People - Please Help Me Out.

As some of you may or may not be aware, I am trying to somehow get a sideline as a writer going, mainly for my personal amusement and to let out my creativity, but if it leads to a career change, it might not be a bad thing.

The problem is this: I have not got a clue what I could start writing about. I was thinking more along the lines of opinion pieces than creative writing, so no Who's Line is it anyway improv suggestions if you please.

But as there is a hell of a lot going on in the world, I am finding it hard to focus, so if you could suggest some things for me to research, write about or comment on, I would be most grateful. The resulting pieces of work from any suggestions will be posted in my blog here, as well as on either of my two blogs, depending on the subject, or both if there is interesting crossover.

Quote: Croupier

As some of you may or may not be aware, I am trying to somehow get a sideline as a writer going, mainly for my personal amusement and to let out my creativity, but if it leads to a career change, it might not be a bad thing.

The problem is this: I have not got a clue what I could start writing about. I was thinking more along the lines of opinion pieces than creative writing, so no Who's Line is it anyway improv suggestions if you please.

But as there is a hell of a lot going on in the world, I am finding it hard to focus, so if you could suggest some things for me to research, write about or comment on, I would be most grateful. The resulting pieces of work from any suggestions will be posted in my blog here, as well as on either of my two blogs, depending on the subject, or both if there is interesting crossover.

As Hemingway said, and said often, you can only write about what you know. Thats why he tried to get so much worldly experience, so he could write about it.

Quote: EvenBob

you can only write about what you know.

An awful lot has been written about horse racing and about suicide but the authors had not at that time ever committed suicide or been a horse that had raced. Many travel writers have never visited the places they write about.

The first thing is, are you talented? Have you ever been known to write anything deemed as impressive or excellent work? That is, it's difficult to become something you're not good at, professionally.

That said, you research what you are interested in, write very well, and hope that you get noticed.

I've been in cahoots with a couple of professional writers (meaning that I've married them). My first wife worked in health care in the communications department doing newletters and internal communications. After my baby was born, she quit and freelanced based on her contacts. This grew into a travel writing gig with a well known publication and a book. She (as far as I know) now does this on the side).

My wife, now, was a technical writer, writing or co-writing seven computer books about 10 years ago (All "dummies" type books). Once again, it was through connections that she found the work. We met and hit if off because I was on a course for something that she wrote about. She also had a job with a company as a technical writer which paid very well.

Both wives have degrees in English.

In my opinion, it's difficult to make a living writing. To get into it professionally (such as a job) usually requires a degree in English and/or some experience. You have to catch some lucky breaks. I don't think writing exclusively for the internet space will get you anywhere for a career unless you're extremely talented (such as the Wizard, and even then, he'll tell you that it hasn't been easy).

Quote: Croupier

But as there is a hell of a lot going on in the world, I am finding it hard to focus, so if you could suggest some things for me to research, write about or comment on, I would be most grateful.

Think about what interests you and what you know. It's hard to write well when you don't care for the subject, even if it's a popular one with others. And it's even harder to write intelligently about things you're unfamiliar with. For example, what do you know about the amazing properties of graphene?

I'd think you'd have to be passionate about the subject and issues you choose to write about so the words will just f-l-o-w off of your brain to your fingertips. Stay within your comfort and knowledge zone when choosing, think of what it is that grabs you when reading others, then fire away.

You are in an environment that confers one huge benefit and one huge handicap. Namely: it is far easier to get your work "out there" than it ever has been; it is easier in terms of time, effort and money. This means that you can find out if something works without a large investment of capital on your part. The bad side of that is that others have the same increased opportunities as you do. This means that the internet (and, to a great extent, other media forums as well) is flooded with content that ranges from very good, to good, to mediocre, and also to total crap. The danger, then, is getting drowned in the sea of crap.

It used to be that the herd of writers was culled by the fact that a person could not easily (or credibly) publish himself. This meant that there was an automatic quality control, as publishers/editors/etc. would not invest their resources in written work that was poorly done. There was also another gauntlet that written work had to pass--it had to be saleable. In particular, topical/opinion pieces were hard to write for profit (unless you could somehow get into syndication), because the slow nature of the editorial process meant that it was almost impossible to write anything "timely". It was also hard to write about "fads", trends, etc., for the same reason. The internet changed all that--it is now possible to comment on today's issues today. However, the first hurdle that a writer formerly had to jump--that of quality--also no longer exists. Likewise, much of the content produced today is no longer generated for the purpose of making money. This means that most writers of internet content don't consider the concepts of audience and market.

