​“James Patterson is a terrible writer who became very, very successful.” — Stephen King.

Could this statement be true?

How can a terrible writer become so successful that he has sold over 400 million copies of his books? Today, out of every 100 hardcovers sold, 6 are his. Is James Patterson really a terrible writer? And if so, how did he hoodwink the world to buy his books?

Is there something he knows and others don’t?

After all, James Patterson sells more books every year than any other living writer. Even more than Stephen King.

But what made him a success?

Patterson always wanted to become a writer.

Even when he was working as a copywriter for J. Walter Thompson, he would find time in his busy schedule to write every day. He would write during lunch breaks, or on flights during his business trips, or at midnight on a busy day.

His first book was rejected 31 times before it was published. However, when it was published, Patterson won the prestigious Edgar award for a best debut novel from the Mystery Writers of America. The Thomas Berryman Number was critically acclaimed, but it sold less than 10,000 copies.

Patterson wrote 6 more books after this, all of which were duds.

It was only during the process of writing the 8th book that he stumbled upon an epiphany — his writing process.

Patterson’s writing process

James Patterson had a unique writing process.

First of all, he wrote with a pencil on paper.

And before writing a novel, he would first create a long outline.

He would outline all the scenes in detail.

He would outline the protagonist and the antagonist’s backstories in detail. Sometimes, his outlines would be 50 pages long.

He would know the beginning, middle, and end before he started writing the book.

But it was only while going through the outline of his 8th book, he realized, he had already written the book. The short scenes in his long outline seemed perfect. It kept the pace of the book. Why flesh it out with more boring details only to add length to the book?

He recalled a story his editor had told him. While writing Nebraska — Bruce Springsteen picked up his guitar and created a rough demo. But he eventually realized that the demo was the record — just him and his acoustic guitar. Nothing else was needed.

Write the outline. Keep everything else out.

Patterson realized that his outline made a better book than a book filled with long, detailed scenes. And so, he made the whole book full of short chapters just 2 -3 pages long. Each chapter had just one scene, one thought.

The book, Along Came A Spider, became a page-turner. It hit the second spot on the New York Times bestsellers list.

Unknowingly, Patterson had found the magic that video game makers chase. Give quick wins to hook the readers. Readers would get satisfaction with finishing chapters, which makes them keep on turning the page.

The Magic is in the pacing

Patterson’s quick pacing and two-minute chapters hit the perfect spot for the attention-deficit population.

And Patterson realized that what he is best in the world at is not crafting stories that were memorable, or writing prose that is quotable but in pacing the stories in such a way that gave quick wins to the reader. He wrote stories ‘okay’ stories but made them fast-paced.

When he realized that, he parlayed that a step further. He focused on only writing the outlines. And then finding co-writers to flesh out his 50–80 page outlines to form a 250–300 page book.

Writers he collaborates with had to follow his rules:

• Keep the chapters short and sweet.
• Make the book dialogue rich because dialogues are quicker to read.
• End as many chapters on cliffhangers as possible, even if it feels ridiculous. Because the goal is to keep the reader hooked and give them a sense of accomplishment.

That’s how, each year, James Patterson releases close to two dozen new books. Because of this strategy, Patterson has published over 350 books so far.

Librarians all over the world recommend his book to turn non-readers into readers.

This is how Patterson outsells Stephen King by a huge margin.

How can you implement James Patterson’s strategy?

The idea is to give quick wins to your audience.

Why?

Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer once set out to study the lives of 26 project teams in 7 companies. They wanted to see what leads to the highest levels of creative output in a workplace.

They asked all the folks in these companies to write a daily journal of their work and thoughts. They also asked these people to rate their work days: was it a good day or a bad day?

After reading 12,000 journal entries, they found people were most motivated on the days they had made progress in their work.

Motivation followed the progress, and not the other way around.

Even more surprising, the type of progress made didn’t matter. Minor progress had an outsized impact on people’s moods and motivations.

Win quick, to win more.

Don’t bore your audience. Give them quick wins. Break progress steps down into smaller units.

The scope of the wins didn’t matter as much as the speed of the win.

Just like Patterson broke down a big chapter into six small chapters to give quick wins to his readers so that they kept on reading, you’ve got to plan your writing in a way that secures quick wins.

Because that’s what will keep your readers coming back for more.