Writing stories is akin to dreaming while wide awake, except it’s depicted in words rather than dream images. It’s often said that everyone has at least one decent story in them. The problem a lot of the time is finding it. You should see my own ideas file as I’m still looking.

Hello everyone

It’s often said that everyone has at least one decent story in them. The problem a lot of the time is finding it. You should see my own ideas file as I’m still looking. You have to decide not only between the good and the bad ideas but also the ones that needs some thought and development or just let to stew until a good time to write them. Sometimes you’re lucky and can see the entire plot and know if it’s worth writing right away. Anything else is just storycraft and practice. Probably explains why so many people enjoy reading fiction than write it as it’s a lot of hard work. However, you have to understand fiction at some level to read and understand its rules without being told what they are. When you look at the pages of pointers off the SFC main page, its only then there is a realisation of how much you know, take for granted or even forgotten about that you have to start remembering the rules and applying the basics.



When it comes to writing your story, especially Science Fiction, having a level of imagination helps as well but a lot of that can be guided by the decision process and that is something you can employ from real life. In fact, you still need to know about real life and other subjects, as well how to research quickly, and not get too distracted. At the plotting stage, you just measure up the choices you can make on a decision and use the one that’s most likely to work and seem logical and be flexible enough to change things if a better idea or solution comes up. Characters that exist on the page can make a different decision depending entirely on the mindset you provide for them. Then you wonder why some writers say their stories write themselves. They don’t really, it just stems from knowing what each of the components do at an instinctive level. If all storywriting was that easy…

Describing the storymaking process in this way tends to make it look all too easy and you’d wonder why not more people don’t take up writing. A lot of it is down to incentive. A lot of the time it is not financial. Very few writers made vast sums of money from all the effort they put into the confines of a room and forsaking social activity just to put words on paper or typing into a DOC file. There has to be a love of writing for its own sake first of all. Without that, writing becomes a chore that you have to complete rather than something you enjoy doing. Being an innate storyteller helps a lot. If other people like the story, that’s a bonus, especially as you’re already working on the next story.

But how do you know if you have the qualities necessary to write? Imagine you have a power-cut, lousy weather or whatever and in an isolated room for a day with little incentive to go out and all you have is a couple notebooks or pad of paper and a pen. Would you twiddle your thumbs, make paper darts or write something?

The first two activities can become tedious after an hour or two. If you just doddle, then you might decide art might be more your thing. I suspect most of you will end up writing something, even if it’s your plans of what to do when you get out, shopping list or even your last will and testament. Writing can come in all shapes and forms, be it articles or stories. They might not be any good at first but practice makes perfect and in isolation, you’d get plenty of that. You might even fall in love with doing such things, especially if it’s fun. Anything beyond that depends on whether other people enjoy your work as well but that’s a different story.

Being able to understand a story isn’t quite the same thing as writing one. After all, at school, we all read books. If anything, writing Science Fiction means a greater use of imagination and it’s rare for someone with no interest in our genre to write it, let alone write well without hitting on ideas that have been turned into stories in the past. Our interest in the fantastic also means we’re open to greater possibilities than mundane fiction, which is mostly stuck to one community or world. Science Fiction can take in a lot more and explore all the genres basic plots before adding its own variants.

The great joy is that you can take up writing at any age. What inspires you has to be more than an isolated room. I write because I can and its very much second nature. I’ve had extended isolation in my youth as well but I was creative long before that. I just had the opportunity to let it mature earlier.

Part of my job as editor is to inspire people like you reading this to write. Don’t try writing a novel from the start. That’s running before you can walk properly. Starting with short stories gives you a better chance to learn how to write well and know you can complete a tale and get the kinks out of your storytelling. Everyone has a half-complete novel because they ran out of steam. If you think you have a novel-length idea, note and store it away until you’re capable of writing it. Start small and work up. You’d be surprised how your confidence will soar knowing you can complete a story. Then you have to keep writing more stories to show that you haven’t written a fluke.

