Finish Writing Your First Non-Fiction Book

By Charlotte Booth

If you have an idea for a non-fiction book but have no idea how to get started then this step-by-step guide is just what you need to get you started and more importantly to ensure you finish writing your first non-fiction book.

A no-holds-barred approach to getting your book written and seen by traditional publishers (if that is the publishing route you choose) including how to deal with rejections, imposter syndrome and the overwhelm of actually writing a book.

By following the step-by-step programme, the reader will have a process that makes writing non-fiction books easy and can be used again and again.

Charlotte has been a professional author for nearly 20 years and has 18 books traditionally published on Egyptology, history and pop culture. During her career she found the majority of the how-to guides were about fiction and so had to work out the hard way the best approach to planning, writing and choosing a publication route for non-fiction.

This book is an accumulation of what she learned ensuring that your first book is a pleasure to write.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Jul 4, 2023
• ISBN: 9781447550280

Charlotte Booth

Charlotte Booth is a freelance Egyptologist with a PhD in Egyptology. She has had numerous books and articles published on all aspects of Egyptology.

Book preview

Introduction

Congratulations on taking the first step towards writing your first book which has been going around your head for ages. I know exactly what that’s like. You have an idea, but you do nothing with it, and it continues to grow and take up space in your mind; sometimes for years. But now it’s time to take that idea by the horns and finally turn it into a book.

But how do you do that? Well, that’s what I’m here to help you with. The book you’re holding in your hands, will give you a step-by-step process for getting that idea out of your head and into manuscript form. ‘From Brain to Book’ if you will.

The advice in this book is for authors working on non-fiction which can include local, national, family, world and ancient history, tomes about flora and fauna, books about behaviour of animals or children, true crime, psychology, architecture, biographies, self-help and of course business books. In fact, the list of non-fiction genres is pretty much endless, but this process will work for all types of books.

Despite the amount of non-fiction being written, in my time as a professional writer I’ve noticed a lack of advice for non-fiction book authors. Conversely there are dozens of books on writing fiction, on how to create characters, how to design a bullet-proof plot and how to tie it all together.

There are a handful of books on specialised non-fiction such as theses, reports or essays with a very niche audience in mind. This book addresses the balance. It focuses on how to write a non-fiction book that people will want to read from any genre. A book which is well-researched, well-written and generally fabulous.

You may be wondering what qualifies me to write this book. I’ve spent the last 20 years or so as a professional writer and have been through the process of writing and traditional publishing for a total of 18 non-fiction books and one self-published book (this one).

I had to learn the ropes as I went along, both in the writing and publishing processes. With this book I’d like to save you the time and energy by guiding you along the easier path to writing and finishing your first book. Throughout my career I’ve learnt a lot about how the process of writing can be streamlined and then reapplied when writing book two, three, or ten.

Hopefully, my experiences from a series of ideas to 19 published books can make your first journey easier. I learned the hard way, so you don’t have to. Am I a perfect writer? No. Do I know how to effectively plan, pen and pitch a book? Yes. Do I always follow my own advice? Absolutely not. I am human.

But I’m happy to admit that throughout my writing career I really could’ve done with a book like this on how to write basic non-fiction books and how to successfully approach publishers. Don’t get me wrong, with 19 books published I’ve been successful, but there was a lot of trial and error, some books remained unloved for years before I found a publisher and there were times when I wondered why I bothered. I would’ve found this book so useful, and I hope you do too as you approach writing your first non-fiction book. I may not have followed all the advice all the time, but it would’ve been so helpful in working smarter and getting my work written quicker.

So enough about me. Let’s get back to you and your hot idea for a book. And before you pull that face you know it’s a hot idea or you wouldn’t want to write it and wouldn’t be reading this book.

Planner vs. Pantser

When it comes to writing a book for the first time there are two types of writer: the Pantser and the Planner.

I’m hoping that because you’ve bought this book and are reading it, that you are a Planner as a lot of the first chapters are all about how to carefully plan your book, so the writing becomes much easier.

A Pantser on the other hand is someone who writes by the seat of their pants, doesn’t like to plan and just wants to get writing.

Neither approach is wrong, but whenever I’ve tried the Pantser approach, I’ve run out of steam about one fifth of the way through the book and it never gets finished. On the other hand, when I plan, I never get stuck or lost, I always know what I’m going to write about, and I always have the bigger picture in mind.

