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The teeny tiny word choices drive me nuts.quote:At our first interview(1), Charlie’s hair was a mess of black greasy tendrils, pushed around with a comb. He sat hunched over his chair(2), tracing a crack on the table with a chewed fingertip. Then he peeled back a smile and said(3), “Pretty sure it was eleven heads in that van. Cops said ten, but they’s wrong.” A set up to describe the first time the narrator met the person: 1. At our first interview / - During our first interview. - At my first interview. - In the first interview. How the person was seated in a chair: 2. He sat hunched over his chair. / - He hunched over the chair. - He sat hunching over the chair. He grinned and said something after poking at the table. 3. Then he peeled back a smile and said / - He peeled back a smile and said, - Peeling back a smile he said, - He said, peeling back a smile, I agonize over this little poo poo, looking for the best, most efficient way to say what's in my head, which is, "the first time I met this guy was in an interview with him, and he was a sinister lovely person*." (* and no, I do not want to write it like THAT because I want to SHOW don't TELL.) magnificent7 fucked around with this message at 00:16 on Jan 21, 2014 |
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Jan 21, 2014 00:00
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magnificent7 posted:The teeny tiny word choices drive me nuts. Even if you find one you're happy with now, you probably will change your mind later. This is the sort of thing I worry about on a review of an already completed draft, where I usually change tonnes of little poo poo like that. I think it's easier when you have a version out of the way so that you know essentially what is. But you will probably never be entirely happy. There's always a lot of options, just like with anything. When eating a meal: should I eat all of the potato first? Should I eat half the potato, then the meat, then the rest? Should I have both at once? But ultimately the end result will be the same, you just need to find out what you want your journey to be. Which brings me on to your reference to "the best, the most efficient way". I might be nit-picking, and you might not have meant this, but the best way might not always be the most efficient way. I suppose it's a style thing or a voice thing. I suggest that you might not have meant that as "He sat hunched over his chair(2), tracing a crack on the table with a chewed fingertip" isn't exactly super efficient, but the idea of dwelling and focussing on this particular minutiae still might be the best way to do it. I am curious, though, how did the police accidentally not count a head?
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Jan 21, 2014 00:57
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The van was a mess of deteriorating body parts. Sorry - posted too quick. The longer story including the guy being found in a van full of rotten body parts, the body count determined by the number of jawbones located... and/or the total bodies were more than ten, but they only found ten heads. drat. More holes in the story. quote:Even if you find one you're happy with now, you probably will change your mind later. For instance: In my mind, the guy is slumped down in his seat, head hanging down, totally zoned in on the table. Hunched over. But, saying "hunched over the seat" suddenly sounds like the seat's turned around backwards, or poo poo, maybe he's standing over the table... it's this ridiculous inner-debate that kills my writing; I'll write something, think, "yep, that's it right there", and then pick it apart, so by the time I'm done with that one sentence fragment I've lost the bigger moment. (as in, "oh by the way the van was a mess of body parts... that's why nobody's sure how many bodies were in there.") magnificent7 fucked around with this message at 02:18 on Jan 21, 2014 |
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Jan 21, 2014 01:52
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Business-end question (and background): I've been submitting stories to lit magazines for a while now and I've been getting the usual 10:1 ratio of rejections to acceptances. Thing is, one of my recent stories has a "second read" status instead of the usual accept/decline. I figure it's good news--I mean, even if it's a lateral reader and not someone up the chain, it's still getting a second set of eyes on it, which can't be a bad thing--but I've never seen a submission page update with "second read" before. Anyone ever gotten something like that, and if so, did your story get accepted? edit: in case anyone missed it, this is me desperately looking for relief in the middle of a long publishing drought Asbury fucked around with this message at 07:03 on Jan 21, 2014 |
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Jan 21, 2014 06:39
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Yeah, I've seen it happen and I did get accepted. I think it generally indicates that you've mowed at least a little way up the chain.
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Jan 21, 2014 06:49
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Yeah, I've had that happen a few times. "Shortlisted" is the word they use sometimes. I've had a few get accepted from there and a few not.
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Jan 21, 2014 07:19
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Is there any online resource which sets out the different writing styles used in world folklore? E.G. How the Arabian Nights's style is obviously different from the Poetic Edda. I'm trying to find out what are the key things that separate them to be distinctive.
