The Executive's Book Coach

Tag: tips

  • I Don’t Know What to Write About

    I Don’t Know What to Write About

    People often say to me, “Well, what would I write about? I don’t know what to write about. How can I write a book when I don’t know what to write about?” Well, the answer to that depends on your answer to a deeper question, which is, “Why do you want to write your book?”

  • 7 Steps to Manuscript

    7 Steps to Manuscript

    Over recent weeks I’ve been talking about the obstacles that stop people from actually getting their book written. But I thought today I’d have a bit of a change of pace, and I’ll start talking about the actual process of writing your book. And yes, there is actually a process.

  • My NaNoWriMo Story

    My NaNoWriMo Story

    During the month of November, groups of people get together in different cities and they write together, and the goal is to write the first draft of a 50,000-word novel during the month of November. It’s pretty crazy, actually, but I decided to try it.

  • There Are Lots of Books on My Topic Already

    There Are Lots of Books on My Topic Already

    I recently had a conversation with someone, and not for the first time I’ve heard this, but I recently had a conversation with somebody who said, “I want to write a book, and I have a lot of information on my subject area, but there’s a lot of books on this subject already, and so…

  • Topic vs. Subject

    Topic vs. Subject

    A topic is not the same as a subject. A subject is much, much bigger and wider and it can be defined as your general area of expertise. But it’s way too big in general to write a book on. Within that subject, you need to choose topics. And it’s a topic that you use…

  • English Is Not My First Language

    English Is Not My First Language

    “I would like to write a book and I know my materials very well. The trouble is, English is my second language, and my English is simply not good enough to write a book.”

  • Building the Table of Contents

    Building the Table of Contents

    Sometimes people are surprised when I suggest that you do a table of contents so early in the process, but actually, it becomes a very useful tool for getting your book done. Because it’s kind of an outline almost, and a very simple form of what’s going to be in your book. So it’s very…

  • Who Am I to Write a Book?

    Who Am I to Write a Book?

    Today I’m going back to speak about another one of those reasons that people don’t write their books, those obstacles that people put in the way of becoming authors. This is something people don’t always say, but very often, they’re thinking. Sometimes, they actually say it, and somebody said it to me not too long…

  • Writing the First Draft

    Writing the First Draft

    You’ve done all the pre-work, you’ve done all the preparation work. Here are some tips for writing your first draft.

  • Write Your Draft with Yellow Stickies

    Write Your Draft with Yellow Stickies

    The first draft is a particularly intimidating part of the process, especially if you’re new to being an author. This is kind of where the rubber hits the road and you actually have to start writing. The technique I want to give you today is going to help you to deal with that, it’s going…