How to Write a Book

Keep an idea file and add to it before you choose. The idea that still interests you after a month of notes is the one with enough in it for 300 pages. Pick a genre early, even loosely, because readers of a mystery, a romance or a fantasy arrive with promises the book has to keep. Read three recent books in that genre with a pencil: where the first chapter ends, when the main problem arrives, how long the chapters run.

Test the premise against the ending you imagine. If the protagonist could solve the problem in chapter two by making a phone call, the obstacle is too weak. If nothing changes for them when they fail, the stakes are too low. A strong premise also suggests the inciting incident, the event that starts the story moving, and usually the kind of climax the book is heading toward.

A profile is useful when it ends in scenes you can write: what this person would never do, and the situation that would make them do it. Give secondary characters a want of their own, or they will exist only to help the protagonist. Names do work too. A name fixes a character's age, place and family, so choose it for the year they were born, not the year you write.

A simple outline has the beginning, a turn that commits the protagonist to the problem, a midpoint that changes the problem, the worst moment, and the ending. The three-act structure is one way to place those; a beat sheet is a finer one. Write each turn as a sentence about what changes, not a summary of what happens. When the draft departs from the outline, update the outline: it is a map of the book you are writing, not a contract.

End each session in the middle of a scene, or with a note on what happens next, so tomorrow starts with writing instead of deciding. Keep research and rereading for a different time of day than drafting. A month-long challenge such as 50,000 words in 30 days (about 1,667 a day) is a good way to break the first-draft barrier, but the habit that finishes most books is the ordinary week.

Most first drafts sag in the middle. The fix is pressure, not filler: raise what failure would cost, take away a resource, or let a secondary character act on their own want. Write the ending even if it is rough; knowing it changes how you revise everything before it. Show what characters do and say rather than explaining what they feel, but do not police that rule in a first draft, when getting the scene down matters more.

Chapters have no fixed length. Many novels use chapters of 2,000 to 5,000 words, and thrillers often go shorter to keep the pages turning. End a chapter where a reader wants to know what happens next, not where a word count runs out. A page of a printed book holds about 250 to 300 words, so a 90,000-word novel is roughly 300 to 360 pages.

Write a one-line summary of every chapter after the first read. The list shows sagging stretches, repeated beats and threads that disappear. Keep each earlier draft rather than overwriting it, so a cut you regret can come back. Then give the book to readers who read your genre, ask them where they got bored or confused, and believe the where more than the why.

A query letter is a short pitch: the premise, the stakes, the book's length and genre, and a line about you. A synopsis tells the whole story in a page or two, ending included. Research each agent's list and submission guidelines before sending, and query in small batches so you can improve the letter. While you wait, start the next book; it is what most published novelists did.