What do you view as the most important element of your writing, or your writing life?

Passion? Yes, we all need that, especially when faced with rejection or obstacles in our quest for publication. But if passion were the most critical element in the making of a successful author, the bookstores would be overflowing with our works.

Persistence is certainly another closely related trait shared by successful authors. Again, though, while essential to success, it’s only part of the story.

Time (and balance) questions are often posed to well-known authors in Q & A sessions. It’s a challenge for everyone: how to juggle family/work/writing. That one has no pat answer. Each person has to find what works, and once a routine is established, be flexible enough to accommodate changing circumstances.

How about subject matter and finding a matching audience? Yep. Crucial. Have you written something that someone wants to read? How are they going to discover it? If you have a good handle on these basics, you’re a step ahead of many writers.

Let’s say you have all these ingredients. You’ve got a story (or a topic, for nonfiction writers), a passion for telling it, you are persistent, and you have a good sense of your target audience. You’ve created a workable plan that supports your creativity.

Anything missing?

I would humbly propose that commitment to development of one’s craft might actually top the list. If the final product is full of misspellings, inappropriate word choices, poor pacing, clichés, etc., no one is going to want to read it, no matter how awesome the premise.

Your goal is for readers to snap up your amazing work! And then clamor for more!

Development of craft can come through formal schooling (college coursework, or in-residence classes), informal schooling (online classes or workshops at conferences), or books. I’d like to share my favorite books on the craft of writing. Some of these have garnered mention in my contributions to the CWG blog over the past year or so, but I thought it would be helpful to list them together. I’d also love for you to jump in with your favorites.

• Self-Editing for Fiction Writers, Browne & King. The first craft book I ever bought, its precepts remain timeless and valuable.
• Plot & Structure, Bell. Great for learning, well, how to structure fiction.
• Conflict & Suspense, Bell. How to keep your reader turning the pages. The ideas pertain to all fiction, not just suspense, and can be applied to nonfiction, as well.
• Revision & Self-Editing, Bell. Just what it says. (*Note: The last three books are by James Scott Bell, and are published by Writers Digest, which offers an extensive list of books on the different aspects of craft. There are other books on these subjects by other authors and other publishers.)
• Save the Cat!, Snyder. Intended for screenwriting, it is a great resource for learning story structure and for increasing the level of dialogue (a trend in modern fiction).
• Writing the Breakout Novel, Maas. Everything about novels and how to balance the elements, written by a high-powered literary agent.
• Break into Fiction, Buckham and Love. Perhaps more geared to the genre of romance, but more broadly applicable.
• Writing a Romance Novel for Dummies, Wainger. A top editor with many years of experience, this peek at our work through her lens is invaluable. Again, the content can be more broadly applied.
• Believable Characters, Creating with Enneagrams, Schnebly. A method for creating rich characters based on personality types.
• Punctuation, Plain and Simple, Edgar C. Alward and Jean A. Alward.
• Roget’s Thesaurus.
• Any good dictionary.
• Words That Make a Difference, Greenman.
• The Elements of Style, Strunk and White.

Books by successful authors about writing on my shelves:

• On Writing, Stephen King
• How I Write, Janet Evanovich
• Escaping into the Open, the Art of Writing True, Berg.

Believe it or not, this is not a complete list of my reference books. Some of the rest duplicate the content of the ones listed, or stray from a strictly-writing focus. Have I read all of these? You bet. In some cases, several times over. Have they helped me? Absolutely. Would they help writers of the submissions of a recent contest I judged? Yes, yes, and yes again.

What references do you keep at hand as you write? What books do you consider so essential that you’d buy a copy for your favorite protégé? Let’s see how many different books show up in this list! Thanks for contributing to a reference gem for our fellow authors!