How to Write a Novel in 90 Days

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How to Write a Book in 90 Days

It may seem like a crazy idea, but with the right planning and a little bit of preparation, you can write your first novel in 90 days. This concise guide will walk you through the steps to write your first draft in no time, from getting into a positive mindset to scheduling daily writing sessions.

Writing the first draft of a book in 90 days is possible, even for first-time writers.

Every November, during National Novel Writing Month, many writers complete 50,000-word manuscripts in 30 days. So, writing a full-length novel in 90 days is just as achievable. It takes a story idea and a desire to challenge yourself to bring it to life.

This post is a step-by-step breakdown of writing a book in 90 days. Keep on reading and get ready to write a whole novel in no time.

It Starts with a Winning Mindset

First and foremost, your success in writing a novel will depend on your mindset. This goes for any goal you set in life, not just your writing goals.

A winning mindset is when your thoughts and beliefs support your goals.

If you sit down to write each day, but deep down, you don’t believe you can write a novel in 90 days, then chances are you won’t. You will procrastinate and find reasons why writing the book is impossible.

Here are some supportive thoughts and beliefs for creating a winning mindset.

I Can Write a Book in 90 Days

Reframe your thoughts and start believing your goal is achievable because it is.

If people write 50,000 words in 30 days, 100,000 words in 90 days is possible. Deciding to achieve a goal is a choice.

Whether you have a goal of writing 1500 words or 1000 words a day, your novel’s success lies within you – your thoughts.

The First Draft of Your Novel is Supposed to Be Messy

You also have to embrace the fact the first draft of the novel will not be perfect. It’s not meant to be perfect.

All best-selling authors will tell you they went through multiple drafts before publishing their books.

Accepting the messy first draft will help you push through the tough writing times. It’s inevitable. You will have a draft with plot holes and typos.

Embrace it and keep moving forward.

Allow yourself to write without overthinking. You will not have everything figured out.

Your first draft is an exploration of your story. Let the story come to you naturally rather than forcing it. Give yourself the freedom to just write.

The best way to overcome writer’s block is to write unfiltered, even if your writing doesn’t make sense. You can make sense of your thoughts during the editing phase.

Editing as you draft is the quickest way not to finish the book, so tell your internal editor to relax and go on vacation for 90 days. The editing will happen later.

The goal is not to write a perfect book but to finish the first draft.

What matters is that you write your story.

I Don’t Have to be Perfect

There is no ideal way to write a novel. Let yourself make mistakes.

You’re not going to be 100% on track all the time, so don’t beat yourself up if a writing session doesn’t go as planned.

Write what comes to mind and focus on moving forward. It doesn’t matter if you only write 100 words today or 2000 words tomorrow, keep writing each day. You’ll find that momentum builds after the first few weeks, and before you know it, you’ll be finishing chapters in record time!

I became a writing machine after I read and implemented the tips shared by Rachel Aaron in her best-seller, 2000 to 10,000: How to Write Faster, Write Better and Write More of What You Love. Definitely check out her book if you want to increase your daily word count.

It’s easier to achieve your writing goals if you accept that the first draft is a discovery process.

Writers sometimes think they need to wait until every sentence is perfect before moving on, but the more you try to make it perfect, the less chance you have of actually finishing the book.

A successful writing mindset is making a choice to achieve your goal no matter what, brushing off any setbacks, and writing not to be perfect but to write the best story you can.

Create a Daily Writing Routine

Having a daily writing routine helps you make time to write your story. It also helps get the creative writing process going.

A writing routine is a set of tasks before each writing session. The benefit of a routine is that it signals to your left brain that it’s time to write.

This could include getting up at a particular time, making a cup of coffee or tea in your favorite writing mug, having a light breakfast, and going for a run.

Deciding when you’re going to write is probably the most essential part of the routine. What time of day? How many times per week? Once you decide, calendar your writing time and make it part of your schedule.

To give you an idea of my writing routine, I do the following before each writing session:

Get up at 5:00 am (I’m a morning person).
After I wash up for the day, I change into my writing clothes. I have specific T-shirts and yoga pants I wear only when I write.
Make a cup of coffee in my favorite writing mug

Prepare a light breakfast of fruits and nuts
Stretch and meditate for a few minutes
Light a scented candle
Turn on the music playlist
Start the 50-minute timer and write.

I write in 25-minute time blocks. Then I take 5-minute breaks in between. If I do more than two writing time blocks, I take a 15-minute break before the next time block.

Other ideas to include in a routine are journaling or taking a few deep breaths to relax. Find a routine that works and make it your own. My first attempt at creating a routine didn’t work, but I kept trying different things until I found a routine I could stick with.

Plan Your Story

Whether you are a plotter or pantser, you will benefit from a systematic approach to story planning. Knowing what you will write is a big part of the writing process.

