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There Are Only Three Things You Need to Write a Book
And none of them are what you think.
I wrote a terrible and delightful 190k-word novel when I was sixteen.
Yes, it was almost 900 pages.
Yes, it was 190k words.
190,731 words, if you want to get specific about it.
I wrote this book in a single year, which was definitely an accomplishment, given that I had teenager things going on, and I didn’t exactly have a lot of free time.
While a year is a short time to write a longer-than-Dune-novel, I do need to reiterate that I started this article by describing the book as terrible.
Which it was.
I was a kid, and it wasn’t like I could write an epic of incredible prose between classes (and during classes — sorry to all my teachers).
I was barely going to write a book that made sense.
But I was going to write a book that I loved.
When I tell people I’m a writer, I get asked the same few questions.
Usually, I’m asked how I’ve managed to make any money at all, but the rest of the questions are more like:
What do you write?
