African Writers Press

First published by African Writers Press in 2013

ISBN: 978 9970-28-001-1

eISBN: 9781626751644

First Edition

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims damages.

Copyright © Goretti Kyomuhendo 2013

For G

For those amazing qualities: Love, Patience and Friendship

My teacher in many ways; my first fan

Thank you for coming with me this far

Dedication

Foreword

Introduction

Author's Preface

Part One: Background

My Journey as a Writer

How I Got Published

Part Two: Essential Writing Techniques

Plot

Types of Plots

Character Building

Exercise on How to Create Believable Characters

Point of View

Types of Point of View

Exercise to Help You Decide which Point of View to Use

Setting

Tips on How to Create Credible Setting

Exercise on Setting

Dialogue

Four Tips on How to Create Good Dialogue

Diction/Language

Four Tips on Diction

Tips on How to Create Good Images

Style

Show – Don't Tell

Part Three: Writing Tips

What Does it take to be a Writer?

Courage

Commitment

Hard Work

Beginning to Write

Sustaining Your Writing

Ideas for Stories

Finding the Time to Write

Writing as a Process

Keeping a Journal

Planning your Story

Length of your novel

Choosing a Genre

A Writer Writes

A Writer Reads

After You have Finished Writing: Re-writing, Revising, Cutting, Editing, Proofreading, and All That

Dealing with Rejection from Publishers

Dealing with Criticism and Critics

Part Four: Frequently Asked Questions

Writer's Block: Is it Real?

Intention

Moral Obligation for an African Writer

Language and the African Writer

What Jobs are Available for Writers? Can I Live on My Writing? Can I Make Money as a Writer?

Part Five: Publishing Your Manuscript

Publishing in Africa

Publishers (in Africa)

Publishers (abroad)

Self-Publishing

Internet Publishing

Literary Agents

Part Six: Marketing, Selling, and Promoting your Book

Part Seven: Support and Resources for Writers

Writers' Associations

List of Writers' Associations

Writers' Residences

List of Writers' Residences

Writer's Prizes

List of Ten Literary Prizes for African Writers

Writers' Grants

Writers' Fellowship

Writer- in- Residence Positions

Books Quoted

Biographies

Literary establishments across the world have for long held the view that creative writing is something that is inborn, that cannot be taught. In other words, that such talent springs out of an individual spontaneously the way a wild flower springs out of the bush. However, in recent decades many educationists have taken the view that such talent can be cultivated and nurtured. Hence the emergence of schools of creative writing in many institutions of higher learning.

But even outside the schools of writing efforts have been made to design manuals, guides and discourses on the subject of creative writing. Such guides are often accompanied by drills that offer some kind of apprenticeship along the path to a writing career.

The subject is still relatively new and many of its aspects are yet to be explored. This is being done at many academic institutions in the English speaking world in which creative writing courses have found a place in the curriculum. But of course not everyone who is interested in a writing career will have the privilege of enrolling in such courses. Most would-be writers have to pursue their vocation privately through trial and error.

Goretti Kyomuhendo has chosen to use her personal experience as a novelist as a basis for drawing lessons that she has offered to those likely to be faced with similar challenges. She has chosen to particularly target African writers who are the most likely to share similar backgrounds and similar challenges in gaining access to peer review, good editors, willing publishers and, at the end of the line, a supportive reading public.

This book is not an instructional manual, but it is full of useful tips about how to overcome hurdles that are commonly encountered by beginning writers in Africa. At the end of the book the author offers valuable information about literary prizes, writers' residences and fellowships available to African writers.

I have no doubt that Goretti's personal journey will serve as a source of inspiration for many aspiring writers in Africa and beyond.

Prof. Arthur Shatto Gakwandi

Literature Department

Makerere University

The first word of this Handbook for African Creative Writers is the first person, "I" – setting the tone for the immediate and lasting impression Goretti Kyomuhendo's book will make on its readers. Indeed, it is the sound of Goretti's voice, caught unerringly on the page, which makes this book "essential" in a very real sense: it is a handbook, a guide, written by someone who has lived and worked through all the material it covers. Someone who becomes through its pages just the sort of guide one wants in such a personal endeavour as creative writing - sitting alongside you before the blank page or computer screen, and working with you through the experience of writing, and all that follows on from that experience.

