Fiction Writing: Advice and Discussion

The Something Awful Forums > Archives > Comedy Goldmine > Fiction Writing: Advice and Discussion

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

So I'm 70,000 words into the second draft of the novel I've been loving around with since forever. I posted the first couple of chapters from the first draft a year or two ago to pretty much universal consternation. It really was fantastic, and totally made me rip it up and start over, down to switching from first person to third (thank you Sophia, it was awesome advice) and stop concentrating on artsy-fartsing around and just tell something somewhat readable. I'm feeling pretty good about my writing, so I'm thinking its time to get other people on the internet to change that. What's the best way to do that? Another thread?

# ¿ Jan 28, 2014 12:41

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ¿ May 22, 2024 03:36

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Martello posted:

Yes.

Alrighty, while I get the nerve to post it, I have a couple of questions. Posting it do I have to worry about things like tags or writing the title thread other than mentioning word count (I'm thinking 5,000, the first two chapters or so). More importantly, do other people post chapters from their manuscripts? I'm worried about people not being interested by a snippet of something that is meant to be longform. I suppose the most I can hope for is to gauge whether its something people would want to read more of.

# ¿ Jan 29, 2014 16:25

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Posted the first couple of my chapters here: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3606189

Please be gentle.

# ¿ Feb 1, 2014 13:06

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

crabrock posted:

Why? Would you rather be a good writer or a delusional bad one?

Just a joke. I come here for the brutal honesty. I don't think I'm an especially good writer or anything (as seen by my thread), but I'd like to think that I have the constitution to adapt and change depending on feedback. I'd really like to. So I really need honesty (rather than passing it around my friends and getting the responses I want). But that doesn't stop it from being brutal, even though its very much necessary.

The fact that my thread is still up is anxiety producing, especially since I'm doing a first page, from the first word, re-write. Not to mention embarrassing. I just want to wipe away what I wrote, and maybe later on put up the newest version of it.

# ¿ Feb 3, 2014 15:00

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Dune did a great job with powered action scenes. Usually having the main character just destroy someone in a sentence.

There was this series I read as a youngster that I thought back then had a good handle on it, think it was the called The Runelords, had a bunch of fun sequences to read about.

# ¿ Feb 23, 2014 22:40

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Yeah, Seldom speaks truth. The best action you're gonna read is old time pulp stuff, noir, maybe some L'amour or something. Tersely described, but effective as all hell. With bad enough characters that its really credible when they just outright destroy someone.

Fantasy can be a self-limiting genre. You know what's the best written action scene I read recently? A non-fiction article in a magazine (Men's Health maybe? I'll try to post it).

# ¿ Feb 24, 2014 18:00

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Gonna side step the video game thing (and that whole can of worms), but I found the action scene I liked from what I think might be Men's Health or something:

quote:

"You don't have to hit an opponent to defeat him," Alex said. "You can fake it and get him to do what you want. You must remember that the attack must be constant. Motion is life; stillness is death."

He pulled Gleb aside to demonstrate. Alex faked a punch to Gleb's stomach, stopping just inches from impact, causing Gleb to pull back, then Alex faked a punch to Gleb's head, causing him to tip backward. Then he gently twisted Gleb's neck, causing him to fall to the ground.

I've learned to be suspicious of these master-disciple performances. The student has been conditioned to allow his teacher to look good, especially when an outsider is watching. So when Alex offered to demonstrate on me, I steeled myself.

He faked a punch to my groin. I doubled over and raised my left knee to block. He immediately reached down and pinched my inner thigh hard enough that I twirled in a circle and extended my left arm. Switching attacks, he pressed his right hand under my left elbow to straighten, raise, and extend it, while at the same time grabbing two of my fingers with his left and bending them back to the point of breaking. Then he walked me, on my tippy-toes, toward the door, saying in a mock official voice to the class, "Step aside, step aside, this man has had too much to drink."

The action is believable, clearly told, credible, and it even has a little arc to it.

# ¿ Feb 25, 2014 12:39

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

I got highlights in my head, then purposefully don't think about it until I sit in front of the computer. Otherwise the excitement dies, and I lose interest. Half the fun is seeing what pours out and buttress the flashes going off in my head.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2014 19:46

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

I have to say I'm having a lot of fun with the writing lately. Been posting in the specific thread for it, and having an audience and a self-imposed deadline to post the chapters regularly has really galvanized what I've been trying to do. Positive reinforcement is loving magic! Enough so that I might be turning obsessive about getting pages done....

