Sarah Waters' Rules for Writers

I've finished Sarah Waters' magnificent ghost story The Little Stranger (in the dark, on my own, the windows unshuttered....in other words, very nervously, but compelled to keep reading, unable to put it down and wait until daylight hours). The ending of this novel is a tour de force - the kind of gorgeous revelation that leaves me hurtling back into those 500 pages  again trying to make sense of the whole thing now I know. And yet the sheer gorgeousness of it, is that I still don't know for sure...

There is much to learn from Waters about pace and tension and layering, and I plan to go back through the novel and make notes. In fact, top of Waters' ten rules about writing (as published in The Guardian UK) is  'Read like mad. But try to do it analytically...' - which I do try to do, but often forget, moving on to the next novel and the next. This time, I have the notebook ready.... and tucked under my belt, number 4 on Waters' list of writing rules:

Novels are for readers, and writing them means the crafty, patient, selfless construction of effects. I think of my novels as being something like fairground rides: my job is to strap the reader into their car at the start of chapter one, then trundle and whizz them through scenes and surprises, on a carefully planned route, and at a finely engineered pace.

Bring it on! The full Rules for Writers by Sarah Waters are here with thanks to The Guardian, and there's more on The Little Stranger in my previous post. I am thrilled to see it is on the longlist for the Orange Prize , along with NZer Eleanor Catton's The Rehearsal - another superbly crafted book.

The First 12 Years are the Worst

Below is the inimitable Anne Enright on her ten rules for writing fiction, courtesy of The Guardian . She and I shared the same hotel at the Auckland Writers and Readers Week. I ran into her at the front door, and we talked a little. She's very spiky and funny on stage and her Booker book The Gathering is spiky and dark on the page. Her descriptive powers are heavenly. So here she is, predictably spiky and honest about writing ... and in the same article you'll also find  Atwood, Gaiman, Ford, Franzen and others.  


Anne Enright's Ten Rules for Writing Fiction

1 The first 12 years are the worst.

2 The way to write a book is to actually write a book. A pen is useful, typing is also good. Keep putting words on the page.

3 Only bad writers think that their work is really good.

4 Description is hard. Remember that all description is an opinion about the world. Find a place to stand.

5 Write whatever way you like. Fiction is made of words on a page; reality is made of something else. It doesn't matter how "real" your story is, or how "made up": what matters is its necessity.

6 Try to be accurate about stuff.

7 Imagine that you are dying. If you had a terminal disease would you ­finish this book? Why not? The thing that annoys this 10-weeks-to-live self is the thing that is wrong with the book. So change it. Stop arguing with yourself. Change it. See? Easy. And no one had to die.

8 You can also do all that with whiskey.

9 Have fun.

10 Remember, if you sit at your desk for 15 or 20 years, every day, not ­counting weekends, it changes you. It just does. It may not improve your temper, but it fixes something else. It makes you more free.