Writing Essays

As a freelance writer, you will by now have come to understand the huge opportunities that await those who want to write for the internet. Everything revolves around the cyber-media these days, and if you have not ventured into online writing and blogging yet, you are certainly losing out.

Web content writing could enable you to become a published author, or to earn an income by providing writing services to others. This is particularly the case for internet marketers that do not have the time, talent nor inclination to write their own articles or sales copy.

If you are already aware of these great freelance writing opportunities, I would suggest that you seriously consider the option of starting up a formal writing services business. There appears to be an increasing need for writers of quality search engine optimized (SEO) material, to deliver premium content to professional internet marketers, who want to raise the profile of their websites.

Most online marketers need a massive amount of content, not just for their sites, but also to publish on article directories and article marketing sites. The main purpose of doing so is to generate links to their websites, and get a higher search engine ranking.

The search engine robots just simply love sites with lots of links coming from unconnected sites, and duly reward them with great rankings.

If an internet marketer’s website is not on page one of the search engines, they will get minimal traffic. If their website is within the first 5 results for a particular search term however, then they are bound to get the attention of most visitors.

Another way of maximising your online writing is to leverage one article into many versions. Once you have created a premium quality article it can be distributed in different forms like smaller blog posts, forum comments, social networking platforms, and even made into a video or an audio.

Although previously mentioned, I cannot over emphasise the opportunities available to freelance writers that are proficient in producing high quality SEO content. If it is your desire to become a top rated SEO writing expert, and you do not have the proper credentials yet, then enrol for a training course.

Freelance writing for the internet is now being viewed as a niche writing opportunity and many colleges are running courses to specifically address this need. After you obtain your certificate of competence in SEO writing, people will come begging to use your expert online writing services.

No matter what your profession, being a better (and published) writer will increase your success. Here are some books that you will find useful to consider for your library of books about writing and publishing.

2010 Writer’s Market (Paperback).

Holy moly. This book is a treasure trove of information for anyone who is a writer. Just click on the link and once you get to the Amazon page, you’ll see several of this book’s brothers and sisters (including an on-line version), too. Note: It’s not necessary to purchase the Writer’s Market book every year, but if you intend to write and get your ideas out there in any number of different formats, then you need to buy one every couple of years, at least. You can also find this book at essentially every public library. Check it out!

Kremer, John. 1001 Ways to Market Your Books (for authors and publishers; paperback), 6th edition.

Are you kidding me? 1001 ways…. And it’s true. It’s quite the hefty book (704 pages) and it’s stunning the number of different ideas that are included. Out of that number, any one of us can surely find at least…10 ideas we can use. Or maybe even 100…

Manser, Martin H. The Facts on File Guide to Good Writing.

This book has chapters on preparing to write, revising, grammar, word usage, punctuation, etc. It’s a handy reference tool.

Winget, Larry. How to Write a Book One Page at a Time.

This book is apparently no longer in print, but maybe you can find a copy somewhere. I’ve included the link to Amazon, although you can only buy it from used booksellers. It is worth worth hunting for a copy.

McCutcheon, Marc. Damn! Why Didn’t I Write That? How Ordinary People Are Raking in $100,000 or More Writing Niche Books and How You Can, Too.

If you’ve ever had the experience of seeing a book and thinking, ‘Hmmm…I could have written this,” then you will want to read this book.

Sellers, Heather. Chapter After Chapter: Discover the Dedication and Focus You Need to Write the Book of Your Dreams.

This is a great book, especially if you are considering writing a novel. HOWEVER, and it’s a big however, I recommend it regardless. I am certainly not writing a novel and I have learned a great deal from reading this book.

Sellers, Heather. Page After Page: Discover the Confidence and Passion You Need to Start Writing and Keep Writing (No Matter What).

It’s hard to say which book in this list I recommend the most highly, but this is one of them. When I bought this book, I read a little bit of it each night before I went to sleep. I find it a scrumptious book. Both of these two books (Page After Page and Chapter After Chapter) are printed on great paper and in such an intriguing way. But it’s the content that will really be helpful to you (and has been to me).