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Jan 21, 2014 11:14
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Are there any best practices when writing about a "team" of characters? How many are "too many" on a team that will be continuing on to the end of the book and possibly into the next? Is it too difficult having a main character who is only slightly more important than the rest of the team and will be featured as such? Is it possible to pull off a main character acting as the stable, no frills, foundation of the team while the supporting teammates have more interesting characteristics and flaws? I have a team of 6 so far, 5 of which have very interesting and unique personalities. As a reference, think of the team of marines in "Aliens" that goes in to investigate the colony on LB426. I am currently just brainstorming ideas, putting things on paper and have yet to have the reality of what I can and cannot do set in. This is my first endeavor into fictional writing and I think I might be getting in over my head.
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Jan 23, 2014 17:19
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I'm going to take the prick approach here and answer your questions with some questions of my own. What makes your characters people? When you say a "team" I picture something like Oceans 11 or Mission Impossible where the characters aren't personalities so much as they are classes (the Thief, the Fighter, the Hacker, whatever). Those kinds of characters work in movies because the actors can add little bits of personality to their roles, but in a novel you'll need more. Irony is your friend here. What can you do to make the characters memorable, or to invert the trope? The stoic, squared-away leader is a pretty stock character. Can you make the shitbird in your squad the leader instead? What conflicts are there between your team members? This is where they'll end up memorable. Who hates who, and why? How can you use that conflict to push the plot? Does a fight lead to jealousy and does that jealousy lead to one of your team members loving over another one and risking the mission? Internal conflict is money. What event, what moment, makes each character relatable to the audience? What scene makes the reader think, "Okay, this guy deserves to win, but this guy, what a cockbite?" How will those characters change throughout the course of the story? Every scene you've written has to have some kind of change. Otherwise it's flat. What do your characters want, and how far will they go to get it? What primal desires drive your characters? Most importantly, what's the story? Like, if you were trying to pitch this story to an agent, what is the one line you would use to sell it? Take a look at a couple examples here: 1) A platoon of space Marines, stranded on a planet after a rescue mission gone wrong, must fight their way through nightmarish alien creatures to escape. 2) A determined woman, traumatized by her experience with a deadly alien creature, decides to face her fear and joins a squad of Marines in a mission to destroy an alien hive, but finds herself trapped on the planet with a few fellow survivors and must fight her way through the depths of the hive to escape. These aren't the best examples since they're just off the cuff (and leave out all the thematic motherhood stuff), but I think the second one is far better. There's primal, personal stuff at stake there--it's about one person the reader (or in this case, the viewer) can get behind. Anyway, point is, the team is only a part of it; the story is what matters, because if you don't have a story you don't have much. Let the story be the boss, but let the characters drive that story--figure out how their personalities and their desires make things happen. Asbury fucked around with this message at 22:11 on Jan 23, 2014 |
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Jan 23, 2014 18:34
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Not to bring you down or otherwise invalidate you if the answer is "no," but are you published anywhere? Between the sound advice you give and your apparent taste in entertainment I'd really like to read your stuff.
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Jan 23, 2014 18:50
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Let me send you a PM (I'm old enough to be leery about having my name out on a message board, even though I know anyone with enough time and patience could probably piece together everything about me except my cock size, and maybe even that)
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Jan 23, 2014 18:54
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lunatikfringe posted:Are there any best practices when writing about a "team" of characters? How many are "too many" on a team that will be continuing on to the end of the book and possibly into the next? Is it too difficult having a main character who is only slightly more important than the rest of the team and will be featured as such? Is it possible to pull off a main character acting as the stable, no frills, foundation of the team while the supporting teammates have more interesting characteristics and flaws? Stop brainstorming ideas and write. You learn to write by writing, not thinking about what you're going to write. Having an idea where you're going is good, but if you've spent more than a day or two in the planning stages, you need to be moving forward. The story will mutate on you anyway: my current novel started deviating from the outline about two paragraphs in, and was completely divorced from it by chapter 4. I'm a pretty hardline gardener so you'll probably stick with it longer than that, but it still won't last as long as you think. It also tends to create more organic characters. Stop planning, and let the story do its thing: rather than saying "Hogson is the Medic With a Heart of GoldxBadass Bruiser", just make him a dude who looks after the other dudes and misses his kid, and see what happens to him from there. He'll surprise you. A trope just turns into more tropes, but a character turns into a better character.
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Jan 23, 2014 19:27
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3Romeo posted:I'm going to take the prick approach here and answer your questions with some questions of my own. This is really excellent guidance. Thank you for this!
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Jan 23, 2014 19:29
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SurreptitiousMuffin posted:Here's the best piece of fiction advice you'll ever receive: This makes a lot of sense. Time spent planning is less time actually spent on the story itself. I especially like the point about developing organic characters by not over-thinking things.
