Writing a book can be quite difficult and especially if it’s your first book. The sheer nervousness and pressure of starting your very first book are enough for you to keep putting it off. 

However, if you want to pursue your dreams, you must not give in to the temptation so here is the guide for seven simple ways to write your first book.

1. Decide What Your Book Is Going to Be About
2. Break Your Story Into Pieces
3. Focus on Quality
4. Set a Word Count Every Day
5. Keep Yourself Motivated
6. Get Tons of Feedback
7. Publish Your Final Product

Step 1: Decide What Your Book Is Going to Be About

Before getting anything started, you need to figure out for yourself what your big idea is. You may already have an idea in your mind or perhaps you have absolutely no clue as to what you are going to write. 

For situations like these, it’s best to get the destination right and start from a goal. Here, start jotting down the genre of your book, characters, tone, takeaway, age group and work from there. This way you will have a structure to work on instead of starting from scratch and losing your motivation midway. 

Step 2: Break Your Story Into Pieces

After knowing what you’re going to write about, you should try to visualise a rough version of your story. 

As a general rule of thumb, a book should have a good outline to start with and a book will always be viewed in three phases which includes the Beginning, Middle and the End. 

However, it is often easier to break your story into many more small parts since the way to do anything successfully is to take things one step at a time.

Step 3: Focus on Quality

When writing a book, it is absolutely necessary to focus on quality more rather than quantity.

Remember your book needs to have an impact on people. They need to live it in a way they live their own lives. Therefore, it is crucial you commit yourself to only writing quality words in the book. 

Don’t worry, you won’t get the perfect draft in one go. The key here is to keep writing and revising it until you get to a point where every plot twist, scene, page, and chapter relate to the next. The more cohesive, the better. 

Step 4: Set a Word Count Every Day

That said, where quality plays a huge role, there are times when we get carried away with perfectionism that we forget to make the move in the first place. Don’t feel motivated? Write. Too tired? Write. Don’t think you are good enough? Write. 

Keep writing until you reach a habit to work on your book for several hours a day. This way even if you end up writing a not-so-perfect piece by the end of the day,  you can devote the same hours to going back and revising the story. 

Another thing that does wonders for first-time writers is to have a decluttered working space. Because let’s admit it, as casual as it may sound, you will never be able to get anything done by simply rolling in your bed all day. 

You should create a special writing space to have specifically for writing so when you sit down in front of your computer, you are fully prepared to go for the word count of the day and feel motivated to complete the task. 

Step 5: Keep Yourself Motivated

Every year millions of books get started but only a handful of them actually make it to the publishing stage solely because writers had given up halfway or just weren’t interested anymore. 

You don’t want to be one of them, don’t you? 

Being motivated is also an important part of writing a book especially to avoid writer’s block which is one of the writers’ biggest enemies so it’s better if you focus on being motivated and have a clear WHY in front of you. 

A few good ways to stay motivated is that you should create a list of things with why you want to write a book and you should also often reward yourself at important milestones.

Also Read: How to Overcome Writer’s Block 

Step 6: Get Tons of Feedback

Getting feedback is always a good idea for your first book whether you’re getting it from your fellow worker, friends or just family members. Here, remember you should get the opinions of at least three different people since everyone has a different mindset. 

Therefore, everyone looks at things in different ways so other people reading might just give you great feedback that would completely tie your book together or perhaps just fix mistakes that you failed to notice.

Step 7: Publish Your Final Product

After months of writing and editing and rewriting, you have finished your book but successfully writing is a book that is only ever complete if you publish.

There are two ways of publishing which are Indie publishing (self-publishing) and traditional publishing. 

Both of these methods come with their own set of pros and cons which you can read about in my depth guide on Indie publishing vs Traditional Publishing. 

After your book is officially published, begin your journey with book marketing through social media, Facebook groups or let famous influencers review your book for utmost exposure. 

Lastly, you should be ready to embrace failure as mistakes also ultimately lead to success and who knows when the satisfaction of getting people to read your first book leads to another work? 

Good luck!