Your Next Draft

You Can't Skip Learning How to Write a Novel. Here's Why


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Before you can master writing great stories, you have to learn to craft great stories.

When I was fifteen, I got my learner’s permit and began learning how to drive a car.

This made me very unhappy.

See, I wanted to know how to drive a car. I didn’t want to learn to drive a car.

Knowing how to drive a car was fun, freeing, and exciting. Learning to drive a car was dangerous, tedious, dangerous, difficult, and also dangerous.

Writers, I find, feel the same way about writing great books.

Writers want to write great books. They don’t want to learn how to write great books.

The stakes aren’t life or death. But the sentiment is the same.

And just like fifteen-year-old me, writers face an uncomfortable truth:

You can’t skip the learning stage of skill development. If you want to write great books, you have to spend time learning to write great books.

In this episode, I’m digging into what it really takes to learn the skill of writing great books—and how to know when you’ve mastered it.

You’ll learn:

  • The 2 stages of skill development I see in writers
  • Why you just can’t skip the learning stage (no matter how much we all want to!)
  • 3 features of the learning stage (yes, features, not bugs!)
  • And more!

The amazing book you want to craft is on the other side of the learning stage.

Check out the episode and build the skills that empower you to write it.

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Your Next DraftBy Alice Sudlow

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