# ¿ Mar 8, 2014 04:40

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Jagermonster posted:

Yeah, don't do that, it sounds horrible.

Reminds me of this turd: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3527428&perpage=40&pagenumber=102#post418079196

I really, really love this. Its pretty great.

EDIT: "Our man, our hero man" Its catchy!

# ¿ Mar 12, 2014 14:45

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

sebmojo posted:

This link is packed full of awesome.

Whereas this - I dunno. If it's the story you want to write, sure, but ideology almost invariably makes terrible fiction. For every Left Hand of Darkness you're gonna get 99 SpoonfullOfBromides, you know what I mean?

I'm reading the first part of the article, and Jonathan Franzen's do list is incredibly irritating. The guy just seems like an irascable dick.

# ¿ Mar 12, 2014 23:51

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

I like one of the things to do (from Richard Ford) was not have kids. Most of his points were fun to read, in fact.

# ¿ Mar 13, 2014 00:04

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

sebmojo posted:

Hang on, what's wrong with these? Seem fine to me.

Maybe I came off a bit stronger than I intended, but there's a concentration on how writers are hacky, compared to the other authors, and the rarified life of the writer. And the bits about how writing today is valued because finding info is easier than it used to be and internet access makes your fiction worthless was especially notable for an article that overall lacked that type of negativity.

# ¿ Mar 13, 2014 16:12

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Back about the Lucifer thing, it might be worth reading up about Jewish mysticism about the concept, specifically kabbalism nd Gnostic teachings regarding the topic. The concept of the demiurge is a never-ending spiral of interesting storytelling.

# ¿ Mar 15, 2014 14:55

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

DivisionPost posted:

If I start explaining something, it's not because I think of the criticism as "wrong." No matter what, something failed to fire, and 99% of the time that's gonna be on me. (The other 1% covers unforeseeable Acts of God.) When I explain, it's with the expectation that the reader isn't going to magically see it my way; I'm simply looking for more information so I can better do my job, and I make sure that's clear to anyone offering crits.

Some people don't have the knowledge to properly articulate why they don't like something. Just that they do. And its important to listen why.

Criticism of any type is great, and good for motivation.

# ¿ Mar 21, 2014 19:47

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Editors are paid to make your work better. Asking strangers to rewrite your stuff is too much. Their reactions are plenty.

EDIT: VVV Now you're just being weird.

Shageletic fucked around with this message at 20:41 on Mar 21, 2014

# ¿ Mar 21, 2014 20:05

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

I've been in an interesting gulch regarding my writing for the past couple of weeks. Kind of hectic time in my life, but its mostly about what I'm writing. For my next chapter for the thingie I'm writing, I have to write a battle scene, and for the life of me I can't quite get up the motivation to write it. Its so....conventional, the ur-hero fantasy stuff of strong warriors killing people impressively, enough so that I'm rolling my eyes writing it. I've tried to spice it up with out and out weirdness, and its a necessary component to what comes after, its upending, but do other people have this problem. A lack of patience with writing stuff that doesn't exactly sing on the page, to better pay off stuff later?

# ¿ Mar 27, 2014 23:49

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Djeser posted:

Your writing is inherently way more interesting to you than it is to anyone else.

If you think "this scene is boring", stop. Evaluate what you're writing. Why is a boring thing relevant to your plot? Why can't you skip over it? If you can't skip over it, how can you make it more interesting? Seb's got the right idea. If what you're doing isn't interesting, do something that you wouldn't expect.

And if you absolutely have to do something expected, use unexpected words. Describe the sky as the color of a dead TV station. Have clocks chiming thirteen. If you're saying something everyone can expect in the way everyone expects to hear it, why are you writing it in the first place?

Yeah thanks for this, and Seb too. Basically, I need to write this scene to show a clutch of characters at their height, to make an audience give a poo poo about them. Similar to the beginning of Predator, or for those into more lovely random movies, James Woods' Vampires. I've now changed it from a simple raid on nondescript fortress to launching an attack on a floating Kabuki castle powered by a hell dimension. The more I play around with it, the more random it gets. Who knows where it'll end up.

