The Million Word March

This originally published as a post in February 2011; some update editing has been done.

One million words. That’s the amount I’ve been told it takes before most writers are any good at their craft–and no, that doesn’t include rewrites. To give you an idea of the scale here, the entire Bible (Old and New Testament) runs under eight hundred thousand words. The usual advice for new authors submitting their first novel is to aim for around eighty thousand words; for fantasy and science fiction, that goes up to a hundred twenty five thousand words, because building a fictional world takes a lot of extra words.

On the other hand, my first novel, Secrets of the Sands, came in at a hundred forty thousand words, and nobody seems to have minded that length at all. My publisher, Mercury Retrograde Press, has told me that a story is as long as it needs to be, and not to worry over word count. (Yes, I’m exceptionally lucky to have such a great publisher. I know. I’m also a good enough writer at this point that she trusts me to cut the flab to a minimum. I’ve earned that leeway.) But one million words came first for me, no question about it. I’ve been writing since I was a kid, and I’ve gone through endless writing exercises, classes, failed attempts, bad novels, short stories, and even poetry (although I try not to let most people see those efforts).

I’m absolutely not trying to discourage anyone who’s just starting out, as an adult, by giving that million word target. I believe writing is the most rewarding and incredible career choice I could have made, and I believe we need more good writers in the world. We need as many good writers as possible, because humans need stories as much as we need food and water. Stories tell us who we are and why we do what we do; where we come from and where we’re headed.

Starting from scratch on anything can be a lot harder when you’re an adult. Everything is easier, from languages to creative innovation, for a kid. Adults have built up patterns, habits, mindsets, and a whole different set of neuroses to cope with; it can be awfully difficult to get from zero to full speed in any kind of reasonable time. There is a flip side, however: with age (as you may have heard somewhere before) comes maturity, experience, and discipline. Writers who start from an adult perspective may well spend less time floundering around in the experimental and derivative stage, going straight to the stuff that matters and blowing past those who have labored longer. I’ve seen it happen, and it’s spectacular to see someone who was barely hooking sentences together coherently a year before walk away with a large writing contest prize. It’s also very humbling.

So becoming a “real writer”, no matter what the starting age, can be done, and it’s worth aiming for, whether you want to create memoirs or a science-fiction series. Writing is the most fun you can have, any time of day or night, legal in all states and even most other countries, and it doesn’t require you to wear nylons or ties to get the job done. (And yes, writing in your pajamas while the rest of the world labors in suits is just as much fun as it’s rumored to be.)

A friend once told me that unless an artist has over three hundred works already completed, she doesn’t consider them a “real artist”, because it takes that long just to prove you’re serious and have some notion of what you’re doing. A musician must put hundreds of hours of practice into working with their chosen instruments before they qualify for the barest notice. A chef prepares hundreds of meals before they’re hired by a class establishment; thousands before they appear on TV with their own show. And so on.

Writers have it no different: our goal can be set at a million words. And while that may seem a high ladder to climb when you’re staring at the first rung, it goes by surprisingly fast once you begin, and the real trick isn’t to keep going–it’s to make the process fun enough that when you arrive at the top and find the next ladder waiting for you, you’ll leap forward to grab it. I’ve seen people reach the top of their first ladder and decide the view’s just fine from here, thanks; they’d rather be at the top of a climb than start all over at the bottom of a new one. That’s an individual decision, and not one anyone has the right to turn their nose up at. I’m determined to keep growing and learning, myself, and I’m more than happy to help others who want to keep up with me–my various mentors have been exceptionally generous with their time, expertise, and energy over the years, and I’d be letting them down if I did less for those asking me for help.

There are specific steps to becoming a writer; techniques that work and others that don’t. Everyone develops their own methods and madness, and a class can’t teach you how to be a writer past a certain point. I believe most writing classes handicap themselves by starting far too late in the process: they start by talking about writing. The problem with that is, writing is the end result of a lot of other decisions, and if you don’t already have the discipline, organization, professionalism, and determination parts sorted out, learning to write is going to take a whole lot longer than it needs to.

I’ve developed a writing class which starts from the ground basics before it ever touches writing methods. I teach people to be in it for the long haul, to work from a solid foundation; as Sara Zarr relates in her recent speech, one literary agent she spoke to pointed out, “The time between when you are no longer a beginner but you are not yet in the business is the hardest and no one can tell you how long this phase will last.”

To me, that means that beginners are the lucky ones–because they have the chance to start out knowing how hard this is going to be, and preparing for that slow, sloggy stretch of not-quite-amateur but not-yet-professional, the same way one would prepare for hurricane season or stock a fire extinguisher in the kitchen. It’s going to happen. Get ready for it now, and you’ll sail right through without a hitch.

Those who have already been writing for years can also benefit from this class, by going back to the basics, seeing their work from a new angle, and learning to have fun with writing again. If you’re in that trough between newbie and pro, this is a good chance to bring some spark back into your writing and reaffirm your faith that you’ll get there in the end.

This class has, in the past, run through Cozy Corner of Virginia Beach (now, sadly, out of business). I do not have a class running at this point in time, but am willing to hold this class in Williamsburg or in Newport News as well, if enough people are interested and a suitable location can be found. The price of the class would depend on the price I have to pay in rent for the location and the number of students; I want to keep the price as low as possible to make this class very accessible. If you or someone you know in the Peninsula area are seriously interested, and can round up at least five people total for the class, please contact me (leona@leonawisoker.com) and I’ll put a class together that meets everyone’s location and budgetary needs.

I’ll leave you with this thought:

One million words.

What are you waiting for?