“You’re a liar. A brilliant liar.”

This book is designed to get you thinking about, or writing, fiction for fun or  profit.

Why? Because it’s a creative avenue that I don’t see enough people doing, and more people should.

Hopefully, as you’ve started reading this book, it’s already resonated with you for some reason. Maybe you’ve considered writing fiction before, or maybe you’ve never thought about it, but you’re curious. Keep reading. You’re about to discover if you have a superpower.

If you regularly dream (day or night), if you have an active imagination and can invent ideas, or expand on situations you’re faced with, then you have a natural skill that many other people don’t have.

You read correctly. Not many people have that natural skill. Apart from rare exceptions, everyone dreams, but not vivid, detailed, sensory dreams. That’s different. And remembering your dream after waking isn’t common at all.

I dream every night, but I remember almost nothing within moments of waking naturally. If I’m woken suddenly, I can remember snippets, but they disappear quickly. Or one vivid image may remain for an hour or so, then dissipate throughout the morning. By the middle of the day, there’s nothing left. I also find it very difficult to create things with my mind. If someone says ‘pink elephant’ I don’t imagine a pink elephant; I only see a person saying ‘pink elephant.’ And yet, even with my limited imagination, I’ve written and published five works of fiction.

I have a friend who dreams wildly, and remembers every single detail: faces, places, conversations, full adventures from beginning to end. He’s always been like that. Maybe you are too? Or maybe you’ve got it to a lesser degree, but still way more than I have.

So if I can write fiction without a great imagination, you definitely can. And if you lean into it, you’ll discover an unlimited resource of visual imagery, going to waste everyday and you don’t even take it seriously, because no-one has told you it’s your superpower and one that can pay your bills.

I’ll repeat my statement above…

If you regularly dream, day or night, if you have an active imagination and can invent ideas, or expand on situations you’re faced with, then you have a natural skill that many other people don’t have.

Fiction is ripe for you.

Even if you don’t have vivid dreams, you can train your mind to become more creative to write great fiction. You just think up a scenario and expand on it, continuously until it’s as vivid as if you actually experienced it.

Before I go any further, let’s just break down what a story is quickly: it’s a tale of someone doing something for a good reason that probably isn’t easy, but is ultimately worth doing. That’s it. If your character has a good reason to try and do something difficult, it’s a story. If you’re a skateboarder, you’ll immediately see a connection. Skaters do hard things for a good reason: All. Day. Long. Struggle and conflict are built into skateboarding from day one.

So, get this: You have dreams (an active imagination), and do hard things every day as a hobby. That’s two big requirements ticked off already.

But I can already feel your resistance: You’re already beginning to fight against me…

‘Yes, but I don’t write.’ I can hear you thinking. My point is, this isn’t school. There’s no grade to win, teacher to mock your ideas, no presentation to give. You could write, and until you try, you might be surprised, one: at how much you enjoy it, and two: how good you naturally are at it.

‘There’s no-way I’m telling people I’m going to write fiction.’ Fine, don’t tell anyone. Do it in private. Do it because you’ve realised you might have brilliant imagination and need to see if my theory has legs.

‘Writing is hard. I can’t spell well. I can write , but I don’t have the words to do what other people do.’ So what? Write badly. Who cares? But unless you try it, you won’t know.

‘No-one wants to hear a badly written story.’ Wrong. The author TS Paul (RIP: 2019) wrote a 60 page sci-fi story for funzies, published it on Amazon, and made thousands of dollars in his first few months. It was badly written, full of errors, and even had duplicated paragraphs he left in by mistake. All the reviews slated him for it, but they also bought the story, said it was great, and they wanted more. They didn’t care about the errors. TS Paul proved you didn’t need to write well, you just needed to write something worth reading. And he didn’t know what was worth reading until he wrote and published it.

‘I can’t type.’ You don’t have to anymore. You can turn speech into text on your phone. Try it. Hit the microphone button on the keyboard of your favourite messenger app and start talking. It’ll type out your words almost perfectly. Just remember to turn down the music or go somewhere quiet to do it! Dictation is the secret weapon for anyone wanting to write and can’t type or spell. And there’s a lot of free software tools to help out with punctuation and grammar too. More on that later.

‘I can’t write a whole book.’ You don’t have to. In fact, it’s better if you write something short first. Try the smallest story you can think of with a simple beginning, middle, and end. Find out if you like it, if you can do it, if it ignites more ideas in your brain. If it doesn’t, stop. You don’t have to continue.

‘But all those words though…’ Ok, now you’re just bitching without trying.

So let’s recap:

• You have an active imagination

• You have struggles all the time through skateboarding.

• You haven’t tried to write

• Readers don’t really care about errors as long as the story and characters are good.

• You don’t have to be able to type.

• You don’t have to write a whole book.

With all those excuses out of the way, the only valid excuse is not knowing how to tell a story worth reading. That’s where I come in.

There’s a lot of writing books out there, and you should ignore all of them. You only need one book on writing to get going. That’s this one. Because I’m a skateboarder who has written fiction, and you’re a skateboarder who wants to write fiction. I know how you think. Better than any other fiction ‘teacher’. Follow my process, structure, and tips, and you’ll get to the end of this with a great story. Once you’ve done one, you can go any route you want to create more. But you have to start somewhere, and I recommend you start right here.

I will help you flesh out an idea into a full outline ready for the first draft. In this process you’ll discover the basic elements which are needed to tell a compelling story and grip readers from the very first page.

I want you to sketch out lots of dumb ideas which go nowhere. Because only then will you find a gem to turn into something brilliant.

Flesh out the seed of an idea into a full outline ready for the first draft. In this guided process you’ll discover the basic elements which are needed to tell a compelling story and grip readers from the very first page.

1. First you must brainstorm your story elements

2. Then you must flesh them out into Acts (beginning, middle, and end)

3. Then you must write the first draft.

Each section is fully introduced for the new writer and allows the story to develop from any point the writer wishes.