How to Finally Write Your Book - from Someone Who Did

Photo by Andrea Piacquadio from Pexels

Lots of people want to write a book, but very few do. I’m going to give you my best tips on how to finish writing your book. But first, some personal background.

I wrote my book at the age of fifteen. It was approximately 30,000 words. I didn’t make up my mind to write a book all of a sudden — it was a necessity. I wanted to get into a fancy high school, and I didn’t have the grades to make it. Staying in your home town with old bullies is never fun. But that high school was known to accept ‘exemplary’ kids who’d created their own fashion lines, businesses, etc.

My mother told me I wouldn’t get in — unless I wrote a book. That would help my odds a lot. So I buckled down and wrote it in 30 days, my parents hired an editor, paid for it to be self-published, and we had a book signing at a friend’s bookstore where all 200+ copies were sold and recouped the printing costs.

After sending a copy of the book to the school, I got in. You can Google my name for all the embarrassing book signing pictures and cringy fifteen-year-old me quotes, but I won’t put them here for obvious reasons.

Looking back eight years later, I know I succeeded because of these three steps I took. It doesn’t matter what age you write your book at to follow them.

Tie A Goal To Finishing The Book — ‘Finishing’ it Doesn’t Count

I had always wanted to publish a book. I’d been writing since I was five, but there was nothing to motivate me. I figured I’d write a book eventually as most people think. You would be surprised how many people want to write their own novel.

When I desperately wanted to go to an all-new school with new kids, nothing could distract me from that goal. I wanted it so badly, and the only option was to write the book. Otherwise, I’d be stuck with all the kids I grew up with and some not-so-friendly ex-friends. I needed a new social life. There was no question, I would write that book.

It might be difficult to want something as badly as I wanted to get into that school. But we all have different dreams, and those dreams can serve as your motivation.

That vacation you keep telling yourself you’ll take? Promise yourself you can go as soon as you finish your book. Make a vision board of your vacation, plan all the sites you want to visit, and think how quickly you could get there if you just sat for an hour or two every day and churned out words. Set a timer if you have to, and take plenty of breaks. You can do the Pomodoro technique, which is twenty-five minutes of work followed by a short break. I use this method nowadays to write my articles.

I would write for four-hour chunks at a time, but I was a kid — I didn’t have much else to do, unlike now. The one thing I did have was a schedule. I’d set aside 3–4 hours every day only to write, grabbing a snack, and not leaving my bedroom until the time ended.

I was the only one enforcing it, to be clear. I was very motivated. You can be too if you pick the right reward. Remember to start small – don’t set out to write multiple hours a day when the most time you’ve written in a day is twenty minutes.

Don’t Edit While Writing, Highlight instead

The first ten days of my writing journey were a waste in terms of productivity. I wasn’t getting anywhere going over the same ten pages again and again editing and reworking different sections. See my article on productivity here.

My mother noticed the lack of progress and told me those revisions are what editing is for, but that they should happen after the content is completed.

Once I stopped editing, I was making 10X the progress I had in the last ten days, daily. You are your own worst critic, but there has to be a draft to critique, or else you’ll get nowhere. It’s better to show up with an attempt than to show up with nothing.

I used the highlight function on Microsoft Word to flag sections I wasn’t happy with, and then would continue on. After completing the draft, I went back to those sections and reworked them until I was happy enough to remove the highlights.

The editing was blocking me from getting in the zone. I’d be sidetracked, overanalyzing every sentence I wrote. Editing while writing is not advisable.

Have Someone Else Serve as Your Motivational Coach

My mother knew how badly I wanted to go to a new school. I’m sure she wanted me to get into that school just as much, but she never showed it.

She did, however, make sure to ask me every day that month how my book was going. The topic found its way into our everyday lives, whether she asked if I had been up in my bedroom writing or doing something else, how many words I was up to, etc.

Accountability ‘buddies’ and motivational coaches are helpful, but arguably more helpful if they’re also completing the same task. Find someone else who wants to write a book and check on them repeatedly.

A great option is NaNoWriMo, a writing site where every November people log their word counts on the site, discuss their difficulties, and their triumphs. I wrote my sequel during that event. I later lost all 40,000 words of the sequel, but that’s another story.

If it’s not November and NaNoWriMo sounds good to you, they run “Camp NaNoWriMo” in April and July, which gives you access to that same, valuable writing community. Don’t use waiting until November as an excuse.

If a fifteen-year-old kid can write a book in a month after wasting 10 of those days editing before finishing the draft, you can do it in a lot less time. You won’t need to hire an editor if you use free proofreading software and ask a couple of friends. Additionally, printing books isn’t necessary nowadays with eBooks programs you can sell your book through.

Chances are you have more experience writing than the average person if you’re reading this article, and you have more pressing goals than getting into high school to motivate you. You can do it. Think big.

The time is now. Good luck.

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