On What to Write About

Hey guys!

The question today is, How do you know what to write about?

This one is tricky because it really varies based on who it is, almost more than anything else about writing. The general rule that anyone should stick to: Write what you care about.

You care about cooking? Great, write cooking guides. You care about fairy tales? Awesome, write some of those bad boys down.

For me, I write dystopian fiction. Most of the stories I've started have fallen in that vein because that's what I really care about. I love reading that kind of thing, so I love writing it too. I've tried fantasy stuff, but that fell to the side of the road like so many others.

So now we've got our genre picked out, how do we know what to actually write about? This brings me to the second rule, write what you know.

This rule can be interpreted in a few different ways. The most common way is people should write based on what they've read or experienced. If you're basing it on your experiences, you have memories to help you get it all down then. If you're basing it on what you've read in the past, you've got actual written words to refresh your memory with, which is great.

I read this article a few years ago which changed my perspective on writing off of what you've read. I wish I could find it and post a link for you guys but it has since disappeared into the ocean that is the internet. The gist of it was What you write doesn't have to be a new idea, just new to you.

That really got me thinking. It's absolutely right, no two people will write the same story the same way even given an outline. So you end up with two distinctly different stories. That's part of the beauty of writing, everything is different in different minds.

Okay sorry, side tracked for a second there. The other way write what you know gets interpreted is write what you've researched.

With that, you can write about anything. If you're willing to put in the time to learn the ins and outs of something, by all means, go for it. There's something beautiful about learning the intimate details of a subject and relaying that back to the world.

My personal opinion is that you should have a nice little mixture going on. I base what I write on what I've read, what I've done, and what I've researched. It helps to connect the writer more intimately to the work and gives you a better shot at finishing what you start out to do.

Find me on Twitter, Facebook, and follow this blog for notifications when new articles go up. As always, thanks for reading guys and I'll be back soon.

B