1. Laughing Rabbit

    Laughing Rabbit Active Member

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    No direction/non linear writing

    Discussion in 'Plot Development' started by Laughing Rabbit, May 31, 2020.

    My brain is all over the place right now so this post is going to be rambling, sorry about that.

    I did what I shouldn't and showed the story I've been working on for a few years now to someone close to me. Their reaction was.... disappointing to say the least. It boiled down to I'm just not a good writer. I can't get the thoughts and ideas I have in my head onto paper in a satisfying way. So I stopped writing my story for several months. Unfortunately the story I want to tell has stayed in my head, I'm always thinking about my characters and the world they live in.

    One thing I really hate in story telling (books and movies/tv) is non-linear stories. I don't like it when a story starts in one time frame and then jumps into the past, whether it's ten minutes or forty years, and then jumps back into the future again to finish the story. It just irritates me, no matter how well written the story is. I'm currently slogging my way through a book that is leap-frogging between past and future events and even though I like the story as a whole, it's driving me crazy and I'm not entirely sure I'll finish reading it.

    All that to say is one of the problems I found with my plot is one of my characters needs information. This information is not secret and well known to everyone in the town (has to do with the identity and past of my main character who saved her life, she thinks he's a superhero with a secret identity and develops an unhealthy obsession and the readers gain their knowledge of him through her). I had her just asking questions and getting straightforward answers, but that's the problem, just giving the answers out in a q/a session isn't very interesting. Now, to change it up, I think I could have her find a file box on him at the local police station (he's well known there, plenty of run ins in the past) and as she reads the different files, I take the story back to that point and go from there, telling the story as it took place at that time, instead of just as q/a.

    My quandary is, since I don't like reading stories that do things like that... should I really go in that direction? Should I just chuck the story in the trash and try to erase it from my brain? I'm really at a loss of what to do.
     
  2. J.T. Woody

    J.T. Woody Book Witch Contributor

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    It wouldnt hurt to write the scene anyway, and if you dont like it, you can always delete it.

    Experiment with things you dont like... Maybe you may like it, maybe it may fit your story better.
     
  3. Not the Territory

    Not the Territory Contributor Contributor Contest Winner 2023

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    We have to learn the hard way sometimes.

    Why write what you don't like? Anyway, I see some paths.

    1. This could be an opportunity to learn why you don't like typical flashbacks. Deconstruct them. You might have a good idea about writing them very differently, and your own spin might well be a boon.

    2. Does the reader actually need to experience the information? If done well, you can just allow the reader to infer something from each character's reaction. I'm sure you've seen it in stories:
    "Oh, of course you're going to do that. This is NOUN all over again, isn't it?"
    "I asked around. I know what you really are, what you're capable of."
    There's likely a trope named after it...

    3. Make the dialogue better. I've read plenty good long exposition dialogue in the past. It absolutely can be done in a way that doesn't sound like a q/a session.

    If you don't find a way around this roadblock, it will come up again and again in almost every other story you try to write. Solve it now, in what may indeed be the ugliest of your children, so that the rest may flourish.
     
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  4. Homer Potvin

    Homer Potvin A tombstone hand and a graveyard mind Staff Supporter Contributor

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    Probably not. If you don't like beef, why would you make a cheeseburger?
     
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  5. Xoic

    Xoic Prognosticator of Arcana Ridiculosum Contributor Blogerator

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    The best reason I know for flashbacks etc is because sometimes the story would work better with information presented in a certain order.
     
  6. Wreybies

    Wreybies Thrice Retired Supporter Contributor

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    I'll play Devil's Advocate and say yes, it's worth doing.

    There are lots of narrative elements that I do not personally like. I do not like pointless tip-to-toe descriptions of characters that lack any contextualizing. In fact, I don't like that kind of description about basically anything. Waxing rhapsodic as to the architecture of that Gothic cathedral over there, down to esoteric masonry terms that no character on set is familiar with, will set me to skimming for the next bit of dialogue. Too often that kind of indulgence has no purpose, goes nowhere, sets me up to think this building is of import, or at least its architecture, and then, no, nothing comes of it. Just a spot where the writer stopped the story to tell me pointless things, or maybe to make good on that architecture class they once took back in the 80's.

