How to Write a 100K Words a Year

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[prabhdeepsingh]

Someone : I write 100 words per year. Can I write a novel?
Other writers : Get the fuck out of here.
Sanderson : Yesss. Its doable. You just have to write for 1000 years.

[Rian-zfye]

Brandon, you don’t have to pretend to take your pulse to convince us that you’re human. We don’t care. We accept you for whatever species you happen to be.

[NububuChan]

I like how Brandon likes to remind us to change our goalpost if we can't follow the writing advice. Like, if you *can't* set aside 8 hours a week to write if you typically write 250 words an hour, then you can't do 100k a year: Just accept that and set a goal to write less but also expect not to be able to "go pro" as fast as some people. Very non-judgmental, all-purpose, flexible advice.

[intentionally]

Great advice here. As someone who wrote 200, 000 words last year with a full time job, I think the biggest habit that helped me was learning to turn off the inner critic. So often I'd get in my own way because I wanted every word to be perfect. The critic is useful for editing, but a hinderance for creating the first draft.

[maggot]

i deleted social media in college and finished 3 40k word books about three months later. they had all been 50-75% done but then they were all just magically finished after having been working on them for 2 years.

[rustykoenig]

Why would we pay for masterclass, when we have Brandon for free?!

[Candide]

I had days where I wrote 8, 000 words in one or two sittings throughout the day. There are other days where 1500 words were a struggle, but the key for me is to always be writing something (I do switch between fiction and non-fiction from time to time). Although quantity is not quality (I'm sure I wrote more words than Stephen King for several months - big whoop!), it does help to remember that you're only going to improve the more you do something with laser-like focused intensity.

[andreevvalle]

The title ought to be: how to writte 100k words a year with good quality

[timothyreal]

The best advice I ever received about word count came from Harry Turtledove, who said the first million words anyone writes are unpublishable garbage. Out of curiosity, I gathered together the word counts of everything I’d written in the entirety of my adult life (about twelve years at that point) and put it into a Google spreadsheet. All those years and all that effort added up to around 200K words. More than most people, sure, but rather pathetic for someone with any kind of literary ambition. Since that time, I’ve written over 150K words every year and just passed the half million mark last month.

[jaydingiesler]

I used to stress about getting time to write, but since I’ve set my goal to just 500 words a day things have been much better. An hour a day is all that it takes, and now I’m at 30k words with zero stress about finishing.

[jonocasuyon]

100K words a year

Me: I can finish a novel at that rate in about 10 years
Fan-fiction writers: Hey guys sorry I finished this 120k word installment in 2 months, twice as long as I promised. I was busy with finals and my part-time job as a teacher's assistant

[aaronfreeman]

You can tell that Brandon is a master at his craft because he shares his secrets and teaches others to do what he does. It's beautiful 😁

[boblinhobgoblin]

A writing tip for anyone who's a weirdo like me: I absorb books mostly in an audio format. I've found the flow of my chapters feel better when I use a voice to text to jot down my ideas as though it were an audio book. When I'm feeling stuck I take a walk at a park or while I'm cleaning the house I use this method and it usually gets me the shape of my next chapter and I build it out from there.

A word to the wise for this method: the voice to text works best when you speak clearly and don't use your made-up names or words. I use placeholder words then find and replace in a Google doc.

[saadamansayyed]

Step 1 - Be Brandon Fricking Sanderson

[rodrigo]

I usually do 500 words an hour and i always thought i was slower than most, this made me feel better.

[theshorty]

I aspire to have this man's fashion sense.

[pcvsk]

My minimum at the moment is 400 words a day, but I usually go over 500. That's around 2.8k to 3.5k words a week, or 11k-14k words a month. Cutting it into small goals a day makes it seem so achievable it's almost ridiculous.

[janczy]

Brandon: learn to turn off social media
Me: *looks up from twitter* huh

[lucasg.freeman]

I usually have weeklong to monthlong research and planning stages (e.g. writing dialogue mentally while in the shower) followed by several overnights or café campouts in a row, cranking out 4K to 8K words per session. This works for me because I don't need to pause typing to decide what my character is wearing or what the temple is built from. I guess one might call that binge writing, but it's a structured process. My first novel, BOOK & BONE, took me about 16 months while working full-time, and I'm doing the same with book two.

[kevnar]

I once wrote 20, 000 words in a day. I had a disconnection notice for the electricity on my desk, and I knew I had to get my book done or it would be weeks if not months before I could get back to it, and I'd have lost the soul of the story. So I sat in that chair for about 16 hours or so until my back was aching and my hands were nearly numb. But I got it done.

That's probably way too much, but to this day it was some of the best writing I've ever done.