Now for this chapter, we will be covering some simple questions.
How many chapters do you need to complete a book? If you followed the steps in the previous chapter you don't have to worry about this. This is because there is always room to expand and grow. Either by using flashbacks to expand the relative information about the main character. Or by allowing you to change the main goal, by completing the previous one. However, a rule of thumb I like to use is that if you are writing a book, a minimum of 30,000 words should be a good stopping point, without overly rushing things. I have a finished book called, WarWithin, that only has 10 chapters, but the word count is something like 35,000 words and it was very rushed. It wasn't a good ending, but I left an opening so that if I wanted to continue I could.
Do you need to be good at spelling to write a book? Oh good heavens no, I am terrible at spelling and even worse at punctuation. As long as you have access to a computer, you should be just fine. When I first type up a chapter for my book or a section, it usually consists of 1,500 words or so. However, after the various methods I use to check my spelling mistakes and grammar, it usually falls to around 1,200 or so words. Now the easiest way to check your work is if you have Word. Word has a variety of ways to spellcheck and grammar check some problems in your work. It also has a function of TTS or text-to-speech so that it can read you the section in question. An example of this is the word certion/certin/certain I had so much trouble figuring out how this was spelled because the way you sound it out seems like there's supposed to be an o in it, however with the TTS function when I heard it pronounced I was like, yea that's not correct. Now if you don't have access to the full/paid-for Word, I would recommend turning to Grammarly.
Grammarly and ttsreader.com both of these are 100% free, with an option to pay for more options. I have used the free version of Grammarly, as well as the paid version of Grammarly. If you have no money to spend on these luxuries you will be just fine, however, If you do have the spare cash, the Grammarly subscription is worth it. It allows you to expand on your writing with simple suggestions, such as "I'm very happy to be part of..." to "I'm thrilled/delighted/pleased to be part of..." Now the only reason I'm mentioning the paid-for version of Grammarly is that it helped a lot when I was writing my college papers, haha.
What steps can I take to stay focused while writing?
I honestly don't have an answer to this, I have ADHD, and I can't sit still for too long to stay focused. Like right now I'm listening to music while watching a video on the side. I'll be 100% focused then, lose track and go on a 2-hour tangent of youtube shorts, it's crazy.
Now if you're talking about staying focused on the actual story, I would suggest getting a small whiteboard, and writing down things you want to cover within certain sections of the story and cross them off as you go through them, while also writing down things to keep track of. Like, let's say the cat transformation in the last chapter, for the story about the cat who ran up a tree. This is important to note because now the world that the characters are in, is magical, or close to it and that entity is out of the norm, in some shape or form, unless that is the norm of the world you're going for.
What about the world?
The world can be anything you want, just make some rules to follow, so that you can bend them when needed. Let's say I create a world about magic. This would has an element we don't have here, or I think we don't, we could entirely have magic just not know about it, but that's beside the point. A law would be something that, each individual in the magic world, has access to magic, however, magic does not come out of thin air, but somewhere within the body. Then by exhausting the magic it can either grow or cause the person to go into a magical withdrawal. How about a fighting world, same concept, but instead of exhausting their magic, something like ki or exhausting the body. How about a cultivation world, or a world filled with superheroes? It's the same thing, you just need to set ground rules.
How violent can my book be/How sexual can my book be? Well, this depends on a few things. I'm in the U.S.A. and I am allowed to write just about anything. So below is a list of reasons a book can be banned/removed/challenged in my country.
sexual content
offensive language
unsuited to age group
religious viewpoint
LGBTQIA+ content
violence
racism
use of illegal substances
"anti-family" content
political viewpoint
Now let's get rid of the reasons that won't matter in general.
sexual content
violence
use of illegal substances
That only leaves three, but even then that could be debatable, especially if you're writing fiction about the mafia, or some other criminal organization. AND EVEN THEN you can write just about anything. You just need to know the audience you want to write to.
If it's children, you don't talk about sex, violence, or illegal substances. If it's for teens, some violence is acceptable just, like a face slap, or an occasional punch here and there, as for sexual content, light kissing at most. If your audience is adults, it becomes a bit more complicated, because adults break up into many categories, some only like smut stories, some only like action and violence, while others just want the most disturbing things this planet has to offer.
Write what you want to write, do not dought yourself.
As for the last topic, I believe it's not something many people think about, but I feel is important to note, is how many people your main character is interacting with at any one point in time.
Let's say your main character is in a room with 20-something people, you have to keep track of those 20 people, and at times it can get very hard to keep track of. In cases like this
so in so said this
mike said this
sally said that.
etc
however, if it's just two people, you can get away with something like this.
Hi, how was your day John?
Oh, wonderful my wife woke up early and surprised me with eggs and bacon.
This is a bit of a hit-or-miss area because it can get confusing. As it's not stating who is talking, but the intent still gets across as it was a direct question. If you're a beginner writer, keep it simple.
Hi, how was your day John? Asked mike
Oh, wonderful my wife woke up early and surprised me with eggs and bacon. Said X
however, this can get a bit bland, add some excess thoughts to make it a bit more interesting.
Hi, how was your day John? Asked Mike as he was sitting down in the breakroom.
Oh, wonderful my wife woke up early and surprised me with eggs and bacon. Said X as his thoughts ran wild about his wife having an affair.
The last thing to think about is chapter titles. You can go with chap 1,2,3, or something like chapter 1 the awakening. Chapter titles are a small, but important section a book can contain. However, you need to be careful if you choose to do titles because it can spoil some of the later chapters. For example, Chapter 69 losing the battle. Chose something like this instead, Chapter 69 A grueling war/battle/fight. This way the intent of the chapter is still communicated, but the story is not exposed. A grueling war/battle/fight can mean many things, however, losing the battle already tells you the story.
With that, I will be ending this chapter here. In the next chapter using the previous steps mentioned, and the story about the cat who ran up a tree. I will make a short interesting story.