    But my personal dislike for superfluously pointless details has a way of making me eschew details altogether as a writer. It creates a problem that is the polar opposite of pointless description - "whitebox syndrome". The setting is only lined in and the dialogue takes over and the visuals fade completely. That's just as bad as superfluously pointless but in the opposite direction. Forcing myself to occasionally indulge description makes me address my whitebox syndrome.

    A story certainly doesn't need to come with dramamine to fight the nausea of being pulled back and forth in time, but time jumps and non-linear story-telling is a thing, a feature, a concept that should at least be understood as to how best to deploy because, as you are encountering now, it will eventually present itself to you. In that sense, yes, it's worth getting past your personal preference and learning how to use that tool.
     
    Last edited: May 31, 2020
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  7. EFMingo

    EFMingo A Modern Dinosaur Supporter Contributor

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    One of the best pieces of advice I ever received was just to write something you would like to read. If it excites you, or falls in your wheel-house, it won't be so forced. The direction and character will feel more natural. Otherwise, if you are trying to bound yourself tightly to something you don't like, it will reflect on the whole. Non-linearity done correctly isn't intrusive unless it really needs to be, and if it is, it needs to feel like it was naturally progressed to even if it happened at a separate time or place. If you aren't comfortable doing that because you don't like to read it, I wouldn't write it. I imagine this is one of the only non-linear points in the story, since you feel it is needed, but what will happen is that it will stick out very oddly and not feel framed right. Don't do this unless you plan on making it part of the story's entire style.

    I do agree with @Wreybies on some level though. Getting past personal preferences has opened me up to a lot more options in writing. And non-linearity is most certainly a very active tool, one that can be royally screwed up if not ease into correctly. Getting out of the comfort zone, and being more open to writing projects you wouldn't normally attempt can open a lot more doors, or it can firmly lock the ones you were already keeping shut.
     
  8. Steve Rivers

    Steve Rivers Contributor Contributor

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    This line stuck out to me.
    If you took a thimble of seawater from the beach, chances are you won't find life in it, does that mean there's no life in the sea? If one person doesn't like something you wrote, it does not mean you're a bad writer.
    And even then, even if you are, all it requires is hard work. Writing is the communication of the thoughts in your head, not the thoughts themselves. You can be terrible at physically communicating what's in your brain onto the page, but you can work at it and get better. It's easier to work and correct that than being a clueless idiot who doesn't have the thoughts and ideas to begin with. Every person here, at some stage, was only 1/10th or less as good at writing as they are now, without exception.

    Like Woody and Wrey say, dont discard anything, try everything. Go searching for ideas as you would researching a topic. Use youtube and look up story, plot, and character techniques and ideas. Anything to give you inspiration or see things from an angle you might not have looked at before.

    And EF just beat me to it, ... But at the end of the day, whatever happens, write what makes you happy and what you enjoy. Nothing kills motivation more than doing something you hate. This is meant to be -your- creative expression. Don't worry what your friend said, dont worry about what anyone says, get it done and try to enjoy yourself doing it.
     
    Last edited: May 31, 2020
  9. Cave Troll

    Cave Troll It's Coffee O'clock everywhere. Contributor

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    The more of a challenge it is to write, the more you get to explore
    the things you are not comfortable with, which is good. :)
    It may be some of your best work, since you are working harder
    on it, than you would have if you were writing something that
    comes easier to you.

    Stick with it and it should be great in the end. :superidea:
     
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  10. Laughing Rabbit

    Laughing Rabbit Active Member

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    Thanks for the advice, I have a lot to think about.
    I could possibly write this section both ways. 1) change the beginning so it's completely linear writing and there is no mystery to the reader as to who this guy is (well, still a little, but not much) and the reader will just have to see how well the obsessed character uncovers the answers. 2) Buckle down and write it non-linear so the reader discovers the information at the same time as the character. Then, I can see if either direction changes the tone of the story as it progresses and just choose which beginning fits the story best. Still a lot to think about, I may have to do a few outlines first.

