We asked six authors with recently published novels to offer writing advice as gifts to aspiring writers.
“Believe. If you truly believe in your story, you will edit it ruthlessly and polish every line until the whole is as perfect as you can make it.”
—Brenda Novak, Take Me Home for Christmas
“Always put the book you’re writing first. Your work in progress should come before marketing and promotion. Your work in progress should come before answering email. No matter where you are in your career, the book is always the most important thing.”
—Bella Andre, Kissing Under the Mistletoe
“Simply write. We can talk about our dreams, spend copious amounts of time plotting our novels, even make up sheets of goals, but what is important is putting words on paper, studying the craft and believing in ourselves. Nike has it right: Just do it.”
—Debbie Macomber, Starry Night
“It is never too late to write the book you’ve
always wanted to write.”
—Nancy Thayer, A Nantucket Christmas
“Finish the damned book. At some point in the middle of a book, you reach a seriously low point where anything else looks more interesting. Heck, even laundry and toilet cleaning seem appealing. But your job is to finish the one you’re working on, however much you want to do something else.”
—Donna Andrews, Duck the Halls
“You can’t fix what you haven’t written. If you keep revising and deleting, you’ll never get to the end of the story. It’s better to go full steam ahead. There’s no such thing as writer’s block. As long as your fingers can move over the keyboard, eventually it’ll segue into something.”
—Mary Kay Andrews, Christmas Bliss