Check out at least one of these books and see what you will learn that will keep propelling you toward more success in your writing and publishing.

According to the last three announcements of national testing scores by the National Center for Education Statistics in 1998, 2002, and 2007, only one in four or five high school seniors (depending on how you look at the figures) can write well enough-”Proficiently” or better-to succeed in college.

NCW’s Call for a Writing Revoliution

Because of the alarming 2002 statistics of writing deficiencies (same as 1998), The College Board created the National Commission on Writing (NCW) in 2002. The very next year, on April 25, 2003, the NCW issued a national press release that called “for the immediate launch of an implementation of a [five-year] campaign, the Writing Challenge to the Nation.”

Here’s my translation of what the NCW was saying:

• We call for a writing revolution because there’s a crisis in the teaching of writing in American schools-far too many of our students write too poorly to do college work.

In their 40-page document, The Neglected “R”: The Need for a Writing Revolution, the NCW strongly recommended that schools-

• hire more teachers
• train and certify teachers to teach writing
• standardize assessments of writing & train teachers in it
• hire more assistants to teachers
• have students spend much more time writing (minimum: double)
• throw a lot more money, equipment, time, & people at the teaching and practice of writing

In other words, KEEP DOING THE SAME THINGS, BUT DO A LOT MORE OF IT, spend a lot more money on it, and hope all that quantity somehow turns into quality.As they say on Sesame Street, What’s wrong with this picture?

One thing’s for sure-we shouldn’t just keep doing what we’ve been doing so unsuccessfully all along, and we shouldn’t start doing it on a larger, even more expensive scale!

Wouldn’t you agree?

Before these demands (“recommendations”) for more people, more equipment, and more money were made by the NCW, what were scholars and teachers doing to improve writing and the teaching of writing in American schools?

The answer to that gives us a fascinating historical perspective on failed scholarship pertaining to writing–

Cycles of Crisis and Panacea

In 1994, composition scholar Robert J. Connors published an essay about a broad pattern he recognized in writing scholarship. He pointed out in his essay, “Crisis and Panacea in Composition Studies: A History” (included in the book Composition in Context: Essays in Honor of Donald C. Stewart, 1994), that scholarship and intellectual activity had grown by leaps and bounds in the field of teaching writing during the past thirty years (now, forty-five years).

But Connors feels progress has been largely limited to a series of crises followed by temporary panaceas-all of which were temporary and none of which were turned into permanent, lasting solutions.

In other words, Connors documents a recurring cycle: Someone hollers “Crisis!” in writing circles, and then someone comes up with a new way to combat the problem. Everyone then focuses on that approach for ten to fifteen years, and then interest lags or money for the project runs out, things quiet down, everyone goes their own way again, and the crisis is forgotten. In a few more years, someone else hollers “Crisis!” and the cycle repeats itself.

Here is a list of panaceas or ‘solution movements’ Connors identified, from 1840 up until 1990, when he began writing his essay:

• literacy
• classroom conditions
• social aims and duties
• communications (linguistics, semantics)
• Rhetoric (traditional, generative, tagmemic, stylistic, inventional, syntactic)
• process writing
• writers’ experience
• back to basics (sentence combining, controlled composition)

Connors believes that further temporary crises, accompanied by their temporary panaceas, will continue to shape the discipline of the teaching of writing. What have teachers learned from all these crises and panaceas? Connors declares that all the failures of the past-”profitless exercises” (his terminology in the final sentence of his essay)-can be used as standards for judging all future crises in writing.Connors optimistically proclaims-for no particular reason, it seems, since he gives none-that teachers of writing won’t repeat the mistakes of the temporary crises, the temporary excitements and panics, and the temporary panaceas that are the history of teaching writing in America that he has taken so much trouble to trace and to document.