EDIT:

magnificent7 posted:

Just go right to the next chapter. Start it with, "and after that big rear end battle..."

This has worked for me in every single none of my published works.

Oh, and here.
https://medium.com/the-writing-process

Thanks! But I do think there is something worth exploring in it, so I'll keep cracking on it, but I hate how its slowing down my writing rate.

Oh, and to the guy asking about mundane life, read a New Yorker short story maybe? I mean, great writers make anything seem immense.

Shageletic fucked around with this message at 20:25 on Mar 28, 2014

# ¿ Mar 28, 2014 20:23

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Quick question: I posted a thread for the first couple of chapters of a project I hope to make novel length someday, and it just got archived (Elysium). I've finally gotten around to writing a subsequent chapter and a half, and I'm slightly concerned about just posting too much drat words. My contributions from the past thread totaled together is about 10,000 words. The new stuff (a chapter and a half) is about 7,000. Maybe I'm thinking too much about this, but should I just link to the archived thread for my previous chapter, and just post the new stuff or just post the entire gut busting thing? Either way, I'd love to have the incredibly helpful feedback I got in the first thread.

Thanks.

# ¿ Jul 14, 2014 23:51

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

SoundMonkey posted:

To answer your next question, no we can't pull stuff back out of archives due to Reasons, nor can we recover anything but the plain rendered text (ie not the bbcode, etc).

Alrighty, looks like I'll just post everything I have so far, each chapter its own post. So many words....

Shame about the archived thread not being findable (at least during my search). It had some great encouraging stuff on there.

# ¿ Jul 15, 2014 12:26

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Submitted my sample of the novela for the Tor.com thing posted a littlw while ago. I am going to end up with something like over 17,500 words. If I don't get selected, what do I do with it? What can you do with a fantasy novella?

# ¿ Sep 2, 2014 16:53

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Getting excited about a new project idea, YA with a sic fi twist. I wanna do it in first person. Any tips/hazards I need to be cognizant of before making the switch from writing primarily in third person? Thanks in advance.

# ¿ Dec 3, 2014 02:24

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

No, that's good stuff, thanks. I'm getting excited about attempting to communicate a real voice and point of view, though I am really aware of how much I can just fall on my face.

Plan on posting something like a first draft hereabouts eventually. Interested to see what you guys make of it.

# ¿ Dec 3, 2014 15:22

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

I didn't even think about how doing first person would affect my tenses! That's a lot to consider, and my first instinct is to use present, which provides its own host of issues, as evidenced by the last couple of pages in this thread.

The lack of another POV is something I am less worried about. Excited about even. The current thing I'm writing really relies on it, and to hunker down on one person's viewpoint, to narrow my world to what they see, is a refreshing change of pace for me.

The other issue I'm having is writing like a teenager. Trying to minimize the amount verbiage, and max up the less mature aspects of my personality is my first initial steps I think. Either way, its gonna be a bit of a ride.

EDIT: Concurrently reading The Chocolate War. YA can get bruuuutal.

Shageletic fucked around with this message at 16:12 on Dec 3, 2014

# ¿ Dec 3, 2014 16:07

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Bobby Deluxe posted:

I find that too. One way round it is to intercut 'I verbed' sentences with other sentences. I say what I do. Description or thoughts of that action follow in the next sentence, using passive voice in it's only acceptable form. I find it helps break up the flow.

Also you could look at it in terms of academic paragraph construction. A tip I was given is that you put the main point in the first line of the paragraph, the next offers evidence (or for fiction, description), and the next offers a mini summation of the above. Like so:

Don't worry about this too much on the first draft or you'll drive yourself mad. Ideas first, readability flow later.

That probably wasn't a great example because I'm just waking up.

So here's what I've written so far, rough as all hell. I'm pretty sure I've hosed up with the tenses already. Thoughts would be appreciated.

quote:

I am in the jungle and I have no protection.

There were the trees, right? They were waving, and they were everywhere. The way back was gone, it was lost in all that nature. It was pretty I guess. The trees stood in lines. They were high and threw a lot of shade. The green, the taken care of green, was chopped below the ankle. Whatever. With the endless lawns, broken up by the stupid hedges, it looked like I was dropped into a golf course. You couldn't even see the road anymore. Just...whatever.