    1. Most flashbacks I think interrupt the story. Sometimes they're needed in the story, sometimes not, but either way I feel like I lost the flow and when the story moves back into the original plot line, I'm usually thinking "okay, now what was going on here/where were we?" Another type is the typical ones used in tv shows, the character/s have gotten themselves into a predicament and then when you're wondering how they'll get out of it, the scene changes to "xx hours/days earlier" and then the story progresses normally until they're in the predicament again. I know it's supposed to build suspense or wonder about how they got themselves into the mess, but it just irritates me because instead of focusing on the story, I'm picking it apart to guess how they end up in the situation, which isn't why I watch tv or read books (for escapism).

    2. I'm not sure how much the readers should experience and how much can just be inferred or told... I may end up writing a scene a few different ways to see how it can be improved from its current state.

    3. Yes, one of the problems is the dialogue is too stiff or unrealistic in several areas, not just the q/a sections. I do need to make improvements.

    Funny you say that... I don't really care for beef, but I do like cheeseburgers! Although I wouldn't go out of my way to make one.

    Yes, that's very often true. However, for my story I'm not completely sure if the information needs to be told in a certain order or if I can get away with a completely linear story and still have a bit of mystery left for the readers.
     
  11. Laughing Rabbit

    Laughing Rabbit Active Member

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    Yes, overly describing things is something I don't really like in books either, and it's still something I found myself doing in an early draft. The obsessed character was being questioned by police after her ordeal and a basic q/a ensued, with them asking her to describe her rescuer, which she did in great detail, because she's obsessing. However, I scrapped the entire scene very quickly because it was too much, I was getting bored just writing it, and I realized I could show her obsession in other ways that would be more interesting.

    I didn't describe the town beyond having the character comment on it being "Mayberry-esque", would that be enough of a description, or do you think I need to go a bit further to avoid what you call the "whitebox syndrome"?

    I do agree that I need to look past my bias and learn how non-linear stories work best, whether I end up using it in this story or not.

    I have the entire story outlined, from beginning to end, and this is the only section that's giving me trouble plot-wise (so far), I do believe it's the only section that would have any sort of flashback if I don't change the beginning and start over at that point instead. I wouldn't want to change the entire story to have flashbacks peppered throughout.


    The person who critiqued the story was being kind, and had a lot of constructive criticism. I don't really deal with advanced grammar or really much after grade school level, so a lot of my personal usage of proper grammar is very low. This person is much more advanced than I and uses advanced grammar almost every day and understands creative writing very well. When giving me the low-down on what the issues were with my story I did get the sandwiched critique (positive-negative-positive), but there was so much wrong: grammatically, structurally, dialogue, and plot-wise. We had a long discussion about why I write the way I do, but not really much on how I could fix the story itself, beyond the grammar mistakes.

    I should have stuck to my original plan and finished the story, go back and fix obvious mistakes, then show it to someone, but I rushed it and became discouraged with how much needs fixing. It's gotten to the point where I want to give a ghost writer my outline, character descriptions, and every idea I have swimming around in my head and have them write it. But I would have to really trust that person to bring out my vision, and I don't know anyone like that.

    I do have an idea about the story, but it's not really plot related, I'll probably make another post in a different section about it later.
     
    Last edited: Feb 11, 2021
  12. Xoic

    Xoic Prognosticator of Arcana Ridiculosum Contributor Blogerator

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    This is all stuff that's fixed in revisions. I think the conversation just got you feeling down. You just need to snap out of it, get back to writing, and let your revisions do their thing.
     
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  13. jannert

    jannert Retired Mod Supporter Contributor

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    OMG, yes, this. It was a hard lesson to learn, but I had to learn it myself.

    Learning involved me sitting on the floor with a pair of scissors and my printed-out manuscript, and actually cutting the first couple of chapters into 'scenes' that I had written in flashback. Then pieceing them all together again in chronological order. BINGO!

