James Richey's WebSpace

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How to Start Writing

The Writing Path

I started my writing life with the false assumption I could make a living right away at writing fiction. The truth is few make a living at fiction writing. So, with that in mind, always have a back up plan. For me, I love to write fiction, but my path has taken me down the road of professional technical writing. Technical writing provides my long haul trucker paycheck, while writing fiction is the sports car I get to drive every chance I get.

In this tutorial we start at what I consider the very beginning. And that is once you have decided you are going to write some fiction, you need some wheels to drive down that road.

The First Step: Pick Your Word Processor

Though you can start off using Notepad or Wordpad or whatever basic word processor your computer comes with, it is best to get a word processor that can provide the manuscript you will eventually need to submit to a publisher. And it has to be easy to work with and provide a professional look when you do finally submit your work.

There are two word processors I recommend.

OpenOffice.org Writer

MS Office Word

My first and highest recommendation is to obtain OpenOffice.org Writer. It is the highest quality open source word processor on the Internet. The best part is that it’s free (though I suggest supporting the organization that created it by whatever means you can afford).

If you don’t mind paying a little, I recommend getting MS Office Word, especially if you decide to become a technical writer. Many companies require experience using MS Office Suite. You can usually find discounted or older versions of MS Office Word on EBay, usually for under $50.

There is other word processing software out there, such as Abi-Word. But not to be discouraging, I’ve steered clear of using Abi-word because with lengthy manuscripts the program does not perform well. Hopefully, those folks will be able to create a revised version that is friendlier toward novel length projects.

So, once you have obtained your word processor, proceed to either the Fiction Writing or Technical Writing Tutorial.

Fiction Writing Tutorial

Technical Writing Tutorial

Updated: February 2009