Week 5: Defining Your Book Parameters
This week, I talked about how to define the parameters of your book. I handed out a 10-page worksheet with instructions and several forms that need to be filled out. The results of this worksheet will be a powerful tool when creating your outline and writing your book.
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Download a 73-minute MP3 of this class to listen on your iPod, MP3 Player, or computer media player.
Before you start writing, you should know your theme. You’ll also need to know the type of person (the audience) who is interested in reading a book about this theme. Now you can come up with a list of keywords to help you write a premise statement that will be proven in your book. You’ll come up with a list of questions and answers that need to be asked of your premise statement. Finally, you’ll want to identify the writing style you’re going to use so you stay consistent.
Read the following worksheet which explains more about this process of defining the parameters of your book.
WORKSHEET HANDOUT:
 HANDOUT – Setting Up Your Book (10 pages) Adobe Acrobat PDF |
Fiction Writers
While the non-fiction book writers were working on this worksheet during class time, I took the fiction book writers aside and spoke to them for about 40 minutes. I described some ways to get ideas for fiction, how to expand those ideas into stories, and I talked a bit about story and structure styles. The group of fiction authors asked some good questions along the way which I answered (or at least attempted to answer!)
You can listen to this 40-minute MP3 audio file here for free by clicking the Play button below:
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Aaron McMahon is the author of These Signs Shall Follow and How to Write & Publish Your Book. He is a graduate of all three years of Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry where he interned for associate pastor Kevin Dedmon. Now, Aaron continues to work with Kevin Dedmon, Chris Overstreet and others at Bethel Church in Redding, California to support our mission: worldwide and personal revival. 
Aaron, I was unable to stay for the very end of the class where you took all the fiction writers to another room to discuss tips on writing fiction. Will what you talked about with the fiction authors there be available for me to catch up with at some time?
Thank you so much, by the way, for all the time and effort you are putting into teaching this class group and pouring yourself out for others. Your heart really shines through in all this great stuff! It means a lot to us.