That historical accumulation of failures is somewhat akin to Thomas Edison’s view of his 2,000 failed experiments in making a light bulb. Edison is reported to have said, ‘I didn’t fail 2,000 times, I just figured out 2,000 ways that it didn’t work.’ For Connors, the discipline of teaching writing has not failed innumerable times-teachers have just found innumerable ways that are not the best ways to teach writing.

Now, I can accept that Edison remembered all his failures or had access to his own records of them, keeping them handy as archived references. But who is going to do that record keeping, that monitoring, for teachers of writing all across America?

Surely, no individual can do it. The National Council of the Teachers of English (NCTE)? The Conference on College Composition and Communication (CCCC)? Hardly. Even if they were able to do so, writing teachers don’t need a list of failures-they need a list of thorough successes built on a solid, proven, and widely accepted theoretical foundation.

All the scholarship of writing teachers, all the back and forth of crises and panaceas, have not been enough to appease Professor Wayne C. Booth’s (noted authority on Rhetoric and writing) complaint about the deficiencies of scholarship on writing:

… where is the theory, where are the practical rules…?

For more than the last 150 years, that same question has been echoed by many other scholars actively writing about and looking for a ‘New Rhetoric.’ That list of scholars includes such highly visible scholars as Herbert Spencer, I. A. Richards, Kenneth Burke, W. R. Winterowd, Francis Christensen, James L. Kinneavy, E. D. Hirsch Jr., Edward P. J. Corbett, Reed Way Dasenbrock, Andrea Lunsford, Richard Lanham, C. H. Knoblauch, and Lil Brannon.Nor have the crises, panaceas, and endless discussions of scholars looking for a ‘New Rhetoric of Writing’ provided any promise of a solution. A perspective of trial and error our writing scholars have got, but an insightful perspective they have not. Why?

Crisis, Again & Again

An article on education provides the answer, and not from within the ranks of those who philosophize about or teach writing-

In 2003, an article in The New York Times provided some light by which to judge Connor’s perception of the recurring pattern of crisis and panacea in teaching writing.

In “ON EDUCATION; Discovering Crisis, Again and Again,” journalist Michael Winerip shares what he learned from Laura Haniford, a University of Michigan doctoral candidate who had presented a paper at an annual education convention that Winerip attended.

Haniford’s paper focused on the news media’s coverage of a racial achievement gap in local schools-the difference between how whites and blacks scored on standardized tests, as covered by one small newspaper, The Ann Arbor News, from 1984 through 2001.

Haniford noticed huge swings from year-to-year in the number of articles and the number of letters to the editor about the achievement gap issue, with nothing at all or in any way concrete happening to change things. And she was amazed that the achievement gap remained virtually unchanged, no matter how much attention was or wasn’t given to it.

Haniford wondered how can such wildly fluctuating coverage by the news media be explained, despite no change in the achievement gap?

To answer this question, she used a research model developed in 1972 by Anthony Downs of the Brookings Institution, which looked very close to this:

Stage 1: A highly undesirable social or academic condition exists, but has not yet captured public attention.

Stage 2: Alarmed discovery and euphoric enthusiasm by officials and interested parties.

Stage 3: Public and news media realize the true cost of reform and the sacrifices required.

Stage 4: Gradual decline of public interest.

Stage 5: Post-problem. A twilight realm of little attention or spasmodic recurrences of interest. [This is where teachers and schools are now. The NCW's five years of "Challenge to the Nation" have passed, Proficiency scores have not increased significantly, and very little is being said about the crisis in writing, as Stage 5 describes.]

The steps of the cycle fit perfectly both the racial achievement gap issue that Haniford was documenting AND Connors’s description of constantly repeating cycles of “crisis and panacea” in the field of writing scholarship and teaching writing. And those cycles of crisis and panacea are nothing less than notations of failures of scholarship.

