Five Steps to Becoming a Writer

by Adventures in YA Publishing

Great writing advice never grows old. Great advice can be the one thing that helps you stay alive as you cross a barren desert of rejection or the rocky mountains of self doubt. We welcome Julie Eshbaugh, author of IVORY AND BONE, here today as she guides us along a five step journey towards publication!

What Advice Would You Give to Other Writers?

“Not everyone will take the same path to publication. There’s more than one way to get there, and there’s no schedule that says you need to be there by a certain age or time in your life.”

With my debut novel about to be released, I think about these types of things a lot lately. If you’ll indulge my love of lists, I would like to share five pieces of advice that I can see, looking back, helped me grow as a writer and reach the point where I am now. I just want to say upfront, though, that I don’t feel like I’m giving this advice from the perspective of someone who has “arrived,” or “made it.” Getting published is just one step in the journey, (although an exciting one!) and I want to stress the fact that I don’t feel that I have all the answers!

1.) Form friendships with other writers

Writing can be a very lonely pursuit, and there is nothing that helped me more on this journey than the other writers I met who had the same goals I had. Also, pay it forward. Be supportive of writers who are a step or two behind you. Twitter is a wonderful place to meet other writers, as are blogs like this one. When I signed with my first agent six years ago, I had just joined a writing blog called Let the Words Flow. That blog grew into Pub(lishing) Crawl, and I still blog with that team today. Without the support of the Pub Crawl contributors and readers, this road would have been a lot harder.

2.) Make Good Art

The day you learn that an editor wants to make an offer on your book will be a wonderful day, but there are often lots of disappointments along the way. Most writers have at least one manuscript that goes out on submission and does not find a home. (I had two.) When you feel frustrated or dejected or full of doubt, the best thing you can do is turn to the work. Throw yourself into a writing project, because the writing will always be there for you. It will remind you that you love the process. It will remind you that you love story. The famous commencement speech by Neil Gaiman entitled “Make Good Art,” says all of this better than I can. You can watch a great animated excerpt from it here.

3.) Harbor no regrets

Not everyone will take the same path to publication. There’s more than one way to get there, and there’s no schedule that says you need to be there by a certain age or time in your life. If you wrote two novels that didn’t get published (like I did,) it might be tempting to look back and second guess the decisions you made when you chose which projects to work on, or to question other past choices, like what you studied in school or what you did for your day job. Don’t waste time making wishes about the past. Be grateful for the experiences you’ve had, because those things have given you your unique perspective that only you can bring to your writing.

4.) Remind yourself every day that you’re a writer

It can be really hard to think of yourself as a writer when you have a busy day job and other responsibilities that fight to claim your identity. It was especially hard for me because I wasn’t willing to tell anyone beyond my family and writer friends that I was writing. But I used small tricks to constantly reinforce my understanding of who I was. I created passwords that reminded me of writing, for instance, and kept encouraging emails from my CP at the top of my inbox. I also wrote every day—something I highly recommend—so I would never forget I was a writer first.

5.) Maintain a folder of writing ideas so you always have something to work on next

As I said earlier, it’s easy to get discouraged when agents or editors pass on your work. When the book right before IVORY AND BONE didn’t find a home with a publisher, I was pretty discouraged. Fortunately, I had a folder on my desktop with several ideas sketched out, and I chose to work on a prehistoric fantasy I’d been thinking about for years. By minimizing the downtime between projects, I didn’t have time to think about the rejection or feel sorry for myself. I had a new goal and I set deadlines for myself to finish the draft. I fell in love with the new story fairly quickly, and it helped me avoid a real writing slump.

“Getting published is just one step in the journey”

That’s it! Those are five pieces of advice that helped me reach my goal of becoming a published author. I hope you find something here helpful on your own journey to publication. Thank you so much to Adventures in YA Publishing for having me as their guest here today.

ABOUT THE BOOK

Ivory and Bone
by Julie Eschbaugh
Hardcover
HarperTeen
Released 6/7/2016

A prehistoric fantasy—with allusions to Pride and Prejudice.

Hunting, gathering, and keeping his family safe—that’s the life seventeen-year-old Kol knows. Then bold, enigmatic Mya arrives from the south with her family, and Kol is captivated. He wants her to like and trust him, but any hopes of impressing her are ruined when he makes a careless—and nearly grave—mistake. However, there’s something more to Mya’s cool disdain…a history wrought with loss that comes to light when another clan arrives. With them is Lo, an enemy from Mya’s past who Mya swears has ulterior motives.

As Kol gets to know Lo, tensions between Mya and Lo escalate until violence erupts. Faced with shattering losses, Kol is forced to question every person he’s trusted. One thing is for sure: this was a war that Mya or Lo—Kol doesn’t know which—had been planning all along.

Purchase Ivory and Bone on Amazon
Purchase Ivory and Bone on IndieBound
View Ivory and Bone on Goodreads

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Julie Eshbaugh is the author of the upcoming Ivory and Bone (HarperCollins, 2016). She used to have trouble staying in one spot, having lived in places as varied as Utah, France, and New York City. Julie eventually returned home to the Philadelphia area, where she now lives with her husband, son, cat and dog. Her favorite moments are when the unexpected happens and she cheers loudest when the pitcher gets a hit.

She is the author of IVORY AND BONE.