So you have to decide what your objective is. Do you want simply to obtain exposure, or do you want to write for profit? The two are almost mutually exclusive these days--the sheer amount of free content means that people are less willing to pay for their entertainment. If you want to make money, you will need to stand head and shoulders above the rest. This can be done in several ways: your writing itself can be of much higher quality than others'; you can deal with a subject or topic in a unique, refreshing way; you can deal with an entirely new topic altogether (though, good luck thinking up anything completely original); you can adopt a particular voice that is different enough and compelling enough that you will attract your own audience. None of those things is easy to do. If, however, you simply wish to throw yourself out there into the blogosphere, that's ridiculously easy to do. That might be the place to experiment, and to obtain people's feedback, which will hopefully be more useful than "AWESUM DUDE YOU ROCK GRT BLOG".

First of all, thanks for all your comments.

Nareed - I have just read the Wiki on Graphene - and I still dont understand anything about it.

Boymimbo - I know I am unlikely to ever make writing a profession. Its mainly for fun, but I just mentioned that if a career change were offered to me, I would probably not turn it down. And to be honest with you, I dont think Im talented, but I do enjoy writing. But thanks for taking the time.

JerryLogan/Nareed/EvenBob - Thanks, its good advice.

mkl - mainly I see writing as a release for my own creative needs. I think I am just having trouble focusing on subjects. Thanks for taking the time for such an in depth and thoughtful response. I have already thrown myself into the blogosphere, but am getting no feedback, which I think is also part of the problem. So if anyone here would like to look and give their thoughts, I would appreciate it. The Addresses are in my sig.

I would not go the direction of opinion pieces. My opinion about opinions is not many people care about them until they respect the person opining. If I were to write for the pleasure of writing, and forced to avoid the topic of gambling, my inspiration would be Bill Bryson. Most of his books are either about his travels or random musings. However, it isn't so much what he writes about as the texture of his writing. His style is very down to earth and witty. I'd like to think my hotel reviews have just a touch of his style, but I won't be so bold as to claim that. So my advice is don't so much focus on the topics to start, just write about anything, and see where it takes you.

Quote: Wizard

I would not go the direction of opinion pieces. My opinion about opinions is not many people care about them until they respect the person opining. If I were to write for the pleasure of writing, and forced to avoid the topic of gambling, my inspiration would be Bill Bryson. Most of his books are either about his travels or random musings. However, it isn't so much what he writes about as the texture of his writing. His style is very down to earth and witty. I'd like to think my hotel reviews have just a touch of his style, but I won't be so bold as to claim that. So my advice is don't so much focus on the topics to start, just write about anything, and see where it takes you.

Did you ever read Bryson's "The Mother Tongue"? It's a great read for those (like me) who are fascinated by the English language.

I agree with you about Bryson's style. He's very readable, and a lot of fun to boot. I've also enjoyed Dayton Duncan, a writer whose style and chosen subjects seem to be similar.

Quote: Croupier

Nareed - I have just read the Wiki on Graphene - and I still dont understand anything about it.

There. Now you know graphene is not a good subject for you to write about.

Too bad, though, because the subtitle "Nobel Prize awarded to an experiment involving a strip of celophane tape and a pencil" is really good in all kinds of ways.

If you'll dabble with opinion, do try to justify and/or exemplify (if that's a word) your opinions, unless you know your audience is very familiar with the topic. For example, the Wizard could refer to 6:5 as "The casino offers only the awful 6:5...." in this site without further explanation. If he were reviewing hotels on a travel site, though, he might have to explain what's so bad about 6:5 and why he won't call it Blackjack.

Quote: mkl654321

You are in an environment that confers one huge benefit and one huge handicap. Namely: it is far easier to get your work "out there" than it ever has been; it is easier in terms of time, effort and money. This means that you can find out if something works without a large investment of capital on your part. The bad side of that is that others have the same increased opportunities as you do. This means that the internet (and, to a great extent, other media forums as well) is flooded with content that ranges from very good, to good, to mediocre, and also to total crap. The danger, then, is getting drowned in the sea of crap.