Without a truly comprehensive general theory of writing—the lack of which Professor Wayne C. Booth complained about—writing scholars and writing teachers across America are doomed to repeating Connors’s ever-recurring cycle of crisis and panacea.

The writing trail, for the most part, has always been traveled by great men and women. Great minds endeavor to leave us trails that mark their efforts. We can call it a light post that illuminates some area life. The trail can lead to something academic, spiritual, foreshadowing, or illuminating. The force almost seems to be a compulsion to put something on paper that will last after the fleshly body stops working. Not doubt the trail has been traveled by many people.

In some cases the effort is worth the trip and brings its own self rewards. Still for others there desire is for recognition. For some, the quest to be recognized by monetary means or awards. The bottom line is what is it that makes them feel validated in their efforts. The self reward of knowing we have given our all to the effort to leave our mark in the world. The opportunity of life has given us the gift of effort and hard work to accomplish an end result. Surely the person that has given all will rest in peace.

The great writing trails left by many seem to focus on direction. Their writing is like reading a good map. The dangers and warning are posted on the map. We can think on them as hill and valleys on a map. The maps give directions and information about the landscape. This is to help us choose the best route. And also the great men and women leave us the writing of their lives. We learn directions from their experiences, pit falls and successes. Good writing trails and direction are closely related in their purpose.

The good writing trails will last through the ages. We need only to look at the set aside scripture to see clearly that great writing trails have an enduring strength. Their trails’ principles and guide posts are just as powerful now as they were centuries ago. We have great trail writing people today whose works will no doubt still be illuminating people many years from now. So, we see that the great trail writing will stand through the ages of time.

Also, there is sharpness to the great writing trails that gets it right to the point. The message along the trail is clearly conveyed to the reader. This trail method helps to keep the writing moving smoothly. But, the sharpness of the writing trail can sometimes be painfully real. Oddly enough, we can all appreciate that a sharp knife is more effective than a dull one. It leaves a clearer line to the truth.

Finally, the writing trail is still a power force in the lives of many today. We sometimes want to leave behind a passionate note about our life. We want to leave behind a trail about the things we have learned from life. The writing process is a way of making to lasting trail. We can never tell when our trail maybe discovered or what profit it may have one day for our fellow man. So, in the end let us continue to make those writing trails.

I learned how to write comedy by watching TV and then copying down the jokes in a notebook. The next day I would perform the jokes at school. Eventually, I was able to write for many comedians.

Generally, the jokes that comedians use are of the one-liner type. That is, they are very short. They consist of two parts–the straight line and the punch line. The straight line is the unfunny part of the joke. It is often called, “the setup,” because it sets up the joke. The punch line is the funny part that follows. For example, take the following simple joke,

“I have everything Tom Cruise has–except money, talent and looks.”

The straight line is, “I have everything Tom Cruise has” and the punch line is, “except money, talent and looks.”

Notice how neither one of these parts of the joke is funny by itself. They are only funny when they’re together. When we’re creating jokes we start with the straight line, then go through our mind until we have something funny that could follow it.

For example, in the earlier stages of this joke, we might have come up with the following punch lines.

I have everything Tom Cruise has–but I gave it away.

I have everything Tom Cruise has–I bought it at a garage sale.

I have everything Tom Cruise has–but he wants it back.

We then would pick out the one that we think is the funniest. I believe it to be the original joke. You, however, may have a different idea.

When you’re learning how to write jokes, it’s important to read as many of them as possible. So I recommend going to the library and taking out joke books.

The next step is to find a comedian to write for. There are two steps I follow to do this. One, is to look on the internet for people wanting writers. Two, is to go to any comedy club and talk to a performer who you think you could write for.

Good luck with your new hobby!

Writing fiction requires vision, and the novelist does more than tell a story-he or she creates a world that needs to function under the author’s vision. A novelist plays God, creating a worldview-how the world works. Before starting to write, the novelist should determine what the theme, philosophy, or worldview of the work will be. Making that determination is setting a foundation that will guide the novel so the beginning will progress logically to the conclusion and convey the book’s message or theme.