This, then, is a handbook full of such practical, down to earth, and meaningful guidance because it emerges out of Goretti's lived experience of the life of a writer. She fulfils the only meaningful definition of a writer: writers write. Not because they are in contexts that require them to write, but because they understand and are committed to the idea that writing is a verb, a 'doing word', something to be practised - an obsession, a compulsion, call it what you will, that may have many practical benefits, but ultimately goes beyond that to a part of ourselves that is difficult to talk about.

And the wonder of Goretti's guide is that she does talk about it, that all the rich nuggets of advice and guidance in this book are set in her deeply felt personal experience of writing, publishing, and engaging in the world of writing. It is, as she says, exactly the sort of book she would have wanted when first trying to make her way in that world, and it is a mark of her generosity as a writer that she has now written something that will be of so much benefit to so many other young writers.

The audience for this book that Goretti has in mind is one made up of people very much like her young self – that courageous, dedicated young woman who is still so much a part of Goretti today. It is a creative writing guide for beginners, and more specifically for emerging African writers who live on the continent. It provides ready reference, instruction, and help for the young writer, but it is this and more: it is also a resource book, listing residencies, grants, prizes, and publishers who are interested in African writing. Crucially, it is also - like that other example of the best kind of writing guide, Stephen King's On Writing - part memoir and part "tool kit". Goretti's nuts-and-bolts advice on the craft of writing emerges out of a vivid description of her first experiences of writing and the writing industry.

This autobiographical context gives her advice on the inspirational and the creative a touch of real pragmatism – even economic awareness – necessary for a realistic approach to writing in Africa. In Goretti's case this includes crucial decisions such as choosing to write in English and understanding the vital elements of the western forms of the novel, alongside a sensitive awareness of the circumstances of so many African writers. This Handbook is very much one for African Creative Writers, but it extends outwards to a whole world of possibilities.

This, too, reflects the way in which Goretti's career has unfolded, from the specifics of her early African experience to her involvement with some of the leading international writing festivals and institutions. Her advice is not, however, limited to her own experience. At times, necessarily, she writes of possibilities she has not yet explored, but she is always honest about this, and tells the reader why she expresses the opinions she does.

In short, with this book Goretti shows that she is not just a writer, but also a teacher. Designed to be easily consulted and cutting quickly to the heart of each topic it touches upon, this handbook is exactly the kind of useful reference work one would expect from a fine teacher - but one who is a friend too. A handbook is sometimes referred to as a vade mecum, Latin for "go with me", and on each page of this handbook one feels that Goretti is along for the ride as the emerging writer strikes out into the strange, exciting, challenging, and sometimes baffling and frustrating life of the imagination.

Michael Cawood Green

Professor of English and Creative Writing

Northumbria University

Newcastle upon Tyne

I have been compelled to write this writers' guide because of the numerous questions I receive from different categories of people, including students, the elderly, retired persons, who have suddenly found themselves with enough time and resources to pursue their creative writing passion. The queries are usually similar: How did you start writing? What inspires you to write? How can I start writing my own stories? What does it take to become a writer? How can I publish my manuscript?

Ever since my first novel, The First Daughter, was published in 1996, I have participated in many literary events such as conferences, symposiums, book fares and workshops in Uganda and abroad, including South Africa, Egypt, Rwanda, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Tanzania, the United Kingdom, United States, Malaysia, Thailand, Brazil, Germany, the Netherlands, and France.

My books are used in a number of universities, colleges and secondary schools and over the years, I have received numerous letters from students asking for my advice on writing and wanting to know a little more about myself. As I write this guide, I refer to the letters to try and answer some of the questions raised by these readers.

When I am in Kampala, I often run into people who have read my books. A bank teller once told me she had studied literature at Makerere University, and used to attend my readings while still a university student. She revealed that after graduating, she had planned to start writing a novel, but instead, had ended up 'doing this bank job', which was completely unrelated to literature. She now wondered if she would ever write that novel. She wanted to make an appointment with me so I could give her advice on how to proceed.