It used to be that the herd of writers was culled by the fact that a person could not easily (or credibly) publish himself. This meant that there was an automatic quality control, as publishers/editors/etc. would not invest their resources in written work that was poorly done. There was also another gauntlet that written work had to pass--it had to be saleable. In particular, topical/opinion pieces were hard to write for profit (unless you could somehow get into syndication), because the slow nature of the editorial process meant that it was almost impossible to write anything "timely". It was also hard to write about "fads", trends, etc., for the same reason. The internet changed all that--it is now possible to comment on today's issues today. However, the first hurdle that a writer formerly had to jump--that of quality--also no longer exists. Likewise, much of the content produced today is no longer generated for the purpose of making money. This means that most writers of internet content don't consider the concepts of audience and market.

So you have to decide what your objective is. Do you want simply to obtain exposure, or do you want to write for profit? The two are almost mutually exclusive these days--the sheer amount of free content means that people are less willing to pay for their entertainment. If you want to make money, you will need to stand head and shoulders above the rest. This can be done in several ways: your writing itself can be of much higher quality than others'; you can deal with a subject or topic in a unique, refreshing way; you can deal with an entirely new topic altogether (though, good luck thinking up anything completely original); you can adopt a particular voice that is different enough and compelling enough that you will attract your own audience. None of those things is easy to do. If, however, you simply wish to throw yourself out there into the blogosphere, that's ridiculously easy to do. That might be the place to experiment, and to obtain people's feedback, which will hopefully be more useful than "AWESUM DUDE YOU ROCK GRT BLOG".

Either you really do think you impress people, or you've gone back to read that ramble over and over again with dictionary and thesaurus in-hand a half dozen times just to smile at yourself.

Get real.

Just write. Find a random topic and write. It's an exercise, and eventually you'll find your style and what you want to write about. One of the things about writing is getting focused into the detail or the topic at hand.

Find a random topic generator (Live Journal has one) and try and write about what it suggests. Find a headline, and opinionate about it. It doesn't matter too much at first what you write about, just the fact you are doing it.

Quote: FleaStiff

An awful lot has been written about horse racing and about suicide but the authors had not at that time ever committed suicide or been a horse that had raced. Many travel writers have never visited the places they write about.

It's all about perspective.

Any number of people can write a book about horse racing without ever having been a horse: Owners, Trainers, Jockeys, Groomers, Track Employees, OTB Employees, Sports Writers, Gamblers, etc.

The only thing I'd be able to write about horse racing is that the first time I went to a track, I counted my money before I left home. I went, paid for parking, entrance, program, bets, beer, hot dogs, etc. When I got home I counted again and was down ten cents. Don't ask me to write another word about horse racing.

Similarly, you don't need to die and be revived to write about suicide. You might merely have attempted it, or thought about it, or merely be depressed, know someone who did it, or be a professional that treats such people.


There was an episode of The Odd Couple where Oscar had writer's block. He was supposed to write about The Killer Instinct, but couldn't think of anything. It was towards the end of the episode that he realized that he doesn't have the instinct. Discovering that, enabled him to write from the opposite perspective.

Quote: FleaStiff

An awful lot has been written about horse racing and about suicide but the authors had not at that time ever committed suicide or been a horse that had raced. Many travel writers have never visited the places they write about.

Well, that Hemingway quote was utter moonshine, and I expect that he, himself knew that. After all, if it were true, no one could ever write a decent science fiction or fantasy novel, or for that matter a historical novel.

Quote: mkl654321

Well, that Hemingway quote was utter moonshine, and I expect that he, himself knew that. After all, if it were true, no one could ever write a decent science fiction or fantasy novel, or for that matter a historical novel.

Hemingway was in WWI in the Red Cross and got wounded. He wrote a novel about WWI. He was in the Spanish Civil War, he wrote a novel about it. Was was an avid deep sea fisherman, he wrote a novel about it. He was an avid bull fighting fan, he wrote a novel about it. He went to Africa on safari's, he wrote a book about it. Even his short stories were taken from personal experiences. H lived in Paris in the 1920's, he wrote a book about it. He lived in Key West in the 30's and wrote a novel about it. How you sound credible by writing about what you don't know is a mystery to everybody but MKL.

Quote: EvenBob

Hemingway was in WWI in the Red Cross and got wounded. He wrote a novel about WWI. He was in the Spanish Civil War, he wrote a novel about it. Was was an avid deep sea fisherman, he wrote a novel about it. He was an avid bull fighting fan, he wrote a novel about it. He went to Africa on safari's, he wrote a book about it. Even his short stories were taken from personal experiences. H lived in Paris in the 1920's, he wrote a book about it. He lived in Key West in the 30's and wrote a novel about it. How you sound credible by writing about what you don't know is a mystery to everybody but MKL.

