So You Want to Be a “Real” Author? Choose Your Own Adventure.

Your Quest Begins.

Words have always been important to you. In your youth, you read, you dreamed, and you scribbled little stories and poems in your notebooks. You collect writing books and quotes the way your aunt collected Beanie Babies, and you absolutely have a favorite mug for your coffee or tea. You can feel it in your bones—you have always been destined to be a writer.

Now you’re on a quest: the quest to become a real author. You’ve always loved writing, but you’re having a tiny case of imposter’s syndrome. People keep wondering if you’re famous, if you’re even published, and if this is just a little hobby or your path to the next best-seller. You’re tired of the uncertainty, and it’s time for a change. You’re going to make this so real that nobody can ever argue that you’re not an author again.

This quest is a journey of choices, choices that will determine what form your path takes. Are you ready? Buckle up and proceed to chapter one.

Chapter One: Your Life

You decide to give Twitter a chance so you can follow agents, editors, and your favorite authors, and you quickly discover a thriving community of other writers who sport all kinds of hashtags and are eager to welcome you in. You might be the kind of person who eats up this kind of social interaction, or you might be ready to delete your account because it all feels too weird. Either way, you’ve decided to give a writer’s chat a chance first.

The first question they ask is what your life is like—how much time do you focus on writing? The question was to everyone, and you already piped up during the introductions, so you feel like you have to answer. What do you tell them?

• If you work three jobs and write when you should be sleeping, go to chapter two.
• If you recently quit your day job to become a full-time writer, go to chapter two.
• If you work from home and alternate business responsibilities with writing, go to chapter two.
• If you’re a stay-at-home parent balancing raising your kids and writing, go to chapter two.

Chapter Two: Inspiration

The writers in the Twitter chat were really friendly! You know better than to compare, but you spent a good bit of time comparing their lives to yours and were a little surprised by how different you are. Even so, it was exhilarating to get to gush about the magic of words and the tea vs. coffee debate and your favorite characters with people who really get you. It doesn’t matter what your scrooge of an uncle thinks—the one who is always suggesting that your “little writing hobby” is a phase best grown out of. Writing is something special enough for there to be communities based around it, and you’re feeling affirmed.

The high also has you feeling inspired. You just had a great idea, and now it’s time to act like a writer. What idea will you be exploring? 

• If you decide to write a memoir, go to chapter three.
• If you decide to write a novel loosely based on your life, go to chapter three.
• If you decide to write a novel that borrows from your personality, experiences, or struggles, go to chapter three.
• If you decide to write a novel that’s about a character who is nothing like you going through things you’ve never had to deal with, go to chapter three.

Chapter Three: Planning

It feels good to be inspired, and you’re excited to start planning your book. You decide this merits a writer-style outing, so you pack up your go-to writing tools and head over to the nearest coffee shop to snag a table and your favorite drink. After people-watching for a while (would that conversation two tables over fit into your story?), you catch yourself starting to scroll through your phone and quickly shove it to the other side of the table. It’s time to get ready to write.

What do you do to plan your book before you can begin to write?

• If you take a basic premise and characters and just run with it, go to chapter four.
• If you make sure you know the beginning and end of the story and intend to fill in the details as you go, go to chapter four.
• If you plan a three-act outline with carefully-paced plot arcs, go to chapter four.
• If you carefully outline every chapter before beginning, go to chapter four.

Chapter Four: Writing

Way to go! You took your inspiration and made a plan, and you feel pretty good about where you’re taking this book. There’s only one thing left to do: start writing.

You’re excited to move forward and determined to do so before writer’s block slows you into inertia. When do you write?

• If you wake up early to start every day writing, go to chapter five.
• If you write when you can find time after work and on the weekends, go to chapter five.
• If you fit in at least 500 words a day even if you don’t have a consistent schedule of when to do so, go to chapter five.
• If you write in ten-minute increments whenever you can squeak it in, even if it’s just a sentence or paragraph, go to chapter five.

Chapter Five: Revising

With a rush like none other, you type “The End” on your first draft. It simultaneously feels like forever ago and just yesterday that you began. You try not to judge yourself one way or another, though. You’ve heard of authors who breezed through their first draft in less time than it took you, and you’ve heard of other authors who took much longer to wrangle their story to the page. That doesn’t matter right now—the important part is that you made it this far.

You take some time to let your work breathe and enjoy your victory, and then it’s time to jump back into the work ahead of you: editing your book. How do you tackle revision?

• If you carefully work through your own chapters following checklists or books, go to chapter six.
• If you rely on your trusty CPs and/or beta readers to help you identify and solve the book’s problems, go to chapter six.
• If you work with a professional editor to strengthen your writing, go to chapter six.
• If you use a mix of these methods to edit your story, go to chapter six.

Chapter Six: Publishing

You’ve worked and worked to get your book polished and as true to how you want it as possible. Now you look back on that first draft fondly, but kind of like a child that had to grow up before becoming a finished project. You head back online and start researching your options for transforming your book from a document on your computer to a “real” book out there in the world

Whatever you choose is going to take still more work, but you’re ready to see this through to the end. How do you decide to get published?

• If you patiently circulate your query letter until you get an agent deal and catch a big publishing house’s eye, go to the final chapter.
• If you accept an offer from a small press after researching to make sure they’re not a vanity press, go to the final chapter.
• If you hire a cover designer and self-publish your book on your own terms, go to the final chapter.
• If you decide not to sell your book and instead post it online or print copies at the local printer for your family members or friends, go to the final chapter.

Final Chapter: You’re an author!

Congratulations, author. You’ve arrived. Flip through those beautiful pages on your tablet or lift them to your face to smell that fresh paper. You have officially succeeded in your quest. Looking back at your journey, you can see that your path looked very different from many of the other writers you’ve observed. At the same time, however, it wasn’t different at all. You wrote, you revised, and you presented your words to the world.

You might still encounter people who can’t see past the surface to recognize that your path is the author’s path, but you don’t have to listen to them. The details of your journey might change the next time you walk it, but what doesn’t change is that you are a real author. Welcome home.