We all have those dreams of great accomplishments from time to time. Of climbing Mount Everest, skydiving, or writing the great American novel. Maybe that is you, the writer who is ready to break out. Or maybe you just want to give it a shot. Regardless of the setup, you are reading this article because you are either writing a novel or you want to write a novel. I understand you because I am you. I am on the journey of writing my first novel and hope to finish my first draft soon. However, the pages I have written in my novel only account for a portion of my writing over the last year.

You’ve heard it before, but I’ll tell you again. Save your work and save it often. Don’t wait until you’ve written 3 chapters to save. Set an alarm to go off once an hour or so and reach for the save button.

The Firm, John Grisham’s runaway bestseller, was a highly successful movie starring Tom Cruise and earning 270 million worldwide, a substantial figure for 1993. In the movie Mitch, the protagonist, solves his crisis in a different manner than in the book. Although I loved the book, I personally liked the movie ending much better. It was more pleasing and certainly more believable. No offense, Mr. Grisham.

Just how am I going to accomplish this task, since I have never managed to do it before? After all, wasn’t I the one who signed up for NaNoWriMo two years ago, only to change my mind at the last minute and switch over to their Rebel Writer department so I could write articles instead of a remarried empress novel?

Ideas for novels are everywhere. Once you get the idea, you have to focus on the principal subject matter of the idea. Even more, you have to understand your own attitude toward the subject matter and your attitude should be strong and clear.

It never hurts to hire someone who knows that they are doing. But know how much you have to spend and stick to it. If you can’t afford $1,500 for editing services, then don’t spend it. When you Google “freelance editor” you are bound to find the more pricey of the options. But there are reasonable prices out there if you look for them. Try social networking, or goodreads writing groups for self-publishing. A good editor is not going to pressure you into hiring them. In fact, a good editor will let you send them a sample of your novel and edit it so that you can see if your styles are compatible. If you don’t like them, don’t hire them, this is the person you have to work very closely with and if your personalities clash it’s not going to help your book at all.

More is available in books and articles about writing beginnings and middles than is taught on producing good endings. Work diligently on producing yours because it will complete or damage your book. Don’t allow all the hard work of writing a quality novel to be crushed by a poor ending.