It's no mystery to me. Credibility in novels has very little to do with experience. David Niven wrote a novel about a giant cylindrical planet encircling a star. It won three literary awards including the Hugo and Nebula, in spite of David Niven never having lived on a giant cylindrical planet encircling a star.

Hemingway won the 1954 Nobel Prize for literature. This year's winner, Mario Vargas Llosa, has written many works including murder mysteries. I'm reasonably confident Mr. Llosa has never murdered anyone. Neither has novelist James Patterson, yet he has sold more books in the past few years than *anyone*.

Quote: EvenBob

Hemingway was in WWI in the Red Cross and got wounded. He wrote a novel about WWI. He was in the Spanish Civil War, he wrote a novel about it. Was was an avid deep sea fisherman, he wrote a novel about it. He was an avid bull fighting fan, he wrote a novel about it. He went to Africa on safari's, he wrote a book about it. Even his short stories were taken from personal experiences. H lived in Paris in the 1920's, he wrote a book about it. He lived in Key West in the 30's and wrote a novel about it. How you sound credible by writing about what you don't know is a mystery to everybody but MKL.

Bob, why do you babble such nonsense? Hemingway did indeed write novels based on his own experiences. That does NOT, however, mean that a person cannot write about anything but that which he has personally experienced. Most novels are placed in settings and periods that the author NEVER experienced.

Don't subvert logic just to make a point. It makes you appear (more) stupid.

You know what? You two guys are like two bored old men who will argue anything with anybody just to feel needed.

Poor babies....

Quote: MathExtremist

It's no mystery to me. Credibility in novels has very little to do with experience. David Niven wrote a novel about a giant cylindrical planet encircling a star. It won three literary awards including the Hugo and Nebula, in spite of David Niven never having lived on a giant cylindrical planet encircling a star.

That's Larry Niven and the novel is "Ringworld." Not Niven's best work, but the Ringworld idea was very innovative.

Niven could write Ringworld because he understood the physical principles underlying such a structure. Of course he missed some interesting consequences and had to write a sequel to set things straight (though I think the Ringworld base material still has a tensile strenght higher than the strong atomic force, which is ridiculous).

Of course that novel is mostly a travelogue of a section of Ringworld, the plot and even the characters take a backseat to that.

Quote: JerryLogan

You know what? You two guys are like two bored old men who will argue anything with anybody just to feel needed.

Poor babies....

And what does that make this most recent post of yours? Never mind, I know---the delusional ravings of an asshole. Have a nice day.

Quote: Nareed

That's Larry Niven and the novel is "Ringworld." Not Niven's best work, but the Ringworld idea was very innovative.

Niven could write Ringworld because he understood the physical principles underlying such a structure. Of course he missed some interesting consequences and had to write a sequel to set things straight (though I think the Ringworld base material still has a tensile strenght higher than the strong atomic force, which is ridiculous).

Of course that novel is mostly a travelogue of a section of Ringworld, the plot and even the characters take a backseat to that.

I always wondered why he had to make the place so freakin' immense. Also, if the people in Ringworld were all experiencing some kind of afterlife, and there were no casinos and no beer, what good was the place...jest askin'.....

Quote: mkl654321

That does NOT, however, mean that a person cannot write about anything but that which he has personally experienced.

Sigh. What Hemingway was saying is, if you want to write about something, learn it first. If you want to include guns in your novel and know zero about them, good luck. If you want to write about other universes and know nothing about the subject, it will probably show. Ever hear of the wild concept of writers doing research? Why do they do that, do you think? Pick a subject you know nothing about and write a thousand words about it. How do you write about what you don't know?

Quote: Nareed

That's Larry Niven and the novel is "Ringworld." Not Niven's best work, but the Ringworld idea was very innovative.

Heh, I had a feeling I'd botch that some day. Ringworld, the Pink Panther, Curb Your Enthusiasm. It's so hard to keep them straight.

Quote:

Niven could write Ringworld because he understood the physical principles underlying such a structure. Of course he missed some interesting consequences and had to write a sequel to set things straight (though I think the Ringworld base material still has a tensile strenght higher than the strong atomic force, which is ridiculous).

I read a short story once about a race that had the capability to alter the fundamental physics of the universe, like gravity or the strong/weak forces. Not saying it makes sense, but once you get past "we don't know how to do that" the rest of the work was internally consistent.