I mean, look at this. Some idiots had hefted it up. Hoisted. Pulled it up above the brick wall, just above my waist. The wall went down one way than the other, all the way around the grounds.

But look at it, hanging above the way in like it was ready to drop any second. Made up of brick, cut into, hanging proud, even with vines just so all around it. So corny. Just a lie, you know?

I could barely stop myself, as I walk under, right between the TRINITY and ACADEMY, hock the biggest loogie I could scratch out.

Prep school?

Prep school is a drat zoo.

Shageletic fucked around with this message at 04:05 on Dec 4, 2014

# ¿ Dec 4, 2014 03:35

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Bompacho posted:

I'm pretty new to CC so take my suggestions with a grain of salt. I found some of it a bit hard to read I've bolded notes and suggestions below for the stuff that stuck out for me on my first read through. If I'm wrong anyone feel free to correct me.

Other than the tense shifts I felt like I spent too long in the dark before finding out you were talking about a sign, keep your suspense for more riveting reveals, let us know it is a sign earlier then describe the brickwork, vines ect.

You obviously have a character your trying to build with the way he talks, I did a re-write as to how I would make it flow personally, though it probably doesn't sound like your character saying it.

"Some minimum wage idiots must have had the lovely job of hefting, hoisting and pulling that ridiculous sign above the short brick wall surrounding the grounds. Perched up there so proud, even the overgrowth of vines couldn't diminish its pretentiousness.

I couldn't help myself as I crossed the threshold, I hocked up the biggest loogie I could, arched my back and spat. It landed right between the words TRINITY and ACADEMY"

Edit: like I said, new to CC so if anyone wishes to correct me on this go ahead. Most of my editing/writing experience is unfortunately limited to the finance sector. Here to write and learn!

Cool! Thanks for the edits I've already incorporated some into my couple of paragraphs.

Quick thing. I'm trying to write as a fifteen year old. I don't know too many fifteen year olds that use the word "pretentiousness". So the incorrect word choices, the fuzzy grammar, the simplistic writing in general (him trying to decide between using the word heft, hoist, or pull is the kind of decision a kid might agonize over when writing into his live journal, oh gently caress I just realized I'm old). I'm trying (TRYING) to mimic the kind of present, closed off perspective you'd see in something like Jesus' Son. Its an approach full of hazards, and its probably not achievable, but I'm curious enough to give it a shot.

Also, I don't want this kid to be spitting all over yet. But I can see how fluffery and meat-less the paragraphs I've posted can be. A consequence of posting a couple of paragraphs at a time, maybe? Hopefully?

# ¿ Dec 4, 2014 13:32

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Its a lot of effort and energy that I, personally, don't have much interest sparing. Worldbuilding, I've found, often comes at the cost of theme, plot, and characterization. Except if you're good. Then gently caress everything.

# ¿ Dec 22, 2014 04:03

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Just got the first chapter (about 5000 words) done of the YA idea I posted about a couple of weeks ago. The holiday is great for writing! I'm burning hot!

# ¿ Dec 25, 2014 01:48

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Where does referring to one of your characters as a "Californian Blond Joe Pesci" fall in the spectrum, I wonder?

# ¿ Dec 26, 2014 16:16

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

magnificent7 posted:

My favorite eye-opener regarding this disconnect is Literary Agent Vader. He/she is pretty much the kid from the Emperor's New Clothes, calling out poo poo that nobody else seems to want to acknowledge.
https://twitter.com/AgentVader

One of my favorites:

Cool post! Here's a quick question: what's the difference between fantasy genre and young adult? Is there one? Its hard to think that fantasy can be literary or mature enough to not qualify as YA, but I'm not exactly an expert here.

EDIT: And what does this mean?

quote:

JMW Editor / Monica �@JMWEditor � Nov 20
RT @alecdshane: Q3:A blank email body with the query letter and 10 pages as a Word attachment. Why do so many authors do this? #tenqueries

From the tenqueries twitter page. You're not supposed to be sending inquiries in that are in Word?

Shageletic fucked around with this message at 22:29 on Dec 10, 2015

# ¿ Dec 10, 2015 22:26

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Thanks for the replies, the question came from seeing some of those queries from editors asking for YA with a fantastical twist to them.

