A few weeks ago, I was chatting with a potential client. She had a great idea for a leadership book. Grounded in her story of sexual harassment, the book would be a guide for women who found themselves in the same situation. She planned to pack the book with research—she wanted lots of statistics, academic journal articles, and a hefty dose of feminist theory.
“So, obviously, I’ll have to get all of that stuff before I can even think about writing!” she said.
I nodded. “How far along are you in the process?”
“Well,” she chuckled. “I’ve got—” she paused, scrolling through something on her computer, “—82 pages of notes.”
82. Pages. Of. Notes.
Reader, this is not only a true story. It’s a common story.
When I was in graduate school, I remember many of my fellow classmates had this same problem—research paralysis, it was often called—where they had everything they needed to write, but they felt compelled to keep reading article after article.
No matter how many articles they read that confirmed their argument, they simply couldn’t stop themselves from reading more and more and more and more. Every article turned into four more articles they absolutely must read. After weeks of work, they were literally worse off than when they started.
You do not need more than eighty-two pages of notes. You do not need 350 citations.
To start your book, you need a single, solid idea. It should be complex enough that you can look at it from a few different angles (yes, this is true for memoir and fiction, too!). And when you think about the topic, you should have some questions—some points that aren’t quite clear in your mind.
“Resist the urge to pile everything into one book—a book with a focused, clear purpose will outperform a “kitchen sink” book any day of the week!”
As you write, you’ll develop more ideas. That’s true whether you write on your own or hire a ghostwriter. So if you start with too many ideas—too many things you feel like you need to cram in before your book is worthy of an audience—you’ll end up with a messy, crowded, unclear reader experience.
You might not be ready to start. But don’t let “research” become a means of procrastination!
I realize that’s not all that clear. Unfortunately, there’s no litmus test to tell you whether or not your particular book plan is solid. But I can recommend a list of very general stages of development. Once you’ve made your way through these steps, you’re more than ready to start writing!
Generate a List of Big Ideas
Most people who decide to write a book have a broad, general topic as well as a scattershot list of smaller ideas they want to share with others. You’ll eventually need to comb through all of those ideas—but for now, we suggest choosing those that qualify as big.
So what kinds of ideas count as big ideas?
Think of big ideas as lenses for the world—ideas that, if incorporated into your daily life, would change the way you interpret everyday things around you. If you’re a memoirist, a big idea might sound like, “We never truly appreciate what we have until we lose everything.” Or if you’re more of a leadership strategist, your big idea might sound like, “Time away from work—true rest—is as crucial to productivity as the work itself.”
You started the process of generating this list in the last stage—now, you’re just getting them down on paper. How will your reader see the world differently after they finish your book? That’s your big idea.
Try to generate a list of at least three or four possible big ideas.
Explore Your Genre
With your big idea in place, you should have a good sense of the specific category where your book best fits—and no set of categories is more specific than Amazon book categories. Head over to Amazon, click to open the “Books” section, and keep clicking through to more and more specific categories until you find the best match for your book. From there, start browsing. Which books catch your eye? Which do you want to read? What kinds of titles do you see? What kinds of covers? Are there different formats available (for example, some memoir categories include graphic novels, and some leadership categories include workbooks)?
Jot down any books that stand out to you as good…and those that look, well, not great. And most importantly, make a few notes about why you formed that particular judgment. Your book will appear on that list. Consider how you can frame your book as similar to the most intriguing titles (with your own personal spin, of course).
Brainstorm Supporting Details
Imagine you had to write a book for each of your big ideas. Using a separate Word document for each, type your big idea at the top of the document. Then, one at a time, take one of your big ideas and brain dump every experience, idea, lesson, anecdote, data point, or story that would help support that big idea.
As you brainstorm, you may find your mind wandering from your specific topic. That’s okay—our brains work by chaining together things that seem similar, even if the similarity is in terms of date range or context rather than topic—but ideas that don’t support your big idea don’t belong in that document. Place those ideas into a separate, blank document.
