Literary Birthday – 23 December – Raymond E. Feist

Happy Birthday, Raymond E. Feist, born 23 December 1945.

Nine Tips for Writers

1. Write. Get your butt in the seat and your fingers on the keyboard.
2. If you are writing without action, your characters are nothing but ‘talking heads’, and if they are ‘talking heads’, they better be saying something important.
3. Give your reader someone to care about.
4. The hardest thing for a writer to conquer is fear. Get over it. You’re never going to write the perfect sentence—but just get something on the page. Start writing.
5. Tell the story. Get the editor out of your head—turn the writer loose on the page.
6. Don’t ever over re-write. You will never get it perfect.
7. Be aware of self-indulgence in description—give the reader enough information to get the picture, but don’t overdo it.
8. When you’re writing, the most important thing, your north star, is the ‎ending. Every word you write should be weighed against that, and if it isn’t contributing to your ending, it’s a sideline and should be omitted. Readers know instinctively when a writer doesn’t have an ending yet.
9. It’s easy and exciting to start a book, but the most important advice is to FINISH it!

Taken from our 2014 interview with Raymond E. Feist

Raymond E. Feist is an American author. He is well know for writing the The Riftwar Cycle, a series of fantasy novels and short stories. His books have sold over 15 million copies. The latest novel in the series is Magician’s End.

[Top Tip: Learn how to write fantasy. Buy The Fantasy Workbook]

Image: Writers Write Event

 by Amanda Patterson

Are you interested in more authors’ birthdays? Please click here: Literary Birthday Calendar