If you think others will enjoy your story, then is the time to try it on other people, like yours truly, for instance. Don’t rely on relatives and friends to tell you how good your material is. They’re not likely to want to get on your bad side nor do they have the experience to look for flaws. If anything, from an editor’s perspective, it comes with the job that we look for the errors first before anything that is good. Mostly because that is what you, the reader or viewer, will also do. Look at how many of you nick-pick a film for factual errors or continuity mistakes. You’re never going to stop them happening, but they can be minimalised. An editor’s job, if done correctly, is to make sure they spot the egg before it breaks on your face. The writer is often too close to his or her own material to spot the mistakes, but once you know what to look for, polishing the draft will at least sort some of them out. That will probably reveal others but as I said at the beginning, practice makes perfect. When you start getting it more right than wrong, the number of re-drafts or polishes do go down which is always a stumbling block to success. It’s a lot easier to polish a short story than a novel as you’re developing your storycraft.

Developing as a story writer is all about hanging on in there and working at it, mostly because writing is a survivors field. Those who don’t, excuse the term, hack it, don’t tend to last. Practice makes perfect. You’ll be forever learning and it’s a wonderful learning curve if you get hooked. If other people like your work then that’s a bonus. You might even be lucky enough to find that one decent story in you that everyone will love and read. You might find more. Only you can discover that.

It’s said that reading is good for your mental health. Writing well must really improve on that. Maybe I’ve inspired some of you to write. I’m quite good at doing that. You might even let me see some of your efforts.

Thank you, take care, good night and think isolation and then write.

Geoff Willmetts
editor: SFCrowsnest.co.uk

Observation: Think back to the French Revolution and the old ladies who were knitting as royalty and dissenters were sent to Madame Guillotine. Just what were they knitting exactly? It couldn’t have been for anything above the neck, surely?

A Zen thought:An ‘i’ upside down is an exclamation mark!

NB: Anyone interested in reviewing books for me, especially fantasy and military SF, as we have a surfeit of books, and lives in the UK should contact me through gfwillmetts@hotmail.com. I’m always recruiting and details are through a link on the top of the SFC main page and in the SFC Forum. If you’ve on a budget, a book for a review is a good bargain and I can teach the nervous how to do it by seeing what you do when you present a sample. It’s a good deal. We get books in a variety of formats these days so all things are possible to those with the knack for putting words into sentences. We would dearly like a few more fantasy fan and military sub-genre SF readers on the team as well as those who just like Science Fiction.

PPS Don’t forget to join on in the new SFCrowsnest Forum. Join up and express your thoughts in leaving typed words that make sentences. I’ve noticed many of you are joining up but the Forum isn’t supposed to be a passive site. Remember the editorial above. I’m not advocating a vow of silence. Are you going to be a lurker or a typer??!! Remember the editorial above, passivity is for sheep not a sentient species. The number of hits shown on the Forum aren’t daily, but for every ten minutes! Write something and others will respond. Equally, you could just be a guest and look around but the more the merrier when you have something to say. We haven’t been spammed since inception with this new version now so you should feel safe to come and communicate on anything Science Fiction. I’m dying to see you people fill in the survey polls. They won’t bite y’know and are active when you sign in and you must be dying to find out why I consider Element Lad the most powerful Legionnaire. I’m still pondering on any differences with the current changes in the DC Universe will have on that idea.

Speaking of the Forum, if you want up-to-date info of book signings and such, have a peak. You don’t have to sign up to have a look as to when these things are happening and I’ve yet to hear of a flash crowd turning up for such things but there’s always the first time. We’re not libel if you do such a thing, just to keep my boss happy.

Don’t forget, I’m always on the lookout for new reviewers as well as articles, interviews and stories and after some recent changes, let’s see if the full details about that appears below. If they don’t then look in the new Forum or on the link line at the top of the main page. For potential book reviewers in the UK, it’s a good way to keep up your reading habit and show you can write. There are detail links scattered over the website and on the forum. If you don’t think you’re up to scratch, you’ll discover why I’m the dutch uncle.

Another real Zen thought but this time for potential writers: If you can express an opinion independently of others and aren’t likely to bend to the masses then you might show potential as a writer.

Zen for those who are scared by all the instructions below: Many of the instructions are things you should be doing automatically if you’re developing your writing skills. If you do them already then focus on the ones that you don’t get right. They are there to help you as much as me to get the best writing from you. If you think you’re 80% there then I’ll help you get the final 20%. Trust me, I’m an editor and I can get things right.