I came across a website once which stated that you don’t need to write a book, and the author gave various reasons why; the last one being that when you’re feeling lost, a book won’t save you. The website also stated that you won’t get self-respect from writing a book. I disagree immensely. There is no better feeling than when you reach your target word count or complete a piece of work to your satisfaction. And about books not saving us when we’re lost? Have you ever written something fictional about a character and then realised that you were actually telling the truth about yourself, through your character? Writing is very important.

So as you can see, not all advice is good advice for everyone. Maybe someone agrees with the points that site made, and that’s fine, but not everybody will. There is probably no piece of advice that everyone will agree with. Let’s look at another example – Stephen King in his book On Writing suggests that we should eliminate all adverbs. If it ends in ly, it should go. I found this to be rather disappointing and annoying advice, since my writing is littered with adverbs, but maybe if I tried it, it would improve my writing. Even Stephen King himself admitted that this rule is difficult for him to stick to.

One author’s advice is to not write when you’re young at all, and to save it for adulthood. They will be hard pressed to find any teenage writers who agree with them. Some people say you shouldn’t use passive voice. The Writers and Artists Yearbook contains many tips for how to approach an agent or publisher, how to present your manuscript and what to say in your cover letter. You may be told you should plan everything that’s going to happen in your story, or perhaps to write the whole thing before you begin editing. You may be told to write what you know. Well, what if you’ve exhausted the topic you’re an expert in? Other people think you should only every use the word “said” when writing dialogue. Maybe that keeps your writing nice and simple, or maybe it’s a complete snooze. Some other interesting suggestions are to not start a story by talking about the weather, get rid of dialogue because narrative is more important, and, bizarrely, eliminate all commas, to pick up the pace a bit. All interesting ideas, to say the least.