How to write a novel as a university student

Hey!

One of the main things that keeps an aspiring writer from finishing their first draft is Time. We never seem to have enough. It is always so difficult to find. We always have other arrangements that need to take priority.

By the time we come around to free space in our calendars, we are completely and utterly exhausted. At that point, we lie down and feel rubbish about the fact that we aren’t doing the writing we promised, but also have no energy to get up and go start doing it. It becomes an endless cycle, with months going by with little to no progress.

As a university student, this is also the case. With lectures, readings, work and social lives, writing often can be put on the back burner. Its presence in your routine is no less important, (unless you have a deadline) but is one of the easiest things to put off in the hope we will continue it another day.

For me, I struggle with writing consistently. I currently do a course around Creative Writing, and other than reading set texts, there isn’t exactly too much ‘homework’ as such. Instead, you are encouraged to develop the habit of writing as frequently as possible. We need to build it into our routines make it a repeating part of our everyday lives.

Not only that but getting published is something that isn’t too reliant on a degree. If you have the skill, people will notice it. The only way to build this skill though is practice. If you wait until after you finish university to start writing, you will have wasted time you could have used to improve. That is my argument anyways.

I’d rather not wait around until I am older, I want to get better as quickly and as soon as possible. With this, I have developed a few tips that are currently helping me.

🕰️Time Blocking

I am fully aware that most people already have a calendar of some sort. As a university student, it is a necessity to keep track of lectures and when your assignments are due. If you haven’t got one set up, do it. Having one is great for staying on top of things, as well as making sure you stay consistent with new habits you want to build.

On starting, I had a calendar already set up. I personally use the Google Calendar as I can access it on my phone and my PC (Not sponsored here, just really like it). What I didn’t do, however, was dedicate time to things inside my house. By this, I reference the common productivity idea that is mostly known as ‘Time Blocking’.

This is where you set aside time for certain activities and block them on your calendar. Through doing this, it allows you to be more aware of how you are spending your time, and how you can actively take charge of what you want to do. It focuses you to spend the allocated time on the activity or project you have set out for yourself. This is brilliant if you, like me, get distracted way too easily.

I use my own calendar to block out the time when I write. Preferably this is in the morning or after tasks that don’t require my full attention. Both mean that before I sit down to write, I can think over what I want to do and plan out the scenes in my head before I start. I have tried to build it into my routine to write every day. I find word counts work in the short term, but we aren’t trying to complete a simple goal. I want to be a writer, which means I am in it for the long haul.

What I recommend is not to track your daily word count or goals, and rather just try and see if you can write daily. Whether it’s one hundred words or a thousand, just set aside an hour and see how much you can get done before you find your mind getting bored or distracted. Some days it’ll be more difficult, but if you set the bar at just getting a few words down, you might find yourself having more to write than you initially thought.

👣My ‘Floating Outline’

Moving on from this, my second tip is having a separate document for planning. Whether you are a pantser or planner, gardener or architect, some sort of plan is quite helpful. I don’t mean your entire outline, that is something that is dependent on what kind of writer you are.

The tactic I use is one I borrowed from one of my favourite fantasy authors, Brandon Sanderson. He uses something that’s known as a ‘floating outline.’ This details the next scene you are going to write, what is important about it, what needs to be said, and how you can make it interesting or exciting. Here is an example of my own:

I find that this is useful, not only for making sure you know what you are writing, but it forces you to have a closer look at the scene. It makes me consider whether my scene is fulfilling the purpose I need it to, and if I am finding it boring to write, then it might mean that it’ll be boring to read.

With my floating outline, I can plan how to make the scene more exciting for me to write. This also means I end up writing more as I am not left with the issue of a blank page; I already am aware of where I need to start.

With these ideas, I hope they have helped and if you want more on writing, let me know. If you want to read some of my writing, I have a short story called ‘Opulence’ that is published on Amazon. I am currently working on a much longer novel which I will update you guys on when the time comes.

Favourites:

Book: 2,000 to 10,000: Writing Faster, Writing Better, and Writing More of What You Love by Rachel Aaron – This book has been heavily influential when it comes to my writing. It outlines some of the simple advice but explains it in a way that has just got me thinking a ton about it. One such thing is that you tend to write more when you are enjoying what you are writing. This has been great and has made me consider my scenes with a more critical eye, debating how I can make them interesting to write and eventually then read.

Podcast: How to Write a Novel by Keith McNally – I wasn’t 100% sure about this podcast from the outset, but I have since come around to it. I feel it is a raw take on writing and what the hurdles are that come along with it. I feel it is a great motivator to keep going and I continually keep coming back to it when I need to hear someone else talk about their writing struggles and achievements.

App: Castro – This app is related to the previous paragraph as it is a podcast app. Unlike the other apps, it isn’t just about listening to your favourite shows. It allows you to, in a sense, ‘highlight’ certain phrases or quotes that you can then refer to later. This comes in handy when you listen to business or self-improvement podcasts like I do. You can save the information and then come back to it when you need to use it.