If you are like me, you are constantly writing. You have notebooks filled with ideas and rough drafts. In effect, you’ve started your book before you really began in earnest. You’re sure that some of this writing will be useful to your book project. How do you make use of what you have?
Take the time to do a content audit—a full review of the content that you have. Some of your content will be in finished form, maybe published on a blog. Some content will be in draft form, large chunks or mere scraps. Doing an audit will help you draw some connections and identify holes in your content. In other words, things that you need to write.
Let’s go through this exercise, as it relates to the Glass Box Project.
Content Audit
I’ve been writing a lot already. The Glass Box Project concept has been crystallizing in my mind over the past year or so. But what of my writing will be useful? What should I cast aside? How will I organize it? I’m making the assumption that everything will need a heavy edit. Moving from blog-post-as-first-draft to book format has to make it worth it for the reader. A blog is a series of short posts, lightly organized via tagging etc. In effect, it’s a content stream. It’s ephemeral. It’s derived from what’s been on my mind in any particular week—ideas that came from conversations with author clients or articles that I’ve read. But I’ve started to lay all of this out to take stock of what I have to work with as a starting point.
Content Function
Producing a book is a different project than a blog, though. The reader is expecting more of you—that you will do the work of organizing it into a cohesive structure. With instructive non-fiction, you can expect readers to take two paths:
- To read the content. Point A to Point B, or in segments.
- To raid the content. Get in and get out, using it as a reference.
This greatly informs the way you present the material. This will probably be my biggest challenge in the project. Thinking macro-level rather than offering specific help on a focused issue. Then chaining all of it together so that it offers a coherent path. If it’s not serving the reader as intended, then I risk making a real connection. Think about that—the content can be great and still miss the mark. Yikes.
Book Structure
Given that, the structure of the book will be incredibly important. I’ve start thinking about the underlying structure, and pulling together a rough draft of the table of contents. I don’t need to commit to this now, but it’s not a bad idea to have a sense of where it’s headed. Some writers I know don’t do this at all. I’ve seen some who are successful with this strategy, too. But I don’t advise it.
Non-fiction is generally meant to be instructive. That means you are a teacher. You have to give some thought to your ‘course outline,’ if you will. If you are going to take your reader on a journey, be kind to them. You don’t want to end up on the side of the road, fumbling with a tattered map. Be a confident guide and a good host. Know where you are headed.
Book Format
I don’t want to get too didactic about word count. It can serve as a good guide, and even help you stay on track by setting daily or weekly milestones. But like most things in the Shift to Digital, the rules have changes. If you intend to produce an ebook only, which I recommend for first-time authors who intend to self-publish, then you don’t need to be a slave to the 350-400 page format. Make the book whatever length you need to. Present your idea, get the point across, and support it.
Personally, I can’t stand books that stretch out one idea far longer than it warrants. If you can say what you need to say in 3,000 words, great. Writing 57,000 more words to “fit the format” isn’t going to make me like it more. In fact, you’re just wasting my time at that point, and you run the risk of ruining a really good reading experience because of it.
Writing Tools
What’s the best tool for the job? What software is going to help me construct the project properly? My instinct is always research, so I did two things to find out more.
- I did my Web research and read up on the reviews of all the available writing software tools.
- I also asked a bunch of other non-fiction writers, via LinkedIn Groups.
The result? Scrivener is the winner. It’s $45 for the Mac version, which I just downloaded this weekend. Everyone says that it’s a powerful tool, and it’s easy to learn. It also handles citations and collections of links, which is great for non-fiction writers. It outputs to different ebook formats, which I’m hoping will save me the trouble of learning how to do ebook formatting by hand.
To date, my favorite writing tool is Evernote, for two reasons:
- It’s great for capturing, organizing, and tagging scraps/ideas.
- It’s always available—all notes are synced across all devices.
I plan to keep using Evernote, without a doubt—but I thought that I needed a more serious and sophisticated writing tool to help keep the project on track.
—
I’d be grateful for any comments you have on any of these issues that I’ve raised here. What are your experiences?
- On this blog (via the comments section)
- Facebook Page: http://facebook.com/glassboxproject
- Google Plus (hashtag #glassboxproject)
- Twitter (hashtag #glassboxproject)
—
You can follow the Glass Box Project here: http://glassboxproject.com.
Please share with any writers you know, using the buttons below (and/or sign up for my mailing list on the sidebar).