A Few Tips on Writing from Amor Towles

I’ve started a small series where I take a few of my favorite writers and compile their best tips for writing. This second issue is on my newest favorite writer, Amor Towles.

I picked up Amor Towles’ A Gentleman in Moscow the day before the first lockdown in California, a choice that became one of my best in 2020. Since then, I have re-read the book three times, and everything else he has put out since and before. It is safe to say that he has become one of my favorite authors. 

I spent the last week or so going through his various interviews and profiles and came up with four main principles that he follows when it comes to writing.

Study the greats.

Amor has spent much of his life studying his craft. Yes he studied at both Yale and Standord (which I heard are alright schools), but that perseverance has extended past his years in college. Amor and three other friends have a book club that has been going strong for the last 15 years, with them coming together every month without fail to discuss a new book. If you do the math, that  amounts to over 180 books. That’s 180 books that Amir has analyzed, critiqued, and learned from to influence his own writing, and it shows. There was a reason his first book was a NYT best seller.  

Plan it out.

By the time Amor begins to pen the first words of his novel, he has already been working for at least a year. The reason, Mr Towles is a ruthless outliner. 

And that takes me about a year to two years, where I just start thinking through every element: the settings, the scenes, the individuals, the events. And so by the time I write chapter one, I have most of the book sketched out.


Amor does not constrain himself to this outline, though. He remarks that he frequently discovers new things about his characters as he writes them. Instead, the outline serves as a foundation, a structure to fall back on when inspiration isn’t hitting like it should.

Inspiration comes to those who work.

There is a common belief in writing, or any creative work, that inspiration drives the action, and one needs to wait for it before work can be done. Amor would disagree.

I almost never start with inspiration. If you start to write a scene or an idea, if you can stick at that for 20 minutes, eventually you can get lost in the process and the creative function takes over. The imagination suddenly kicks in. You almost have to dive in and start to work, and eventually, if you get in the groove, you can flourish.

Don’t use waiting for inspiration as an excuse for not getting to work. Dive in first, stick with it, and eventually you’ll start swimming. 

Follow your fascination.

Amor would be the first to admit that he is no expert on the subjects that he chooses to be the setting or theme of his books but would say that they are areas that he has been interested in for some time.

Rather than pursuing research driven projects, I like to write from areas of existing fascination. Even as young man, I was a fan of the 1920s and 1930s, eagerly reading the novels, watching the movies, and listening to the music of the era. I used this deep-seated familiarity as the foundation for inventing my version of 1938 New York in Rules of Civility. Similarly, I chose to write A Gentleman in Moscow because of my longstanding fascination with Russian literature, culture, and history.

Hemingway had a similar view, where one should write what they know. Having a longstanding curiosity of a subject allows one to draw from past experiences and knowledge rather than going out and researching, as well as adds a personal touch. And at the risk of stating the obvious, it is much easier to write about a subject you enjoy rather than one you don’t but think the reader would.

Liked this? Hated it? Somehow found a typo (it’s rare, but crazier things have happened). Let me know.