When people find out I write fiction and nonfiction, they often ask me which one is harder. They think it has to be nonfiction because everything has to be researched and true. Making up stuff is easy.

I say: No way. Fiction is harder. Much harder.

When you write for a magazine or newspaper or many websites, there are usually guides for how to do it. For style, length, topic. You're writing to a formula, more or less. You learn what the publication wants and deliver exactly that. A lot of standard nonfic is just advanced and hopefully more entertaining versions of stuff you learned in school. How to organize your thoughts and main points, how to access and interpret sources, and explain complex issues in a way other people understand.

Great journalism and nonfiction is a lot more than this. It has high stakes and emotion. It uses fiction techniques to draw you into the story and keep you riveted. These are stories that can shake the world and bring down tyrants. Daily nonfic often doesn't go beyond the formula. It doesn't need to.

Fiction has its formulas too, or you wouldn't see some authors pumping out book-a-year series. But there's no cookie cutter for fiction, no template that's going to take you from idea to bestseller without a long, hard apprenticeship that never ends. Aside from a creative writing unit in school here and there, you probably didn't learn fiction writing skills in any organized way. You have to do it on your own.

That's the challenge.

There's a huge market for how-to books and materials in fiction. You can drown in the how-to blogs. Like any other business, it seems you can make more money telling people how to write a good novel than by actually writing one.

In the end, the fiction writer is on her own. There's no substitute for the butt in the chair. Try out techniques, make the big gaffs over and over till you learn to see what's wrong and try to get it right. Over the years, I've turned down every blind alley there is. I figure I've written a million PAGES (12pt, single space!) just to get to where I am now.

Where am I now?

I'm still learning. I'm still learning nonfiction too, but those assignments are heavily influenced by the publication who asks me for work. My fiction is mine. I have to answer to myself. With an eye on what agents and publishers want, yes. But right now, while I write a novel and short stories, I'm student, teacher, editor and critic.

It's hard. And I love it.