I can already hear your objections. “But I’m writing a romance novel or a horror novel, not some deep, heavy literary story!” Even so, your story will be operating within the worldview that you, the author, create for it. You need to decide whether, despite the fact that it’s all fiction, you are writing realistic fiction or fantasy, or perhaps some blend of the two. For example, do you believe in ghosts? If you think ghosts are real, you might be writing a paranormal romance where ghosts can happen in a believable manner. Your “realistic” paranormal romance must then be written so it is believable. How about your romance novel-do you believe in a benevolent universe where everything works out for the best, or do you believe life is nasty, brutish, and short? The difference in that viewpoint will determine whether you have a happy ending as in “Cinderella” or a tragedy like “Romeo and Juliet.”

Too often, writers claim ideas just come to them; their writing is spontaneous, even mystical, they are inspired, and the story just goes where it will. Yes, there is an element to that in writing, but good writing needs to occur within a clear set of goals and values so your book has a point. Even if you feel life has no point, that in itself may be your point.

Think about it. What is the worldview of your fictional world? What is permissible, and how does the universe operate? What rules, in your opinion, govern the real world or your fictional world? If you’re writing realistic fiction, will God play any role in your novel? Some readers will think God is fictional, while others will think He’s part of reality. Which viewpoint will you promote in your book, and what kind of God? If you’re writing fantasy, what rules govern the use of magic in that world? If you’re writing horror, what are the rules that govern how zombies or vampires or werewolves are created, or why they are allowed to exist? Is your world controlled by evil forces because vampires exist within it, or does a benevolent God have a place in the universe for vampires?

What theme or viewpoint do you want to express? That love conquers all? That discrimination against gay people is wrong? That we are all the victims of our family environment? That we attract into our lives what we want to have happen? That reincarnation is true? That humans are the playtoys of aliens who created the world and are keeping us here like their personal pets? That God does not care, which is why a nuclear war has left your characters living in an apocalyptic world?

Perhaps what it all boils down to is: What is the meaning of life (from your novel’s perspective), and how are you going to convey that meaning to your readers? Even if your book never addresses these issues, you are creating a sense of that message in your novel-certain rules or beliefs will be implied in your writing. Does your murder mystery show that there is no real justice in the world and evil is uncontrollable, or does it show that people ultimately must pay for their crimes? Does it show that in some cases, murder is acceptable?

While you do not need to limit yourself to specific boundaries, finding your voice as a novelist may have a lot to do with understanding what you believe, stand for, and what you want to express. Consider the following literary schools or movements. Ask yourself which one you or your specific novel might belong to, and where you agree or disagree with different schools. Please note that I have simplified the definitions and that other schools exist. Continue to explore literary philosophies on your own.

Romanticism – (Not to be confused with romance). An emphasis on the imagination and how human emotions and imagination can change or alter people. Often an emphasis on the greatness of man, and looking, not at what is, but what man can be. A proponent of self-esteem. Romantic novelists include Victor Hugo, Sir Walter Scott, and Ayn Rand.

Christian – Christian literature promotes the beliefs of Christianity and generally is intended to reveal or strengthen for the reader a belief in Jesus as the savior, in God’s love, or a better understanding of a Christian mystery such as the Resurrection. Most Western literature is influenced by the Christian worldview and either operates within it, or in the case of existentialism and some other schools, operates as a response or in opposition to it. Similarly, your worldview could be based in another religious viewpoint such as Hinduism, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, atheism, or pantheism. Christian novelists include C.S. Lewis, Flannery O’Connor, and Lew Wallace.

Realism – The purpose is to depict the “real” world. Realism does not introduce the supernatural and stays away from unusual or unlikely situations such as winning the lottery. Usually, these are stories of everyday people and their experiences with logical consequences resulting from situations they find themselves in. Realism also tends to explore the darker sides of reality, such as war, unhappiness, adultery. Gustave Flaubert and Leo Tolstoy are realist novelists.