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Jan 23, 2014 19:36
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And when all else fails, have a man come through the door with a gun in his hand 
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Jan 23, 2014 19:38
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Blade_of_tyshalle posted:And when all else fails, have a man come through the door with a gun in his hand Especially in an ancient historical setting 
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Jan 23, 2014 20:26
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SurreptitiousMuffin posted:Here's the best piece of fiction advice you'll ever receive: At least I stopped thinking about it and forced myself to put words down; and for that I'm grateful. My stories in the dome have ALL been like this: "X happens, then Y happens. And people kind of react to that. and then Z happens." Might as well write about my trip to the grocery store. How can I break out of that? Here's my most recent suckage example: Write 900 words about a grave that's been preserved up in New Jersey, it's in a parking lot of a movie theatre. The woman in the grave has a tale - she waited in that spot for 40 years for a captain who said he'd return after the war. She died, got buried, and now her grave is in that lot. Some people say the song "Brandy" was inspired by it, but the songwriter said no, it's not. My take on it: Main character is so obsessed that she became a scientist, and goes back in time to ask her why she did it. The dead lady's response is "true love and because he promised". The MC is irate that this woman has become a monument to women relying on men instead of pursuing their own dreams, the MC says, "don't be a sap, etc this is all you'll be remembered for", the dead woman debates it then agrees and changes her mind, the MC argues, "oh poo poo, no, don't do that." and poof, the MC is no longer a scientist but instead a security guard napping in her car in the spot where the grave used to be, having lost that original motivation. And the radio's playing Brandy because I researched it so dammit put it in there. Sci-Fi Time Travel Cliche Be Damned. That's a story. But the gaping holes in logic, combined with my inability to tell a story beyond "and then this happens, and then that happens" left me with 4 pages of research about this dead lady, New Jersey waterways and plant life, and 500+ words of a story that's marred with every problem I've had since my first story. Sorry for the long side-tracking from the better question posted above. But - what the hell can I do? Keep writing it for the hands-on experience, or scrap it and go back to figuring out HOW to tell the story in a more interesting way? magnificent7 fucked around with this message at 20:41 on Jan 23, 2014 |
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Jan 23, 2014 20:37
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Your Dead Gay Son posted:Especially in an ancient historical setting Then have a man come through the opening to your thatched mud hut with an atlatl in his hand!
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Jan 23, 2014 20:39
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magnificent7 posted:Great advice but I'm killing myself in the Flash Fiction dome thing. I don't have the time/wordcount to let it evolve into its own story. It's well-trodden ground, to be sure, but that sounds like a decent time travel yarn that would fit into that word count (always important to make sure you're telling the right sized story for the number of words). Write it. If you're finding the word count to tight, start at the interesting bit and backfill any exposition you need. Fake edit: Remember: 1. what does protag want 2. why can't they get it 3. why do we care. Actual edit: What is it connects the two characters? Why does it matter? If I met your characters would I want to know their story? sebmojo fucked around with this message at 21:42 on Jan 23, 2014 |
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Jan 23, 2014 21:12
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magnificent7 posted:Great advice but I'm killing myself in the Flash Fiction dome thing. I don't have the time/wordcount to let it evolve into its own story. quote:My stories in the dome have ALL been like this: "X happens, then Y happens. And people kind of react to that. and then Z happens." Might as well write about my trip to the grocery store. Also, never write about time travel. It's really hard, and 99% of the time it turns out absolutely terrible. Also holy poo poo is that story outline confusing. I have no idea what you're talking about. Stop making things complicated: you're just making extra work for yourself. It's a grave in the middle of a carpark: it doesn't need all this poo poo about time travel and philisophical debate to make it interesting. It's already pretty intriguing. Why hasn't it been dozed over? Who stopped it from getting dozed over? Somebody clearly gave enough of a drat to stand up to somebody with a lot more capital and resources than themselves, and they won. They're a million times more interesting than a time-traveling scientist security guard who philosophises about some vague poo poo. That outline reads like a tract, though I have no idea who's trying to convert me. Every time you have an idea for something   AWESOME  to add to your story, I want you to lean back from the keyboard and say "dial it back" to yourself. Keep it simple, keep it human.edit: this is not general advice, this is advice specifically for Mag7, having seen his previous 'dome stuff. A big issue I've noticed is that he overcomplicates things and ends up tripping over his own feet. I feel that stepping back and trying to write some more simple and streamlined stories would help him a lot. SurreptitiousMuffin fucked around with this message at 21:18 on Jan 23, 2014 |
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Jan 23, 2014 21:14
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sebmojo posted:It's well-trodden ground, to be sure, but that sounds like a decent time travel yarn that would fit into that word count (always important to make sure you're telling the right sized story for the number of words). Write it. If you're finding the word count to tight, start at the interesting bit and backfill any exposition you need. Your bigger point, (the fake edit) is good. Thanks for that. It's obvious and in every drat book I have, and I get so far into the stupid details that by the time I ask myself those three questions, I'm doing a lot of mental gymnastics to answer them because I've gone too far. I'll start using those three questions at the start of the writing. SurreptitiousMuffin posted:Flash fiction and novels are completely different beasts. There's definitely some crossover in skills, but you'll get nowhere if you try to write one exactly like the other. The time travel thing... I love time travel sci-fi, even the lovely ones. I was taking a 40's Amazing Stories approach, "she adjusted the dial, stepped into the booth and held her breath. When she woke up, she'd travelled 200 years away." and that was all there was to that part, just to get the uppity feminist there to confront the spinster. Thank you both for the advice, even though they suggest two different directions, they both are spot on about the problems I've got.
