Welcome to the Boot Camp Community.
Essays, Insights, Tips and Tough Love - A Forum For Those Who Love Writing and Love Thinking and Love Thinking About Writing.
Hi, I’m Tim Lott - journalist, novelist, and Guardian writing mentor.
Welcome to my Bootcamp. A forum for readers and writers.
I post three times a week. On Saturdays, an essay, which might be about anything at all. On Tuesdays a post about the craft of writing in some form or other. And on Thursday, a free post from my archive.
There are some difficult truths about novel writing which it suits the creative writing industry ( and make no mistake it is an industry, for all its cuddly, genteel demeanour) to keep under wraps – or at least not think about too much.
(This, incidentally, is where the ‘Boot Camp’ comes in. Not because I’m expecting you to get up at 5 am and do road work, but because my strand is about hands-on, practical advice without any frills. It’s Tim Lott’s Tough Love)
The first difficult truth is – yes, anyone can write a novel, but very few people can write a good novel. Because they don’t really know what makes a novel work. Or - equally likely -they simply don’t have sufficient talent or imagination.
Also writing a novel is not ‘fun’ – at least not all of the time. It’s one of the hardest of all the arts to master.
Writing is not a job or a hobby you can learn by rote. It is a mystery. But although it is unfathomable, it is not entirely without signposts. I specialise in pointing out those signposts to you – rather than telling you ‘how to write a novel’ ( nobody knows how to write a novel, not even novelists). Much of my work on writing appears in this book, published June 15, 2023
The good news is, you won’t know whether you can write a novel until you try. This newsletter is here to help you try – but also to help you be realistic about what you can achieve. And it’s here for you to form part or a COMMUNITY where we all help one another. It’s not so much a pulpit with me on the soapbox, as a bustling village square with everyone swapping information with everyone else. I try and guide and use my experience to help, but everyone has a voice in the Bootcamp. To help build the community please share below.
There’s a more practical reason. Writing courses and classes are expensive. For £5 a month, or £50 a year, I am within the reach of any would-be writer.
If you want to learn about the subscription options please go here:
.
What I am enjoying is the specificity of the feedback and content. It is really helpful, particularly the comments and editing you shared on the scenes submitted by members. Sometimes I feel that the writing advice I read is too vague for me to implement. Editing other friends' writing in my writing group also has helped me to improve my understanding. Thanks, Tim.
Great to read this Tim. Tough love is often the best way when it comes to writing. Excited to see what you have for us..even us writers who have been doing it a long time