I want to write a novel but have ADD. Need advice please?

Question

I have all these awesome ideas bouncing around and would really like to put them down on paper but I get so bored thinking about just one thing for so long. And thats basically what a novel is. One thing for hundreds of pages.
What tips can you give for someone that has trouble concentrating to get work done on something like a novel?

Answer 1

The best thing to do is read authors and books written in the style of your thought. From the sounds of it, something like The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe (http://www.amazon.com/Electric-Kool-Aid-Acid-Test/dp/0553380648 ) or Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson (http://www.amazon.com/Fear-Loathing-Las-Vegas-American/dp/0679785892 ) should help you find the inspiration and voice that you need to use to take advantage of our unfocused concentration.

The worst thing you can do is to fight it or try and read books on how to overcome who you are. Writing is nothing more then your personal reflection – and trying to change that reflection will leave you nothing to write about.

Find authors who are like you, read them and draw from their flow. Your voice will come in time.

Answer 2

Make the ADD work for you. Don't try to compensate for the ADD, so your plot lines will confuse the reader even better.

Remember that the hardest thing in writing the novel is not the first draft. Your biggest trouble will come later when you start editing it. With the first draft just write write then write more. When you cut stuf out, don't delete it, cut it and paste it to a new file and keep it around, you never know if these discarded bits and pieces can be salvaged into some other material later down the road.

Answer 3

I can relate. I write and I have some attention/memory difficulties.
Tape your thoughts, if you don't want to journal them at every opportunity.

Resist the urge to erase, tear up, or if taped, deleted or re-record your deepest or most painful or most entertaining thoughts...make them work for you; have a bad memory at times? Let the thought stay for a while, and brainstorm around for new ideas...

If it's hard to concentrate, then don't write, draw, paint, color, or do something creative to express quiet and contemplative to yourself mentally, and then as your mind gets time to think...you can choose to record those thoughts...no matter how mundane.

Make it fun, yet keep it simple, make your writing a Scrapbook project, or a Memory book, or a website blog or a call it a one of the aforementioned and yet keep it private and on paper like journal/diary.

Remember it's not HOW MUCH you write, but keeping it regular...so that you can draw thoughts and inspiration to form together a short story, then a few more chapters to it, to make short novel or an even longer one. You start with baby steps...and then you in the end you have taken a huge leap, overall.

Answer 4

Write everything down when it occurs to you.
Write in short bursts.
Let it go.
Then come back to it.

Different writers work different ways. I have published several books, including one novel, and I have the attention span of a three year old.

You can do this. Remember, hardly anybody sits downs and writes hundred of pages at one sitting. (Except Jack Kerouac's first draft of ON THE ROAD.) A writer who spends a day writing maybe be staring at a blank piece of paper (or a blue computer screen) for eight hours to get 250 words written,

And remember--ADD also means that the things that distract you from writing will get boring quickly too so you can go back to it.

But first learn to write down everything as it comes to you. Don't worry about making it perfect. Get it down!

Answer 5

u could tell someone ur ideas and they can write them down. i forget what ADD is. oops. i usually think up ideas 4 a novel when im trying to sleep which usually takes 2 hours. maybe u could write notes for ur story. like: boy fails test or girl has to move to Colorado from Tennesse. And so on. i dunno. sorry if that doesnt help. u might write a story about ur life.

Answer 6

I have had ADD my whole life and never conquered it until i decided to give up taking medicine for it. I have learned to cope with it and now work with numbers all day also i manage workers and have no difficulty keeping my mind focused on what i am supposed to do.
A good book to read for ADD would be > "You're saying I'm not crazy, stupid, or lazy?" you can get it on amazon. it helps.

Answer 7

Eat protein. I hope you are a meat eater. Protein promotes concentration and balanced with a carbohydrate like Basmati rice you are on a winning combination for concentration.

Answer 8

I have a hard time writeing a book and I am perfectly normal which tells me that A.D.D. is NOT the problem. You just don't the right inspiration. I would say you should work on it once every day for one hour. One hour a day shouldn't be too much.

Answer 9

I have an answer but I'm waiting until you get on meds before I tell you or you might forget the answer and what good would that do you or me or anyone really? And that's the point right? To do good?

Answer 10

First take your pill. Then write down a brief summary of your ideas.