Do this to make your scenes flow (your readers will love you for it)

I wrote 2.5 million words of fiction before publishing a single book. That's like the Lord of the Rings trilogy five times over.

^^ How do you know you wrote that much, Eva?

I kept meticulous word counts. It was one way to feel like I was making progress while I spent 15 years learning how to write fantasy and sci-fi.

^^ You must not be a good writer if it took you that long to figure it out.

The painful truth is: You're right, or at least, you were before I finally figured out this writing thing.

I was skilled at some parts of writing, sure, but spinning an immersive narrative that carried through an entire book or series? Not so much. I was like one of those spiders whose web is beautiful on one side and a broken mess on the other that makes you wonder if they were drunk when they spun it.

But eight years ago, something changed in my spider brain. 

After years of practice and study, how to write an actual book finally clicked in my mind. I've written and published 20 books since with more on the way.

Another way to put it is this: anyone can be an author if they 1) care deeply about their stories, characters, and worlds; 2) keep writing; and 3) study the craft of fiction writing passionately.

This means YOU can write the novel that's pressing against the inside of your skull like Athena trying to burst out of Zeus.

And you DON'T have to spend 15 years writing 2.5 million words and getting a repetitive strain injury first.

You just need to learn from my mistakes (as well as those of other writers).

The good news is that you can do it even if you've struggled before.

I'm not a "natural" writer (is anyone? Even the best learned from someone else). I learned every single thing, usually in the hardest way possible.

But you can skip past all those painful lessons and get right to the treasure on the last level of the dungeon.  

That's why I'm sharing one of the writing tricks that helped make everything click for me.

Most writing advice is intense--though we try to make it as simple as possible at Scribe Forge--but this technique is one you can implement right away to make your scenes flow better with a logical consistency that makes them easier to read.

In short:

Your characters' actions should follow a specific order of operations that matches the way real people react to the world. The order is:

Automatic responses

Thoughts

Actions

Dialogue

Here's what I mean.

Imagine you walk into your coffee table. Your first response is automatic, the things you don't have control over: You flinch away as pain shoots through your shin.

Then, come your thoughts as they catch up to what your body does on its own. Stupid coffee table!

Then, you take physical action. You kick the table leg as though in vengeance.

Finally, you say something because it's the act that requires the most mental load so it happens slower than the others: "Get out of the way, table!"

When writing a scene, your characters follow the same formula:

Automatic responses

Thoughts

Actions

Dialogue

Or ATAD. It's more than a tad useful. (*wiggles eyebrows*)

This gives your writing a logical flow that makes intuitive sense to readers because it's how we all act every day.

You don't need to include all four elements of ATAD every time your character does something. They might act without thinking or speaking. Or they might think without saying anything.

And you can break the order when it makes sense to do so. For example, if your character thinks about something they just said, they have to say it first: "I'm wearing glow-in-the-dark underwear." I clap a hand over my mouth. Why did I just blurt that out?

But if you're not sure what your character should do next, look to ATAD.