Your ‘Why’

There are many reasons people write books. Some write to leave a legacy; something that will live on after they’ve gone. Others believe writing and publishing a book will set them apart from everyone else in their industry. Perhaps you have a story that you need to tell, an idea you need to explore, or the book could support your business in some way. Or, like me you could write the books that don’t currently exist that you really, really, really want to read.

Regardless of your reason for wanting to write a book, it’s actually very rare for a writer to write for money and fame as this is not generally the result of being published. Not everyone is J.K. Rowling.

Writers generally write because they have a story to tell, something that they think others will be interested in. For me I have a compulsion to write, and to be honest I cannot imagine not being in the process of writing a book. As one writer said:

Don’t write because you want to be a writer… but because you want to write.¹

If this writing compulsion is new to you, know that you are not alone in wanting to write a book. Studies show that for fiction alone 90% of Americans feel they have a book in them and 60% of Brits.² I don’t think they asked about non-fiction books. Obviously. I could begin to get a complex about this.

Rather than think of all the reasons why you should write a book try to think of all the reasons why you shouldn’t write a book?

The top and bottom of it is, there is actually no reason why you shouldn’t write a book, but sadly our subconscious doesn’t seem to know this and whispers lots of reasons into our ears about why we should step away from the laptop. These include:

You’re too old – Some people think they are too old to write a book, but this is utter nonsense. Barbara Cartland, of steaming bodice-ripper romance fame, was writing books well into her 90s and wrote more than 700 books in her lifetime. 700!! Maya Angelou wrote her first book at 41 years old, and Anna Sewell wrote Black Beauty at 57. You are never too old. In fact, the older you are, the more time you are likely to have to dedicate to the process and you will finish the book sooner.

The time’s not right - Why wait until tomorrow to write that book? You don’t know what will happen in the next few months or years (2020 I’m looking at you), so if you have an idea for a book, pull your finger out and get started.

I’ll let you into a secret.

There will never be the right time, the right environment or the right muse to write that book. The perfect time simply doesn’t exist. But this doesn’t stop people from chasing that idealistic scenario of when they will start writing. This could be the right time, space or even weather conditions.

There was a great letter in Writing Magazine (April 2021) from a writer about this very subject:

Everything about my writing is now organised. My computer has every written document I have ever created in its correct folder, named, dated and backed up. My Kindle books are organised into genre collections and bookmarked where appropriate. My hardback and paperback books are all shelved, filed in author names, alphabetically and date published. Each different drawer in my escritoire contains its own pens, pencils, spare ink, ball point refills, erasers and sticky index markers. On top of my small bookcase, which contains all my dictionaries, thesauruses and numerous blank Oxford A4 lined notepads, in colour order, stand my small collection of fountain pens on a purpose made stand. Great, I have everything in order, a perfectly organised writing space. Only one problem. I have spent so much time organising I have neglected the writing.

Whilst I admire this author’s procrastination and organisational skills, to be a writer you have to write. Therefore, if you genuinely want to write a book, simply grab a pen or a laptop and start the process today. Actually, don’t start writing until you’ve read a little more of this book. Trust me it will help.

I will never write as well as [insert fancy pants author’s name here] - We all have our favourite authors who we admire and aspire to. For me, my literary idols are Louis Theroux and Joyce Tyldesley. I will never be able to write like them because I’m literally (pun intended) not them. I can only ever write like me. Many would-be writers may read the work of a real genius in words, and the discrepancy between that gift and his own will seem a chasm to swallow his hopes.³ But don’t lose hope. Perhaps in the future, writing like you will inspire another would-be author to state, I wish I could write like [insert your name].

I may not be able to write like another author, but I feel that if my writing is influenced by my favourite authors I will be truly thankful, but I don’t expect it. As a new author, you should be the writer you are and not the writer you wish you were. As long as you love the journey your style will always be right. Just consider,

. . . the majority of authors don’t make a living from their books. They do it out of love. If you’re writing because you love it; if you’re writing to help people; if you’re writing because if you don’t write a piece of you dies, then you’ll keep writing no matter what your book sales are like.⁴

Some people just need to write even if their work is not as polished as their favourite author. And if you can do it for joy, you can do it forever.⁵ Now, as you are entering that world of being an author you have to write for a ‘job’ and accept that you may not write like your favourite author, but you are more than willing to try to write like you. As Stephen King said:

I believe large numbers of people have at least some talent as writers and storytellers, and that those talents can be strengthened and sharpened.⁶

So, you just need to work on it, keep practicing and you will improve. You are far more confident than you think as you have taken the first step and have bought this book and have started reading it.

