I finally disagree with the whole 'write what you know' advice

My novel about a fisherman tanked hard last year. Three beta readers in a row told me the boat parts felt fake. I've never even been on a boat. Spent 400 dollars on a weekend charter with a retired captain in Tacoma. He showed me rope knots, let me steer, talked about tides for hours. Rewrote the whole thing in two weeks and sold it to a small press. That advice crippled me for years. Has anyone else thrown out a writing rule and gotten better results?

2 comments

2 Comments

morgan_jenkins904d ago

Write what you know" advice hurt me too. I wrote a whole novel set in a bakery and had to scrap it because I'd never baked a loaf of bread in my life.

ross.jessica4d ago

Right? @morgan_jenkins90 that advice is so misleading. Write what you know doesn't mean you can't write about stuff you haven't done personally, it means write from your emotional truth. Like you probably know what it feels like to want something to succeed and have it fail, right? That's the real meat of the story, not whether you can knead dough properly. Research and imagination fill in the rest.