Congratulations, Roy Peter Clark. Your 21st book just arrived, and you're here to tell us that we, too, can birth literary babies if we just squeeze out 200 words a day like some kind of content womb. How inspiring. How... quaint.
In his article “Get ready to write your book: 5 tips on becoming an author,” Clark offers advice so aggressively wholesome it practically smells like fresh library books and self-discipline. Unfortunately, the rest of us are out here drowning in crippling perfectionism, existential dread, and an internet that’s 95% distraction and 5% other people’s highlight reels.
So let's dissect these five tips from America’s Most Well-Adjusted Writing Grandpa and give them the cynical, modern update they so desperately need.
Tip 1: Write a Little Every Day (And Other Lies We Tell Ourselves)
“A page a day equals a book a year,” he says, like a motivational calendar come to life.
Wow. Groundbreaking. A whole page, Roy? You mean all I have to do is push out 200 words a day, and by the time I’ve had 261 minor breakdowns and 52 weekends of pretending I’m ‘resting,’ I’ll have a 52,200-word opus?
Here’s the thing: Writing 200 words a day sounds manageable. Until you realize that on some days, those 200 words have to fight their way past your depression, your day job, your unpaid emotional labor, and the existential scream that echoes every time you open a blank Google Doc.
This is the literary equivalent of saying, “Just eat healthy and exercise!” when someone asks how to lose weight. Technically true. Functionally useless if you haven’t seen a vegetable since the Obama administration.
Tip 2: Gather Your Notebooks and Make Your Bed (Because Apparently, This Is Boot Camp Now)
Clark compares writing a book to exercising. Cute. He then suggests that before you write, you should clean your room like Jordan Peterson’s emotionally unavailable twin. Because apparently, the secret to literary greatness is not wordplay or insight, but domestic tidiness.
“Make your bed. Clean the closet. Organize your notebooks.” Translation: I have no idea how to start writing today, so I’m going to pretend that putting my stapler in a drawer is ‘creative prep.’
Here’s a spicy take: You can write a book with a messy bed. You can write a book with three cups of cold coffee on your desk and last week’s laundry staring at you like disappointed ancestors. You do not need to turn your apartment into an IKEA showroom to earn the right to write. If cleaning helped people write books, every mom with a label maker would have a Pulitzer.
Tip 3: Lower Your Standards (Finally, Some Advice I Can Actually Use)
This one I’ll allow. Clark suggests that the cure for writer’s block is to lower your standards. YES. Please. Let’s drag those expectations all the way to hell where they belong.
Perfectionism is the black mold of creativity. It thrives in the corners of your brain where the light doesn’t reach. You know what ruins books? Trying to write your magnum opus on draft one. You know what creates books? Vomit drafts that look like a 9th grader’s diary crossed with a conspiracy manifesto. You can fix garbage. You cannot fix the void where a first draft should be.
So yes, lower your standards. In fact, smash them with a hammer, bury the pieces, and salt the earth. Then go write something so bad it makes your inner critic curl up and cry in Comic Sans.
Tip 4: Lean into the Zero Draft (Or: Write Like No One Will Ever Read It, Because They Probably Won’t)
Clark lovingly refers to his early drafts as “Zero Drafts,” which is just a fancy way of saying “this is trash, but it’s my trash.”
He breaks his books into snack-sized 1,000-word chapters and says he often spits one out in a single sitting. That's adorable. Meanwhile, some of us are out here giving ourselves a hernia trying to write a tweet that doesn't make us hate ourselves.
Writing a book is less like running a marathon and more like crawling through a swamp with a pen in your teeth. Breaking it up into 1,000-word chunks sounds great until you realize that each chunk is a little existential therapy session you have to write while fighting off imposter syndrome and wondering if anyone even reads books anymore.
Clark says he doesn’t even start with the intro — he just writes whatever’s easiest. That’s smart. I support this. But let’s not pretend that just because you can slice your novel into sushi rolls, it doesn’t still taste like raw anxiety.