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Jan 23, 2014 21:48
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If I have learned anything from the past month it's that writing should be called Metal Gear Rising Revengeance because there's always something to cut.
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Jan 24, 2014 01:40
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I'm looking for one or two Lovecraftian short horror stories, 5k+, for an anthology that's otherwise ready to go. There's a $50 advance against royalties, payable on publication. Royalties are 50% of gross income, split evenly at one share per story. It's going to be released as an ebook first, with a print version. Previously published stories are fine. I'll consider stories under 5k, but while they will receive a share of the royalties, they won't get an advance. If you're interested, drop me a line: tumbleworld at gmail.com.
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Jan 24, 2014 15:07
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Two more questions I didn't see answered yet (apologies if they were answered earlier and I missed it) 1. Are there recommendations for/against the use of foul language in character dialogue? Such as it is OK to use occasionally, but too much cheapens the quality of the narrative? Or does its use in certain situations enhance realism? (Many people swear/curse/etc during those "Oh poo poo!" moments) 2. How to best convey human racial "traits" without outright using ethnicity? Do you subtly describe physical looks like skin tone? Id like certain characters to be portrayed as varying ethnicity but not have to say "The mysterious voice stepped out of the shadows, revealing herself to be a middle aged asian woman."
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Jan 24, 2014 19:02
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lunatikfringe posted:1. Are there recommendations for/against the use of foul language in character dialogue? Such as it is OK to use occasionally, but too much cheapens the quality of the narrative? Or does its use in certain situations enhance realism? (Many people swear/curse/etc during those "Oh poo poo!" moments)
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Jan 24, 2014 19:29
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lunatikfringe posted:Two more questions I didn't see answered yet (apologies if they were answered earlier and I missed it) When I have questions like this, I usually turn to my favorite books to see how other authors have handled similar situations. Most (all) writing rules are soft. They are guidelines, and cannot be reduced to absolutes. For any rule there will be a thousand exceptions, and an author who broke it successfully. Reading books, especially when looking for something in particular, is like taking a master class on different ways to apply the guidelines. It puts tools in your tool box and helps you to develop an intuitive sense of how the guidelines work. So what are your favorite books in the genre you are writing? And in general? How do they handle teams, cursing , and ethnicity?
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Jan 24, 2014 19:44
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Dr. Kloctopussy posted:When I have questions like this, I usually turn to my favorite books to see how other authors have handled similar situations.
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Jan 25, 2014 00:31
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lunatikfringe posted:1. Are there recommendations for/against the use of foul language in character dialogue? Such as it is OK to use occasionally, but too much cheapens the quality of the narrative? Or does its use in certain situations enhance realism? (Many people swear/curse/etc during those "Oh poo poo!" moments) Personally, I never use swear words ever ever. A couple of reasons. One is that I want my writing to appeal to a wider audience and cussin' automatically cuts out a bunch of potential readers. The other that I pretend is the 'primary' reason is that honestly I think cussin' is used too often as a shortcut for lazy writing. It becomes the one size fits all of dialogue. "Hmmm, I want to convey that my character is angry. I'll make him swear! Hmmm, he's hurt himself. React by swearing! OK, now I need to insult someone; I'll cuss him out!" Most of these things, I reckon, could be improved if you find ways to do this that don't involve cussing, because honestly swearing is not that interesting, in terms of dialogue. Some people like it though, whatevs.
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Jan 25, 2014 01:03
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On the other hand, actual real people swear all the time.