The only ideas that belong in each Word document are those ideas that directly support your big idea.
When you’re finished, sleep on it and return to the list. Rinse and repeat until you feel reasonably certain you’ve got every item listed.
A well-developed book should have at least eighteen to twenty supporting details—and minimum—that support the big idea. With that in mind, choose one big idea to focus your book. If you’ve got multiple big ideas with long lists, you probably have more than one book. That’s very common, particularly for memoirists. Resist the urge to pile everything into one book—a book with a focused, clear purpose will outperform a “kitchen sink” book any day of the week!
Analyze
Once you have everything in front of you, you can start to think critically about what these stories mean and how they contribute to the themes of your book. Use sticky notes to brainstorm emotions, intuitions, and takeaways that go with each scene you’ve written out. This will help you narrow down which scenes are the most relevant to the themes you want your reader to walk away with at the end of your book.
“No matter how many articles they read that confirmed their argument, they simply couldn’t stop themselves from reading more and more and more and more. Every article turned into four more articles they absolutely must read. After weeks of work, they were literally worse off than when they started.”
You may also take time to let these thoughts marinate overnight or over a few days to see what additional insights you continue to come up with. You want to end up with a list of events that make up the recipe for where you are. You may realize that the reason you loved watching your children play was because it reminded you of the imagination and fun you could have in life. Bring forward all those lessons on symbolism and see where they pop up in your own life.
Cut It
Once you’ve laid out all of your potential scenes, rounded out their details, and analyzed what parts they’ve played in who you are now, it’s time to decide which scenes most meaningfully contribute to your overall goals for the book. Sure, you had a wonderful internship that helped you build confidence in your skills, but if your overall theme is on the importance of overcoming strife, you may choose to focus more on stories where more was asked of you. Likewise, maybe you want to include your first job as a dishwasher, even though your book ends with a corporate job in the Design field.
It’s important to note that this is still an early stage of your book. Just because you ultimately decide not to include something you wrote down, don’t toss it out just yet. Writing is a process, and as your book progresses, you may choose to shift its overall theme or decide that details you previously thought unimportant are worth including. Any notes you decide to place emphasis on can just be brought to the top of your stack.
Work Through Those Feelings
Not every book will stir up the author’s emotions. But if your book draws at all from your past experiences, it’s worth taking time to work through your feelings.
It can be hard to take time to focus on your emotions, and you may wonder how much relevance they really have to your end product. However, including how you felt during each of your scenes can make your story relatable and applicable to the people who read it. Readers looking for a career change can relate to the dread and monotony you felt at a job you weren’t passionate about, and they may be inspired by the gratification you felt at starting your own business.
But in order to give your readers feelings to relate to, you have to work them out for yourself. Put yourself in the shoes of your younger self and think about how the events you wrote down made you feel. Look up a list of emotions and pair two or three with each of your stories and scenes. See which ones match up or come up the most often.
Let’s Get This Party Started!
Developing your manuscript’s idea can be a lengthy and intimidating process—but don’t let those feelings of intimidation get the best of you. If you’ve moved through the above steps, there’s a good chance you’re ready to get started.
You can always grab our free guide if you’d like more detailed instructions, but I encourage you to dive in. The worst-case scenario? You start writing and realize you need to do more research. At that point, you’ll know exactly what you need to know to move forward, so you can approach your task with a clearer direction. Not a bad outcome at all!
Or, if it would help to have somebody talk you through your process, it might be worth working with a writing coach. We’ve got quite a few resources on how to go about this on our blog, or you can always book a clarity call to find out whether coaching would be right for you.
At the end of the day, only you know when you’re ready to start writing. But don’t let the uncertainty keep you from writing the book of your dreams. Every single book starts with one word that becomes one sentence that becomes one paragraph that becomes MOMENTUM! Why not get that first word on the page today?
