I'm considering writing a book

[Lozzer]

Yes, I understand that this is probably posted in the wrong forum but its not so much about the book itself so much as it is about what I'm going to write. Plus, to be presumptuous I think I'll have more replies here.

Well to the point.

I'm considering writing a book, I've already decided that it's going to be an autobiography (pretentious or what?) about my own coming of age. It's pretty much be a story of how a spoilt little rich boy fell from his privileged position due a many social factors and false expectations. It will only cover my teenage years from 13-16 as these are the three most important and most influential years of my life. It will be about everything from how I my delusions about how the real world worked crashed and burned under the weight of contradictions in my view, how I ended up sciving school, how I spiralled out of control (meeting and befriending those on a completely different social step of the ladder) by becoming a frequent drug user and consumer of alcohol, my experiences in the 'criminal underworld' and my activities as a 'yobbo'. So, pretty much all that including detailed anecdotal stories and shit which I can't even believe would happen.

If I think I can write a few hundred pages on this easily enough, I hope to write it in a humorous way but with a generally solemn tone.

This is where my problem is, its going to be incredibly revealing and I'll end up writing about subjects and experiences which allot of my family do not know about. These things could be dangerous to relations, as in really dangerous. This wouldn't concern me much had I the foreknowledge that the book would sell well after being published. My aim is to make it as exciting an honest as possible to induce interests, but if it doesn't manage to get onto the mainstream its going to be incredibly embarrassing and rather pointless--getting a few pence for an internet publication after having my entire family read it isn't something I would really take much self-achievement in.

And I need to get writing as soon as possible, there is no next year for beginning this book. I've figured that an in-depth autobiography isn't very special when written by an adult, I have to write it now while I'm 17 for the novelty.

So I need your thoughts, has anyone had any experience in writing and had these conundrums before?

[Chinaski]

If you're worried about getting in trouble or something, wait until you're 18 to publish it.

[Feck]

Change the names , use a nom de plume claim it is fiction ,that way you can stray from the absolute truth for extra shits and giggles.

[Lozzer]

If you're worried about getting in trouble or something, wait until you're 18 to publish it.

God no there's not trouble as such. No disappointment either. But the way I'm perceived will be completely shifted for either better or worse. Whether I'm 17 or 18 it doesn't matter, I still won't be seen the same way.

[Lozzer]

Change the names , use a nom de plume claim it is fiction ,that way you can stray from the absolute truth for extra shits and giggles.

Well yes I'll have to do that anyway. I can't give away the real names less I get stabbed

[Xamonas Chegwé]

If you feel the need to write it, write it.

A novel is not an overnight thing. By the time you have finished, you may well feel different about how, where and if you wish to publish it. It is the writing that counts.

[blp]

Even with name changes you can get into trouble if it's too obvious who it's about and the material's too contentious. A friend of my ex wrote a kind of revenge novel about a family who'd tormented him. They found out and the book, which had been commissioned and printed, had to be pulped.

Have you read The Basketball Diaries? Autobiography of a teenage smack head. Might want to have a look. It's a lot better than the movie.

[Rum]

Start writing. Don't talk about it. Do and do it every day. Don't re-write until you have done a hundred pages. Don't stop until it is finished.

Unless you do it this way you will end up writing 100 unfinished or hardly started books like a million others of us..

[Xamonas Chegwé]

Start writing. Don't talk about it. Do and do it every day. Don't re-write until you have done a hundred pages. Don't stop until it is finished.

Unless you do it this way you will end up writing 100 unfinished or hardly started books like a million others of us..

Can't think who you might be thinking of there.

[Hermit]

There is a book in everyone, and that is where most of them should stay.

More seriously, writing a book is nothing like writing the same number of words and posting them to a forum. It is much harder work, and it takes mountains of persistence and discipline to finish. Not that I am talking from experience. All I can say is that even finishing an essay of a few thousand words involves a lot of fucking blood sweat and tears, periods of loathing and doubt interspersed with moments of pleasure as you re-read what you've written so far and contemplate how to continue.

Without the necessary persistence your prospective book will not grow past a fragment of your intended work. That fragment will either finish up as a dozen pages near the bottom of a drawer and eventually in the waste paper basked, or as some long unviewed file that gets lost during a disc crash or reformat because you "forgot" to back your stuff up.

[Transgirlofnofaith]

There is a book in everyone, and that is where most of them should stay.

Fucking Classic! Truer words and all that...

More seriously, writing a book is nothing like writing the same number of words and posting them to a forum. It is much harder work, and it takes mountains of persistence and discipline to finish. Not that I am talking from experience. All I can say is that even finishing an essay of a few thousand words involves a lot of fucking blood sweat and tears, periods of loathing and doubt interspersed with moments of pleasure as you re-read what you've written so far and contemplate how to continue.

Without the necessary persistence your prospective book will not grow past a fragment of your intended work. That fragment will either finish up as a dozen pages near the bottom of a drawer and eventually in the waste paper basked, or as some long unviewed file that gets lost during a disc crash or reformat because you "forgot" to back your stuff up.

I'm working on a novel, albeit slowly. I mentioned it in this RDF thread here. I know I'm not having the easiest time, but that's not the point. The point is that I feel that I am a writer. Now, I think there are two types of people who write, one being categorical and the other describing an innate identification. Simply put, there are writers, and there are WRITERS. A writer is simply someone who puts some words on paper and makes a career or a name for themselves doing it. A WRITER is someone who weighs the intangibles of life and then makes them into rude metaphors to put in novels. But really, being a WRITER is about something internal, something beautiful and transcendent, something which you wrench out from your chest cavity and pimp to the Vicodin-popping masses. But not for their sake, for yours.

Now, excuse my rambling, Lozzer, but the point I believe I was somehow leading up to is that maybe you're one or the other, and which one you are will affect how you go about this project, and your life at large. Now, you may wish to explain the plot of this book as just a bunch of wacky stuff that happened, or you can say: "This book documents a very confused, chaotic, and bizarre period of my life, and how I managed to eventually work my way toward a better place." For example. If you take the project you're on more seriously(provided it's not a comedy book), you approach it in a different way and pay more attention to the underlying themes. Instead of general havoc and personal problems, you would be telling a story of rebirth. The way we see things has an affect on how we regard them. If you approach it as an Archetypal story of death and rebirth, you might attract a better readership than if the book looks to others as a story of teens going wild(bad metaphor ).

[AshtonBlack]

Can we get an update on this project Lozz? I'd be interested to find out how it's going.

[Lozzer]

Can we get an update on this project Lozz? I'd be interested to find out how it's going.

Its not going at all

I spent two hours on the first 4 paragraphs, and haven't been back to it since.