    The idea that a story must start in the middle of 'action,' is one that really should be permanently scrapped, in my opinion. It's not that it can't work, but it's very difficult for a beginner to pull it off.

    Don't be afraid of a a slow, but intriguing start—this is not an excuse for a dry infodump. Instead, give the reader your pertinent backstory scenes in chronological order. Obviously there will need to be some tweaking and some re-thinking involved—and that doesn't mean you can't use flashbacks, on occasion. But if you find yourself constantly flip flopping between backstory and the story present, you might want to re-think that approach.

    Try to get your reader on board 'at the beginning,' with the stuff they need to know or witness, and by the time they get to the 'exciting' bits, they'll be really engaged. They'll know what the stakes are, they'll know who the characters are, and what caused the action to happen. They'll be eager to find out what happens next.
     
    Last edited: Jul 19, 2020
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  14. Dalantri

    Dalantri Member

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    Sorry to hear about the sharing experience of your story. As a note of encouragement, you are not a good writer ‘now’. Everyone who has been successful at something was not successful in the beginning. There’s a book (I think) called ‘At First You Suck’, which is a reminder to us all that in the beginning we all suck at something, but the objective is to discover your weak points and improve.

    Now, as for your story that WON’T go away, it’s a story that wants to be told. Either the story or character/s want someone to reveal their tale and you keep channeling it. I know because I’m in the same boat. My story has been screaming in my head for almost ten years. Several main characters have stayed but they have changed from what I thought they were to who they told me they were. They’ve even told me who they were and what they want. I have written multiple scenes and even stories about them, but they shake their heads every now and then about the continuity of some of what I write. Along the way I’ve learned more about writing and it’s various aspects to telling a story. Luckily, my characters have been patting me on my back for direction, but still make me struggle. The four main characters all want to be the center and I have to find which is best for the audience to follow.

    As for your non-linear obstacle, I think you have a good idea with starting with the files your main character. As an ‘investigator’ she can compile her notes and then begin her actual field pursuit of the mystery hero. I can understand how some mishandling of moving forward and backwards to tell a story can be confusing and distracting, but knowing the history behind an incident/event draws the reader into the story. Even a love story where two people just met will hit a snag in their relationship which may be something from the past of one of them. Taking the reader back through the character’s past will in many cases give the reader a stronger experience than just telling what happened.

    Eastern philosophy says, “a straight line may seem crooked.”
     
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  15. Dalantri

    Dalantri Member

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    I couldn’t agree more with your thoughts. Sometimes in finding something I don’t like I find that vacancy in my own work. Like you, I find tedious details about the environment that don’t have an effect on the story a waste of my time as a reader. ‘Ok, I get it, it’s pretty/it’s dark/it’s whatever’. But, I also know that a LOT of my earlier worked lacked details that engaged the reader’s senses. They ‘heard’ the conversations or ‘saw’ the actions but they didn’t feel the impact of the situation because I didn’t give them any details about it.

    As I mentioned in a separate post, knowing or understanding the history of something gives the reader something to connect with.
     
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  16. Antaus

    Antaus Active Member

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    First of all, don't worry if your writing isn't A+ right off the bat, and remember you are your own worst enemy when it comes to writing. I hate most of my writing but other people don't. Also it takes time, I've been writing casually for years and when I started out, my stories were horrible. I still don't know if I'm up to professional quality yet, but I have improved considerably.

    As to the story, perhaps it might help if you make the information less readily available to the other people in town. Maybe they only know bits and pieces, this way you can tease the reader along. Hint at things and perhaps someone mentions a run in with police. This could be the clue to bring said protagonist to the police station and put all the pieces together. As to tell a past story, if you don't want to time jump then I would suggest having the character put all the pieces of the past story together and letting the reader find out what happened as the character does. By the way, stories usually don't go away even if you ignore them. I know, I've tried.
     