Website | Twitter | Goodreads | Pinterest | Instagram

-posted by Michelle Taylor-

Adventures in YA Publishing

This is the user name for posts from Adventures in YA Publishing that did not have a specific author.

Post © Adventures in YA Publishing. All rights reserved.

Posted: Jun 8, 2016

Category: Imported from AYAP

Tags: WOW Wednesday | Writing Inspiration

Welcome to Transmedia Mutts

Yellow origami dog on a teal background

Unleash your creative bark!

Shout out to AYAP!

Logo for Adventures in YA Publishing

Thank you to the women who started Adventures in YA Publishing and ran it for years. AYAP and TMM have merged to form Adventures in PUPlishing, and the legacy AYAP posts are now part of TMM. Click here to learn more about the earlier AYAP team.

Click to Join our Facebook Group

Share advice, practice pitching, celebrate successes, and support each other through writing and publishing adventures.

← Previous: Eight Steps to Applying the Right Revision Tool for Your Manuscript Next: TONIGHT: Twitter Live Chat With Agent Kelly Peterson →

The first slide is an animation of a science/magic room in a castle. A cartoon character of a mad-scientist looking man in in the foreground says: “Hello! Dr. Frankenstein here to say, Well Done on kid lit zombie week! I’m an expert at reviving the dead, and let me assure you, with a little spark, you can bring dead projects to life. Especially if you dig up parts from other dead things. I’ll even let you have a sneak peek at my laboratory’s store room to consider potential parts for your dead project. If you see something with a yellow glow, that means you should click it. Have fun!”

He points to the right side of the screen and a new scene slides in of a castle science/magic storage room. There are various cartoon Frankenstein body parts scattered around. Some of them have a yellow glow. If you click on them, the images below appear (I’ve added alt text to them, so I hope it works).

The Heart of your story is the main character. The protagonist is the beating core that truly brings your story to life. If your MC doesn't make kids (and their grown-ups) care within the first few pages, your story will flatline. </p>
<p>Your main character needs to be:<br />
• Relatable enough for kids to see themselves<br />
• Unique enough to stand out in the slush pile<br />
• Active enough to drive the story<br />
• Memorable enough to survive multiple readings at bedtime</p>
<p>Where do you find this amazing donor heart? It might be the very thing you loved so much about the manuscript you want to revive. It might be the younger sister from your shelved YA novel. Or maybe it’s the hilarious kid you blogged about meeting at a school visit. Find a character beating with potential and place it in the center of your story.<br />

The Brain of your story is the theme or central message. The theme is the big idea that controls everything else. Picture books are more than stories - they're tiny life lessons disguised with humor and heart.</p>
<p>But your theme needs to be:<br />
• Subtle enough not to trigger the dreaded "didactic" rejection<br />
• Clear enough for a four-year-old to grasp<br />
• Universal enough to speak to both kids and adults<br />
• Fresh enough to prevent agents and editors from responding with "Not another sharing/bedtime/first-day story!"</p>
<p>Check your other dead manuscripts to see if there is a recurring theme, something that really seems to be speaking to you. Find the bit of poetry you scribbled on the back of a receipt to see what theme inspired it. Reread the pep talk you texted your critique partner at 1am. Pick the theme that will drive your story, giving it purpose, direction, and deeper meaning.<br />

The Legs of your story is the plot. Not to be confused with a grave plot.🤪 The plot is what keeps everything upright and moving, as well as providing support for all the other elements. You have very few words to use in a picture book, so you need to do a lot with each plot point.</p>
<p>In general, your plot should:<br />
• Hook readers fast<br />
• Build tension that a child can follow<br />
• Create page turns that feel natural<br />
• Wrap up in a way that satisfies</p>
<p>You can borrow a plot twist (a leg) from one manuscript and the opening (the other leg) from a different manuscript. Consider if the subplot of the middle grade novel you trunked would work better as a picture book. Or maybe your Facebook post about a disastrous camping trip could become a story for kids. Just keep putting one foot in front of the other until you have your storyline.

The Arms of your story are the side characters.

The Torso of your story is the setting. Setting helps a story breathe and connects all the elements of the story. It isn't just where your story lives, it's what makes your story ALIVE. It's the difference between "this happened in a park" and "this happened in that park, the one with the twisty slide that burns your legs and the creaky swing that sounds like a baby crying.”</p>
<p>Your setting should:<br />
• Make your character's world feel real<br />
• Contain your story in a way that makes sense to young readers<br />
• Connect different scenes and moments organically<br />
• Give your illustrator enough room to add visual subplots</p>
<p>Half-finished manuscripts are a great place to dig up settings, since you worked out the place details before the plot petered out. Or maybe you had to cut a second fantastic location from your chapter book. You can also revisit the detailed caption from your Instagram carousel documenting your tour of that delish candy shop. Disinter a robust setting that can house all of your story's vital organs.

After you press the Click When Done circle button, the lights flash with the sound of electricity buzzing. Then the screen goes black and lightning zaps across the screen with the sound of thunder.

The screen then lights up to show the storage room, and all the Frankenstein pieces have been assembled into the whole monster. An upbeat song plays in the background. Then a speech bubble pops up with the words, “I’m alive! I’M ALIVE!” Then the screen goes to black.

Dog holding a sign that says Pupdates!

Sign up for our newsletter for pupdates and publishing advice