# ¿ Dec 16, 2015 22:30

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Dr. Kloctopussy posted:

I don't know if that makes me an expert, but if you have any questions about YA fantasy, I am definitely willing to talk about it FOREVER. AND EVER.

(p.s. knowing about/reading in the genre you want to write in is important. Also fun! Like, why are so many characters named Raffe right now??? I take it from your question you are not interested in this genre, though.)

Thanks for the informative reply. I'm not definitively uninterested in the genre, but the fantasy book I've been wrangling with doesn't seem to match the requirements of the genre (the protagonists are adults, adult themes, etc), but I've been tinkering with an idea that might though, down the line, so this info is pretty useful. That second idea touches on what I loved about the YA genre as a kid, sci-fi and teenage issues, smashing together unexpectedly.

# ¿ Dec 27, 2015 20:11

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Thoren posted:

Are you looking to do any more beta swaps? PM me or leave your email if so.

How do these beta swaps work? Do you swap the whole novel, or just a few chapters? Is there a dedicated website/SA thread for it?

# ¿ Jan 27, 2016 21:12

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

^^^ Okay dokay

Zesty Mordant posted:

Read A Canticle for Leibowitz, it's basically this idea except it's not stone age, it's like dark ages/middle ages.

Isn't this an entire genre? I'm thinking of The Tripod trilogy, a bunch of other sci-fi book titles I can't remember, maybe even the Time Machine.

# ¿ Jan 28, 2016 15:44

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

NiffStipples posted:

I would also be interested in checking out your work and maybe doing a swap in the near future. My preference of reading/writing sounds much like what you're trying to achieve in audience. I become horribly irritated when reading even the slightest of dribble that explains anticipated character reactions or things like the metric weight of the "McGuffin Sword" that King Shitbucket pissed on roughly 5000 years ago. My Bullshit-dar is unfortunately stuck on max. I figure its only natural for us to formulate theories on why a writer deemed necessary to mention something, then immediately try to identify why they thought it should've impress us. I dunno though... As previously mentioned, some people just enjoy reading about all of the things, and for no good reason too. I'm a firm believer that in order to draw better picture, you should make strokes instead of laying down one continous line.

If you're trying to make a living off writing, go where the money is and go at it hard.

PM me sometime.

I've got a chapter of the fantasy novel I'm writing that I'm trying to skim down to the bone, but by its very nature is pretty fanciful and baroque. If any of you are interested in a chapter swap lemme know, I need all the help I can get.

# ¿ Feb 10, 2016 01:10

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Hey, what's the easy way to search twitter for query letter requests by editors again? Getting close to the flagging my novel phase over here.

# ¿ Nov 26, 2016 22:10

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

POOL IS CLOSED posted:

Do you mean who's accepting queries or do you mean manuscript wish lists? Latter is #mswl.

That's the one, thanks.

# ¿ Nov 27, 2016 03:24

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ¿ May 22, 2024 03:36

Shageletic: Jul 25, 2007

Naerasa posted:

I started by going on QueryTracker and putting in my age bracket/genre, then went and looked at the websites and twitter accounts of the agents that popped up under the search. The agency websites show you if they have enough sales to prove legitimacy and the twitter accounts show you if the agent is a decent person or a dick. Beyond that, you can look up agents on AbsoluteWrite, Publisher's Marketplace, or Predators and Editors if you want a broader sense of what they've accomplished and what kind of success a client of theirs is likely to have. Every book sale is different, of course, but you can be pretty confident that you'll have better luck with Senior Agent Eddie Punchclock and his 200 Big Five sales than you will with Junior Agent Sally Housecoat and her 2 sales to a random small press.

PS: Take all my advice with a grain of salt because I haven't managed to get an agent. I have, however, gotten at least sixty rejections, which means I at least know how to find agents. I just don't know what to do with them once I've found them.

General Battuta posted:

Find books you like which were published recently and which compare closely to your book. Look up their agents, check their websites to see if they're taking new clients.

Quoting both of these for later. Thanks.

# ¿ Dec 6, 2016 20:33

The Something Awful Forums > Archives > Comedy Goldmine > Fiction Writing: Advice and Discussion