase: “it bears repeating.” Or is it “it bares repeating”?

Writing Anxiety: Why Does Writing Sometimes Make You Anxious (And How to Overcome It)

by J. D. Edwin | 2 Comments

Have you ever felt a rush of writing anxiety when trying to finish your story?

Whether you view this as resistance or low self-esteem, writing anxiety can prevent you from finishing that beautiful, unique story that only you can tell. Here are four common problems that feed writing anxiety and tips on how to overcome them.

How to Market a Book: 10 First Steps

by Joe Bunting | 1 Comment

Have you ever wonder how to market a book? You spend months, maybe even years writing, editing, then rewriting your book until it’s a masterpiece (or at least finished). Now what? How do you turn all that hard work into sales and, if it’s not too much to ask, money!

There are hundreds of things to discuss when it comes to how to market a book, but what are the first steps you need to take, if you’re starting from scratch? That’s what were going to talk about in this article. Ready to get started?

Best Book Writing Software: Word vs. Scrivener

by Joe Bunting | 79 Comments

When you’re writing a book, you might come to this point where exasperation turns to desperation and you think: “There has to be a better way. There has to be a better piece of book writing software than Microsoft Word.”

Microsoft Word is the default word processor, but that doesn’t mean it’s the only option. And especially when you’re writing something as complicated as book, you might want a piece of writing software geared specifically toward writing a book.

In this post, we’re going to look closely the most popular alternative to Microsoft Word: Scrivener, and talk about where each word processor shines and where each falls short.

From Amateur Blog to Pro Blog: How to Level Up Your Writing

by Joe Bunting | 42 Comments

When I first started blogging, I set up a free account with Blogger. It was great. I didn’t have to understand any crazy computer code. I just had to worry about writing. Then, I read somewhere that I should install Google Analytics to see how many people were reading my blog. It took me an hour, but I figured out how to insert the hieroglyphic-looking code into my theme and opened up my analytics page.

I found out there were about seven people reading my blog. That’s it? I thought. That started me on a quest to figure out how to get more people to read my blog.

25 August Writing Prompts

by Sue Weems | 1 Comment

It’s mid-summer and a great time to do some daily writing! Check out these 25 August writing prompts to get your creative juices flowing.

The (Un)usual Suspects: Unreliable Narrators in Film and Literature

by Liz Bureman and Elizabeth Nettleton | 34 Comments

One of my all-time favorite movies is The Usual Suspects. I could watch it on a loop, and I’d still never get sick of it. If you haven’t seen it, I’m going to spoil the ending, and if you keep reading and get mad at me, it’s your own fault because that movie has been around since 1995 and you really should have seen it by now.

The vast majority of the movie is Kevin Spacey’s con man character telling a cop about a job that results in a huge explosion and lots of deaths. He says the mastermind behind the job is a man named Keyser Soze. At the end of the movie, we learn that Kevin Spacey is Keyser Soze, and a good number of details from the story that he told the police were made up from things he observed in the cop’s office.

The first thing your brain does after it picks itself up off the floor is get confused: Wait—if he made up those details, what other bits of information did he make up? Was anything he just told us real? Is Keyser Soze even real?

And just like that, the movie that was so straightforward for the first 100 minutes is suddenly a completely different movie.

The Importance of Positive Self-Talk for Writers

by Guest Blogger | 71 Comments

If we’re not careful, the negative thoughts in our minds can outnumber the positive ones. It’s a downward spiral no one likes riding. Hard to dismount.

Simple affirmations help. I love post-it notes. Paper ones, or the computer apps that supply them.

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