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  17. Mckk

    Mckk Member Supporter Contributor

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    Teaching low level English should not affect your writing. To think writing simply would mean writing badly, then there goes all our picture books, middle grade books, and basically the entire children's literature industry... Your ESL experience has nothing to do with this, make no mistake. And I'm a tad worried that you're teaching ESL but wrote with a tonne of grammatical mistakes... I can understand though if you're a non-native speaker - non-natives often have a way better understanding of grammar than natives but may not necessarily be able to write that way.

    The hard truth is, perhaps you write badly precisely because you've never shown your work to anyone else? I know my own writing only started improving after joining this site, critiquing people's stuff, and selectively showing my work to people. I've made a few mistakes with whom I showed it to, but overall, it's a much-needed experience, because to improve, you must be critiqued. You must take that comment of "You're a bad writer" and say, "All right, now how do I improve?" As a teacher/tutor yourself, you know this. Growth mindset, rather than fixed mindset.

    Just 'cause you're bad now doesn't mean you'll bad forever. Many writers on this forum aren't even English native speakers - certainly even native speakers write with mistakes. We all gotta start somewhere, is what I'm saying.

    If that friend of yours gives constructive and kind criticism, I'd continue to show her your work. You NEED someone like this. NEED with all capital letters. Because what good is it really going to do you if all your friend said was, "It's excellent! Publish it!" It'd be what you wanted to hear, but it wouldn't make it any better, and if it's not actually publishable work, her saying it is wouldn't change the fact.

    Face the criticism head-on. Take it like it's gold. In Chinese we have a saying: when someone criticises you, they are in fact putting money into your pocket.

    See it like that, and you'll grow, you'll improve, and then you won't need a ghost writer at all. And keep writing. Now I don't like Dan Brown's writing at all, but he's successful and he said this once, which I agree very much with: Don't be afraid to write crap.

    Write the crap. Then you edit. It's what editing is for. And if this one even after the editing is still crap, start a new project. The next one will be a little better, and the next one better still, until your level of "crap" is everyone else's level of "good". You'll get there - but not if you stop writing!
     
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  18. jannert

    jannert Retired Mod Supporter Contributor

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    Erm....at the great risk of starting WW3, this might be a great place to use a prologue.

    You've got a piece of information that 'everybody' else in the story besides the main character already knows. The reader doesn't know it yet either, I presume. So why not write your flashback as a Prologue instead—and DO call it a Prologue, so readers know right away that it happens outwith the rest of the story's time frame. Open the story with this piece of information ...preferably in the form of a good scene, not an infodump.

    This has two good effects.

    One, it keeps your reader from having to hop back and forth between now, and then, and now.

    Two, it creates tension in the reader that wasn't there before. The readers will now know what the main character doesn't ...so they'll be on the edge of their seat, waiting for her to find out the 'truth.' They'll know she's been on the wrong track all along, and will be dying to find out what happens when she realises her mistake. Soap operas use this technique a lot. You see Bob having an affair with Rachel, but his wife Betty doesn't know. So you wait weeks, months, years, avidly watching and waiting for Betty to find out. The tension ramps up. Those soap opera writers know how to work their audience.

    How your character finds out the truth about her hero isn't all that important. Whatever suits your plot best. She can be going through old files, or somebody says something that triggers her awareness, etc. What will matter is what happens AFTER she finds out the truth. Which is what your readers have been waiting for all along.

    A Prologue has one bad effect.

    Some people say they 'never read Prologues.' You'll need to decide whether to cater to them or not. It's up to you.
     
    Last edited: Jul 17, 2020
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  19. Xoic

    Xoic Prognosticator of Arcana Ridiculosum Contributor Blogerator

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    Sorry to be off-topic, but I must know—is Outwith actually a word people use? I've never heard it before. Or is is a typo?
     
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  20. jannert

    jannert Retired Mod Supporter Contributor

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    Actually this is the second time in a couple of weeks that somebody has pulled me up over 'outwith.' Yes, here in Scotland, it's certainly a word. Used all the time. I suppose in the USA you'd say 'outside of.' I've been away for 34 years, and I've kinda forgotten how I used to talk! :)
     
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  21. Laughing Rabbit

    Laughing Rabbit Active Member

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    I am working on reimaging some of my characters. I realized I had too many and could actually combine a few of them into a new character, so I've cut back in that area and discovered that a few scenes flow better, so I'm going to go ahead and keep that change. I won't have to go back and redo much since they're characters that showed up later rather than early in the story. Plus I am restructuring the plot itself. I did go ahead and decide to have a prologue that introduces the MC, but also include the idea of having the files and have "flashbacks". I will see how that progresses, it's still early in the process so I'm not completely on board with it.


