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If you do a google search for the best tips for new authors, you’ll be inundated with a ton of advice. Some suggestions will be good… others, not so much. Below are some of my favorite tips from famous authors out there:

1. Be open to criticism – Be it from your peers, your beta readers, and most importantly your editor. You have to be open to listening to your editor! (Stephen King)
2. Write for yourself, not the market – Write what you care about. Don’t try to write for the market or just to sell. If you aren’t writing what your passionate about it will never sell. (Neil Gaiman)
3. Practice makes perfect – Writing is like a sport. If you don’t practice you’ll never get better. Just a little bit every day – a page a day – will make you better. (Rick Riordan)
4. Ask practical questions – The moment you make a decision about your story, a character choice, a plot choice, etc. you need to ask yourself practical questions about it. How will that work? How will it affect the characters? When you start asking yourself those types of practical questions and finding answers then the unrealistic becomes realistic. It becomes possible. (Salman Rushdie)
5. Teach yourself that everything is interesting – A common desire for new writers is to edit everything, and although editing is VERY important, you don’t want to edit yourself as you write. Put everything into your story – everything is interesting – everything is important. You can edit out what really doesn’t matter at the end, when you’ve finished your first draft. (Malcolm Gladwell)

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