You don’t want to sit down and stare at a blank page.

Instead, you want a writing plan, an outline, or better yet, chapter and scene summaries to give you a starting point during your writing sessions.

I try to keep my prep work to about a month.

Week 1

Expand your great story idea into a complete concept and premise.

Concepts are just ideas, like a supernatural thriller with a female protagonist.

A premise is a richly developed story with strong characters and intriguing plots. Story Engineering by best-selling author Larry Brooks has an excellent chapter on understanding the difference between concept and premise.

He also goes over how to know if your book idea is developed enough to start writing or if you need to go back to the brainstorming phase. To make sure you have a well-developed concept and premise, check out Story Engineering.

Week 2

This week is all about character development. You are going to get to know your main characters and learn their goals and needs. What do they want? What is their backstory? These character-building blocks are part of the foundation for your novel.

Week 3 and 4

For the next two weeks, you are going to work on the heart of your story. You are going to plot out your novel and story structure. The best plotting tool I have found is the Save the Cat Writes a Novel Beat Sheet.

The Beat Sheet helps you structure your plot and even fill in plot holes.

To learn more about the plotting method that changed my writing life, check out Save the Cat! Write a Novel: The Last Book on Novel Writing You’ll Ever Need by Jessica Brody. This is honestly one of the best creative writing books I’ve read. This is honestly one of the best creative writing books I’ve read. It’s no surprise the book is a national bestseller. The tips and strategies for plotting a novel are that good.

If you are writing a YA Novel, check out Save the Cat! Writes a Young Adult Novel: The Ultimate Guide to Writing a YA Bestseller.

Set a Writing Goal

Once your pre-writing prep work is completed, the next simple step is setting a manuscript and a daily word count goal. Your word count goal will be based on how many days per week you will be writing.

For example, if you have a goal to write a 100,000-word novel, and you plan to write seven days per week, then your daily word count will be approximately 1,000 words per day.

Keep track of your progress by creating a spreadsheet to log your daily word count.

Each day, allocate as much time as you need to reach your word count.

Keep in mind that not every session will go as planned. Don’t let that throw you off. Just keep writing and do your best to hit your target word count.

To learn more about setting achievable writing goals, check out “How to Achieve Your Life Goal to Write a Novel.”

Schedule Daily Writing Sessions

You are now ready to write your first book in 90 days. I recommend specific tasks before and after your writing sessions to make the drafting phase more efficient.

As I mentioned, you dont want to sit at your desk and stare at a blank page. That’s a recipe for not finishing your book.

Before Each Writing Session:

For the next 90 days, you will be writing a novel scene by scene. So before each writing session, you want to summarize the scenes and chapters you will be writing. This is an important step, especially if you have little time to work on your novel because you want to get right to work.

Thinking about the action in the scene will help the writing session go faster. Review any chapter or scene from the previous writing session to remember where things left off.

On the day of the session, start with your writing routine. This will prepare your brain to write.

Turn off all sources of distraction so that you can draft with complete focus. If you find it challenging to stay focused, try closing your eyes and visualizing your scene.

For example, what does your character’s voice sound like? What are they wearing? What does your character want in the scene? Are there any smells or other sensory details that can inspire your creativity?

After Each Writing Session:

Take a break and stretch your legs. Get something to drink or go outside for some fresh air to recharge.

Frequent breaks will help avoid writing fatigue. This is why I draft in time blocks of 25 minutes with 5-minute breaks. The process helps me get more writing done without burning out.

After your break, you want to review what you’ve written to see if there are notes you want to make. You want to record any gaps in the plot or inconsistencies.

Write down any ideas or questions you thought about while you were writing.

I draft in Google Docs and use the comment feature to make notes. It’s easy to record ideas I can later adjust during editing.

Remember you are not to edit during the drafting phase. Just make notes for things you may have thought about while writing. Editing happens in the revision phase.

Your focus should be on getting words onto the page and making progress.

Before you stop for the day, log your word count. You want to make sure you are on track to hit your goal. Also, set your writing goal for the next writing session.

If you are behind, you may need to increase the writing goal for the next session. If you are on track or ahead of schedule, keep going. Don’t interrupt the momentum.

Save your work and rest up! You’re done for the day!

Final Thoughts

So, is writing a 90-day novel an achievable task? The simple answer is Yes! And it doesn’t have to take a lot of time. It will, however, take discipline, but if you do the hard work, you can achieve your goal.

If I can write a first draft in 90 days, you can too. The steps I shared in this post are the same steps I followed when I wrote the first draft of my novel in just 90 days.

To recap, success in writing your novel requires a strong writing mindset, prep work, a daily writing routine, and setting writing goals.

Think about how great it will feel when you’re done, especially if this is the first time you’ve written a book. Remember why you started this project and keep plugging away at it. The most important thing is that you don’t give up.