However, if you feel your writing skills are lacking or you need a confidence booster there are ways to be a better writer.

You don’t need any qualifications to be a writer and even if you complete a degree in writing it isn’t necessarily going to make you a better writer with better ideas – you will just understand the mechanics a little more. Whatever your background is you can use that to guide your writing, your research and your general approach to the task. For example, if you are writing a book about your business (as I am here) your skills within your business guides the content. The language can be cleaned up, but the content is key to a good non-fiction book. But like any skill, it can be improved and tightened up. Some people may find it easier than others, but as Dorothea Brande believes, it is possible through the process of teaching the novice to do by artifice what the born writer does spontaneously.⁷

The easiest way to improve is to keep writing. The more you do it the better you will get. This means that the first draft of any book you write may not be as polished as you would like it to be but with editing it will improve. Then as you write the second and third book you will find your style changes. When I go back and look at my first published book I’m surprised at how much I’ve grown and improved as a writer since then.

Reading

Another sure-fire way of improving your writing is to read books in your genre. Lots of books.

Many writers, especially if they are writing in their spare time around a full-time job often state they, don’t have time to read, or worse, they don’t really enjoy reading. It really is too important not to find the time if you are serious about becoming a writer.

One of the authors who went through my From Brain to Book mentoring programme was adamant: I don’t want to read books in the genre as I don’t want to be influenced by them. They were determined not to read anything in the field, and it took some convincing before they considered it.

When you are reading in your genre, you are not reading in order to plagiarise, but to learn from their language, their style and how they handle discussion, sensitive topics or how to make a dry subject (see my copyright chapter) engaging. You are reading as a writer not as a reader, and should have a list of questions, style points or techniques that you are looking for when you are reading through books in your genre.

learn to consider a book in the light of what it can teach you about the improvement of your own work.⁸

By reading carefully, if the author loses your interest at one point, try to work out what it is in their writing which caused this or vice versa, if there is a part of the book that you love, try to work out how the author pulled you in. If they have tackled something tricky or sensitive, and you may have to do something similar mark how they’ve done it and what approach they took. Reading as a writer makes it a learning tool, as you are not there to steal ideas but to see how they handled things which are specific to your genre.

You can attempt to imitate authors in your genre but what you are really doing is assimilating their practices into your own writing style. When you open a book and see lots of short paragraphs, images, diagrams and text boxes you may think the book is more appealing as it appears ‘easier to read’ but if the book has long blocks of texts, long paragraphs and no illustrations it could look ‘difficult’ to read. Alternatively in some genres short paragraphs and lots of images will give the book the appearance of being ‘dumbed down’ and may not be taken seriously. Books with large fonts and lots of white space may not be taken as seriously within the genre as books with a smaller font and spacing. It will be up to you to decide what format and what approach you take depending on the genre and what appeals to you and the audience you are writing for. But you can learn a lot from looking at other’s books.

If you are worried that reading other’s works will change your voice you are deluding yourself.

I read a lot of Stephen King when I was younger, but I don’t (and never have) written like him, and as an adult I read anything by Louis Theroux, but I’m not as dry-witted in my delivery as he is. If reading a particular author made you write in their style it would be great and a lot quicker than having to actually write, practice style, improve grammar and learn about storytelling. But if you truly believe that reading other’s in your genre will change your writing style then bottle the formula and sell it. You will be a millionaire overnight.

The other reason reading is so important is to understand the genre. As we will talk about at length throughout the following chapters, your book is a product that needs to be marketed. If you want to know how to market your book you need to understand the competition, and what sells.

"The more attuned you are to the wants and needs of the market, the better your writing will suit that audience …⁹ It’s a lot easier to write for a market if you know the genre."¹⁰

Whilst reading as a form of market research you can deconstruct the books as you are reading them; the length of each chapter, how the chapter is structured,