How Not to Write a Book by Dorothy Courtis

I've been struggling with the final throes of my latest book. It's taken longer and more arm-wrestling than previous ones and I reckon I can now confidently offer you a shortlist of essentials - to make sure you never get that book written! (And some counter-advice, just in case you're crazy enough to be committed to this writing business.) So, to kick off:

Talk about it: share your brilliant idea with as many people as possible, spill out all that creative energy - and then there will be none left for the actual writing. Counter-advice: keep it close to your chest and in your prayers. Protect it as the delicate infant it is. Don't share it till it's grown and strong and able to stand on its own two feet!

Wait: till you've got a solid chunk of time to work on it; till the kids have grown up; till you're retired; till you're in the mood - you know your own desired thing you think you need before you can actually get down to work. Counter-advice: get writing. Set the smallest doable targets and hit them. I wrote and published the last 9 books on 40 minutes per day five days a week.

Demand perfection: only write what is perfect, grammatically, conceptually, theologically, sentence by sentence. That should stop any book project (or short story, poem, essay, love letter, email) in its tracks. Counter-advice: be comfortable with your own imperfection and the imperfectness of what you write. Be humble enough to be a beginner or an improver, and be willing to produce messy first drafts. (Remember editing can make it better. Not perfect. But better.)

Take on board every piece of criticism and advice: revise, rewrite, every time someone makes a critical comment or suggestion. That way you'll never get it finished (and if you do, it won't be yours any more, it will be a ragbag of knee-jerk reactions to other people's ideas. Oh and you still won't have pleased them...) And if you're at the very first stage of sharing your embryonic idea and someone says (as someone once did to me), 'Nope. Nobody wants to read that...', of course they know best... Counter-advice: you have only one person you should be aiming to please and that's the Lord Jesus. Not Amazon ratings or bestsellerdom or prizes, nice though those things can be.

Go it alone: Then you can claim to be a self-made author, it's your work, your book, your success, your achievement... Counter-advice: plug in to the limitless and amazingly creative resources of the Holy Spirit every time you sit down to write (and think about your work). And give Him the credit! 

Give up: This is the one sure-fire way you can make sure you never get that book written. Counter-advice: Relax! One source suggests 188,000 books were published in the UK this year. At a guess, I would say that you are at least as talented, bright, good at writing, creative, etc as the vast majority of those authors. The only thing they have that you may not have is the fact that they got their book written. You can claim that badge when you type THE END on yours.

Dorothy Courtis has managed to give up on more book projects than she has so far published, but she is working hard to even the score. Her next book, Push Over, is the third in a crime series set in Somerset (though this one strays into Norfolk), and is her 17th so far... Hopefully there will be time for more!