Ideas on how to Write a Bestseller by Dan Brown
Religion
Dan Brown is often accused of being anti-religion. Yet, he considers himself to be “definitely agnostic”. He says that he is on a “constant spiritual journey” himself and his book “The Da Vinci Code” is just “an entertaining story that promotes spiritual discussion and debate”. The book may be simply used “as a positive catalyst for introspection and exploration of our faith”. He explains that “the religions of the world have come up with some pretty interesting tales about where we came from and why we’re here. I don’t think any of them are true, but I’m open.”
Politics
The bestselling author insists that he is not a political person. Nevertheless, he commented on the activity of the 45th president by admitting to being “pretty horrified”. In one of his interviews, Brown said that Donald Trump is “a profound threat – less of a threat to the republic than he is to the honour of the presidency. The republic will survive: there are enough smart, levelheaded people on both sides of the aisle to keep the ship afloat. But he’s certainly damaged the reputation of the presidency and, to some degree, the country.”
Work habits
Brown likes to start his day at 4 pm because he knows for sure that he will not be interrupted at that time. He also likes to start his day with a spinach smoothie or some coffee and work between six to nine hours. The writer uses the application on his computer, which makes the screen go dark for one minute an hour. During that time he does push-ups, sit-ups or hangs upside-down. As for the moments of staring at the blank page, Brown says that “the cure to writer’s block is to write. Write something bad that nobody will ever see. But that process will show you the way back to what’s good. I throw out about 10 pages for every one that I keep.”
Success
Brown confesses that after he reached success, from time to time he could become self-aware when he was writing his new novels. “You type a sentence and say: ‘Wait a minute, how many millions of people are going to read that?‘ But he says that he “was fortunate pretty quickly to be able to say: ‘Wait a minute, you just need to do what you did the last four times, which is to write the book that you’d want to read and if you read this paragraph and you’d like to read it, you’re done.’
Bad reviews
The author treats bad reviews quite philosophically. He reflects that it is natural to “want everybody to love what you do”. If this doesn’t happen, “you get past it at some point and you have to put the blinders on.” He also shared with advice saying that “if you read your reviews, the good ones will make you lazy, the bad ones will make you insecure, so just do what you do, you’ve proven that you know what you’re doing.”