Another time, it was a traffic police officer who stopped me, initially to check my driving credentials but when he recognised me, he beamed happily and asked:

"When is your next novel coming out? I really enjoyed reading your last one and it inspired me to write a novel myself. But I have a big problem. I never went to university. I stopped at my O' level because of lack of school fees, and joined the Police Force. But if you 'showed' me how to write a book, I'm sure I would do it. It's a story about my late mother..."

And next it was a shop attendant who approached me after I had finished doing my purchases and said there was someone who wanted to speak to me. It turned out to be her daughter, who had accompanied her to the shop that day. The young girl told me she was a student in secondary school but currently in her long vacation. She was using the free time to write her first novel. But it was more difficult than she had anticipated and she needed my assistance. She had read my books and believed I was the right person to guide her in her creative writing career.

One incident though, which happened around 1999, still stands out in my memory. While walking through Kampala's busy taxi park one evening, I heard someone calling out, in fact, shouting my name. I turned to look, shocked that someone was trying to catch my attention in the rowdy taxi park. It was a scruffy, young man and when I stopped, he began walking swiftly towards me.

He said to me, "I know you! You are the writer!" He sounded extremely excited by his 'discovery'. He got hold of my hand, looked me directly in the eye and said earnestly, "Please, please, madam, wait here. I have something to show you. It's my book, which I have been writing for a year now. I have it with me, right here. I come with it every day so I can write when I get time."

A taxi conductor writing a book! Impossible, I remember thinking, completely astounded.

Later I gave him an appointment to meet him at my office. I offered to read through his manuscript, which sounded like his memoir. It described how he had dropped out of school after being orphaned at the age of fifteen and how he was working as a taxi tout to raise enough money to go back to school. I was impressed. He had a natural flair for storytelling, except the manuscript needed plenty of work to correct his limited grammar and other teething problems most first time writers face, before it could reach publishable standards.

I told him he needed to rework on the areas that I had highlighted before approaching a publisher to discuss his chances of getting published. He asked me if there was a school in Uganda that taught people like him with limited formal education, how to write or improve their writing; I said I did not know of any. He then asked if there was a text book that he could buy to help him improve his writing skills. I directed him to Aristoc Bookshop, where I knew such books were sold.

I did not hear from him until about a year later, when he came to tell me he was returning to the village to find a better job, which would enable him to fund his education. When I asked him about his writing, he said he had given it up. He had gone to Aristoc as I had advised him but the books were far too expensive and besides, they were all written by foreigners who made references to foreign concepts and quoted books he had never heard of.

These incidents do not happen that frequently but when they do, I feel humbled that people look up to me to help them achieve their writing ambitions. I have thought about writing this guide for a long time now, but my reluctance has been that even after more than fifteen years of writing and publishing three novels, several short stories, and children's books, I still don't consider myself qualified enough to give advice on how to write a good book.

I don't believe I know the infallible way of achieving a successful story. Besides, when I started writing myself, I did not have the benefits of a university degree, nor had I attended any creative writing courses. I had only studied literature in secondary school and read a lot of novels. And even as I pen down my thoughts now, I still feel the craft of writing is a field in which I am still constantly growing and learning; but at the same time, I feel compelled to share what I know now.

In this guide, I share my own experiences of how I started writing and how I first got published; the lessons I have learnt along the way, and what I believe to be the good ethos of writing. The truth though, is that for every writer, it is a different journey and a different experience.

I also know that the writing and publishing terrain in Africa has undergone significant changes since the days when I first started writing. Now there is Internet and Email and mobile phones and blogging and Twittering and Facebook and E-publishing and E-reading. These facilities were not available in the early nineties when I was living in Uganda and struggling to write and get published. I hand-wrote my first manuscripts because there was limited access to computers. But with this new information era, beginners can now download all sorts of information on how to write a good book and how to find publishers.

However, I am hopeful that my own experiences will inspire some people to start writing, and to continue writing, despite the challenges which may seem insurmountable. I sincerely hope that for those just beginning, or about to begin on their writing journey, they will still find the information herein useful and relevant.

Goretti Kyomuhendo

•   My Journey as a Writer

•   How I Got Published

Things Fall Apart