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Jan 25, 2014 01:36
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I'm with ChairChucker, but a little lighter on the "never." I do cuss sometimes, but only when I feel like it really adds to the character.
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Jan 25, 2014 01:40
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ravenkult posted:On the other hand, actual real people swear all the time. Actual real people do and say a lot of things, but not all of them make particularly good reading.
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Jan 25, 2014 01:59
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I can't remember what fiction writing book it was (probably Self-Editing for Fiction Authors) but I liked their little section about cursing. They pretty much argued less is more with everything especailly cursing, "Imagine if a book only used a curse word once. That'd create a pretty good loving effect wouldn't it?" I was like, "nice." Fake edit; I mean I chortled chortingly, "nice."
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Jan 25, 2014 02:03
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magnificent7 posted:That's really what's it's all about. And if you're going out of your own comfort zone/genre, then look at examples in that genre. For instance, my favorite writers do not write Young Adult novels, so... relying on Stephen King to indictate how I'd write YA might not be advisable. That's why you should really read in the genres you're trying to write. If you hate reading YA, you're probably not going to enjoy writing it very much or be able to write it well. It's also why you should read broadly. If you only read Stephen King, you're only going to see how Stephen King has handled these problems/questions. You want to put more tools in your tool box than that. On the other hand, reading outside your genre is a great idea, too. Basically the more you read, the better. Fiction Writing: Advice and Discussion: Read More, Close Thread. Dr. Kloctopussy fucked around with this message at 02:19 on Jan 25, 2014 |
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Jan 25, 2014 02:08
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Chairchucker posted:Actual real people do and say a lot of things, but not all of them make particularly good reading. What makes for good reading is the author knowing exactly how and when to use the words they do, and that's not limited to swearing. Swearing is one of those things that, by its nature, is just more obvious. Still, they're a tool in everyone's toolbox; you don't have to use them if you don't want to, but it's worth learning how they should be applied. neongrey fucked around with this message at 02:26 on Jan 25, 2014 |
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Jan 25, 2014 02:24
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Chairchucker posted:Actual real people do and say a lot of things, but not all of them make particularly good reading. They don't? gently caress
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Jan 25, 2014 04:08
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I love the poo poo out of a book that cusses a lot. There's something about the comedic fireworks of cussing that just can't be reproduced with any other words. David Wong's "This Book Is Filled With Spiders" might be one of my favorite books of the past few years. Tons of cussing in it. But I've also read stuff where the cussing was like too much icing on a cupcake. Just like anything else - you have to learn how to use it effectively... and Crabrock totally called me out on how much cussing I've packed into my stories and definitely brought it to my attention, so when I'm writing now I do try to use it less. magnificent7 fucked around with this message at 04:23 on Jan 25, 2014 |
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Jan 25, 2014 04:21
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I cuss like a sailor IRL, but it always sticks out to me in writing unless it's purposeful. Just like every other thing you write, you should put it in there because that's the only thing that actually conveys the feeling, not just because you don't know what else to stick in there. I hate when characters just say "gently caress." and nothing else, because it's not really useful. I consider it a special form of "telling." Might as well just say "I am angry!"
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Jan 25, 2014 05:19
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Cussing probably depends a bit on genre, too. Gritty real life literature could probably get away with a lot of swear words. Erotica usually beats around the bush (pun intended?), not cussing. For comedy I usually prefer when swearing is avoided. I think it can be a bit lazy and a bit of a crutch. Not swearing but making s cracking bit of humour is much more satisfying, and it'll drag less.
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Jan 25, 2014 12:13
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Chairchucker posted:Actual real people do and say a lot of things, but not all of them make particularly good reading. It really depends on what you're writing about, but yeah, you'll be wanting to write about real people. Meth heads from Kentucky don't say ''frak.''
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Jan 25, 2014 15:27
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Really any word is bad if you overuse it needlessly. Didactically refusing to use swears under any circumstances is not going to do anyone's writing any good*. There are times when the word you need is 'gently caress'.Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale posted:My red skirt is hitched up to my waist, though no higher. Below it the Commander is loving. What he is loving is the lower part of my body. I do not say making love, because this is not what he's doing. Copulating too would be inaccurate, because it would imply two people and only one is involved. Nor does rape cover it: nothing is going on here that I haven't signed up for. That's a bit clinical for most times you're going to want to reach for the word, but it makes the point clear enough. Sometimes someone steps in poo poo, not poop, or doodoo, or feces, or excrement. *Writing for children nonwithstanding
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Jan 25, 2014 15:40
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