Tip 5: Put the Easier Parts Down First (Also Known As Procrastination With Purpose)
Here’s where Clark’s Midwestern sensibility really shines. “Start with what’s easiest!” he chirps, like a motivational goose honking productivity into your soul.
Again, this is decent advice, if you don’t mind the fact that it turns your book into a jigsaw puzzle assembled during a windstorm. Sure, write the juicy scene where your villain gives a monologue and forget about the boring chapter where you explain what the plot is. That won’t backfire at all!
This is how you end up with 43 isolated scenes, 12 half-baked ideas, and a document labeled “Final_Final_ThisTimeIDon’tMeanIt.docx.”
Writing the easy parts first is like eating dessert before dinner: incredibly satisfying in the moment, but eventually, you’re going to have to deal with the broccoli.
BONUS: Take ‘Notes’ (Or: How to Look Productive in Meetings While Plotting Your Novel)
This one deserves a slow clap. Roy Peter Clark admits that he used to write during faculty meetings and let people think he was taking notes. Bravo, sir. This is the kind of petty brilliance we need more of.
This is the only tip in the article that I believe 100% of aspiring authors will actually follow. Because if there’s one thing writers love more than avoiding writing, it’s pretending to write while being paid to do something else. If you’ve never outlined a murder mystery while pretending to type up action items, are you even a writer?
The Real Secret Sauce: Privilege, Access, and an Undying Need for Validation
Let’s zoom out for a second. Roy Peter Clark has written 21 books. Twenty-one. And eight of them were published by Little, Brown, a major publisher that doesn’t just hand out deals like Halloween candy.
You know what helps you get published? Being a white man with an academic pedigree, decades of experience, and connections at places like Poynter. It’s not that Clark isn’t talented — he clearly is — but talent isn’t the only ingredient in this recipe. There’s a generous helping of opportunity, access, and credibility baked in.
Meanwhile, the rest of us are trying to pitch our 3rd rejected novel to indie presses while simultaneously trying to convince our family that “freelance writer” is not code for unemployed.
So What Should You Do If You Want to Write a Book?
Fine. You want to write a book. You’ve decided that the world simply must hear your thoughts on goblin capitalism, your enemies-to-lovers vampire erotica, or your 47-part memoir series about growing up in the suburbs. Great. Here's your no-bullsh*t checklist:
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Accept that no one cares — yet. Not your partner, not your barista, not your dog. You have to be your own hype machine.
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Write like you’re in a fugue state. Turn off your phone. Lock yourself in a room. Pretend the world ended and your laptop is the only thing keeping you alive.
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Edit later, cry now. Your first draft will suck. Let it. The second one might too. By draft five, you’ll either have a book or Stockholm Syndrome.
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Know your market. If you’re writing for everyone, you’re writing for no one. Know your weird little niche and serve it like it’s artisanal bread.
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Pitch like a door-to-door encyclopedia salesman. Rejection is part of the ritual. It means you’re in the game. Embrace it like a literary hazing.
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Get petty. Fuel yourself with the desire to prove someone wrong. A high school teacher. An ex. A TikTok commenter. Anyone.
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Finish it. Not because it’s perfect, but because your ghostwriter in the afterlife will be too busy haunting ChatGPT.
Final Thoughts from a Bitter Word Goblin
Clark ends his piece with a chant: “A page a day equals a book a year.” And sure, if you squint, stay off social media, and have a PhD in Discipline, that might work.
But for the rest of us, writing a book is a war of attrition, a slow-burn relationship with failure, and an act of delusional optimism in a world that thinks TikToks are literature now.
Still want to write that book?
Good. Do it. Even if it’s messy. Even if it’s late. Even if you write it in the Notes app at 2 AM while ignoring 14 unread emails from your boss.
Because the one thing Roy Peter Clark is absolutely right about is this: writing, for all its agony, is still worth it.
Just maybe… clean your closet later.