Naturalism – Similar to realism, but also experimental. The novelist views his characters like laboratory experiments. For example, if we take a character (short, weak, and old) and place him in a given situation (in a plane wreck so he must survive on a desert island) what is likely to happen to him? Emile Zola, Stephen Crane, and Kate Chopin are examples of naturalists.

Existentialism – Life has no meaning. There is no God. We have no hope for the future. What is left perhaps is that we make our own meaning. Well known novelists of this movement are Albert Camus, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Samuel Beckett.

Postmodernism – Literature is largely a game where the fictional veil is see-through. The narrator will intrude, destroying the façade of fiction to speak to the audience. Lots of irony and word play. Often the purpose is to reveal information about something non-fiction, with copious footnotes to back up the fictional portrayal to show how close the story is to reality. Vladimir Nabokov is an example. James Joyce (often considered part of Modernism, the movement this movement grew out of to some extent) also fits here.

Beyond what you consider your literary school and worldview, what is the worldview of your characters? Do you believe the world is governed by a just and good God, but your main character is an atheist who believes in existentialism? How is his worldview going to operate within your novel’s larger worldview? Will your atheist character end up converted to Christianity? What about a Romantic character who believes in the basic good of people and that the world can be made a better place, but you find his viewpoints laughable and want to make fun of him-then are you writing a postmodern novel? How about a Christian character in a naturalist novel? If you take a fundamentalist Christian and place him in a Muslim city, what will be the natural result?

Knowing your worldview as a novelist, as well as that of your characters, will help you figure out the message of your novel and how to present it to your readers, as well as allowing your readers to know what your point is. Too often lately, books and movies no longer seem to have much of a point and that is due to lack of a clear foundation because their writers did not consider what the worldview of the work would be. While fiction’s first purpose may be to entertain, when a story has no point, it is not entertaining but simply confusing and frustrating. Give your readers something to think about, something to mull over, a viewpoint or philosophy to consider and you will leave a memorable and lasting impression on them.

When embarking on a new ghost writing project a ghost writer will ordinarily start their day with a meeting with the individual that they are writing for. This meeting is an opportunity for the writer to learn more about the individual’s background and their motivation for wanting to write the book in the first place. This information will normally be established through an informal discussion during which time the writer can get a real feel for the individual’s own personal style and will start to formulate ideas about how their style could translate into a manuscript.

Once the informal chat has taken place the ghost writer will then start to establish some content for the book, posing open ended questions and allowing the individual to talk freely. A ghost writer will often record this conversation so that they can recall and use it easily in the future. Having determined some of the content of the book, the preferred style of the individual employing the ghost writing service, and also giving some consideration to the individual’s personal character, a ghost writer will then return to their desk to start the planning stage.

The planning phase is vital in order that the writer can set some guidelines for their work in terms of word count, number of chapters, and the chapter order and structure. Jotting notes and planning with the use of diagrams and sketches, such as family trees and timelines allows the writer to get a good understanding of the task ahead and to apply a considered approach once they start writing.

So, having embraced the requirements of the book, and planned how the book will be translated into a manuscript, there will be just enough time to start to write. This will usually involve sitting down with a Dictaphone, a large set of notes and a computer. Following the structure in the plan the writer will start to type, continuously looking for ways to write the text with the agreed style and voice etc. Ghost writers will often find that they are able to write a good starting point of a chapter but as they get into the finer detail in telling the story they will realise that some vital information or key points that will help the story progress or flow, are missing. The writer will therefore make a separate note of any missing information so that they can request this at a later date.

Having made a good in-road to the first chapter, the writer will find a good place to finish their writing for the time being, making a note of how they want the story to continue once they start writing on the following day.

Once the computer is switched off there will no doubt be additional subplots, characterisation issues or style adjustments going through the ghost writer’s head, all ready to be picked up again in the morning at the start of another day in the life of a ghost writer.