    I do not believe writing simply means writing badly. I will try to be more clear. When I teach English, I am in a completely different headspace than when I'm writing for myself. When teaching, everything is already structured and in place, the lesson plans, the classroom, the books, the illustrations, everything. Everything has its place and very rarely am I thrown a curveball that cannot be answered easily. For me, writing for myself is not the same thing as teaching others. There's no ready-made lesson plan, workbook, answer sheet, etc. When I'm writing my story, I'm not thinking about grammar or anything like that, all I'm thinking about is getting thoughts out of my head and onto paper. That's it. Often I write how people in real life communicate, which is very often, grammatically incorrect.

    I've written other, non-novel, non-Scifi/fantasy, nonfiction stuff that others have seen (lots of teaching materials including stories to illustrate a lesson). I've never run into such problems as I have with my fictional stories. I think it's because I am writing for myself just to get thoughts and ideas out and not really writing for others. For me, getting my story onto paper has been a type of escapism from the real world, and I feel like the editing process has brought the real world into my escape world, and now my fun story is no longer fun, but yet another grading chore.
     
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  22. Laughing Rabbit

    Laughing Rabbit Active Member

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    Heh, as I mentioned above, I had already decided to write a prologue. I've heard both good and bad about prologues, but as I wrote a small scene for one of the flashbacks, I thought it would work better as a prologue, so that's what I did. I fleshed it out a bit more, and so far it fits better and introduces the MC right off the bat. Readers will miss some details if they skip it, but nothing pertinent to the story, they will just have to go back and read it if they're curious about certain details! ;) I will still have to write a couple of flashbacks, but I think I've figured out how to do it. I've written the scenes, I just have to plug them in at the right time.
     
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  23. Xoic

    Xoic Prognosticator of Arcana Ridiculosum Contributor Blogerator

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    I have a totally untested theory—actually more of a hypothesis or even lower than that. It goes like this (and I suppose people with more experience will let me know if I'm anywhere near the truth with it):

    I believe the important thing in writing fiction is to have a spark, something powerful that grabs a reader. I think that's partly inherent to each of us, but can also be learned to some extent. But I don't think grammar, punctuation etc—the nuts and bolts of writing—are important, because if your story has the spark then an editor/copywriter can fix the rest of it.

    Part of what I'm calling a spark is the ability to capture a reader's interest and propel them forward, wanting to read more—storytelling skills. These can be learned. And part of it would have to do with writing about something interesting. That can be learned as well.

    I can't be sure, but it sounds like the problems you're talking about are mostly things that can be fixed by a good developmental editor and copywriter.
     
  24. Xoic

    Xoic Prognosticator of Arcana Ridiculosum Contributor Blogerator

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    I looked it up and sure enough, it's mostly a Scottish thing.
     
  25. Dalantri

    Dalantri Member

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    I completely understand the professional aspect of your work and the creative desire of your personal writing. In my personal opinion, you’re being too hard on yourself because of your professional perspective. You already realize that in reality people don’t speak ‘correctly’. If you remove that aspect of your creative writing it will not be relatable to your audience. It may be well written but they will feel like there’s something missing/wrong, and may not know why, but it will be because you’ve removed the flaws of real life.

    I just started listening to a podcast called Story Grid. (It’s one of the better podcasts to me). One thing that was said was that ‘writing is 80% planning, 10% writing, and 10% editing.’ I think the numbers should be closer to 60-15-25, but that’s just me. From my personal experience, I’ve spent A LOT of time researching, plotting, and planning. Then I write my ideas, scenes and dialogue. But I spend more time editing than I do writing.
     

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