It i could pick an aspect out of my writing i think i tend to have to much detail. I have these images in my head and i just go overboard which slows the pace down. I can go three or four pages easy before conversation kicks in. Not a bad thing, but can alienate and kill off quiet a few readers.
I often know my world so well that I forget that not everyone else knows what I'm talking about. So it's slowing down and explaining things (showing though, not telling!)
For me it has to be description of places, like upon entering a city, what does the character see hear and smell and why is this different from any other town. Etching in those details, and then making it all flow together, with the correct nouns, is what keeps me staring at the screen blankly as I deliberate over each new sentence.
What is "SPaG"?? For me the hardest part of writing is in keeping things short. In truth, I don't think I should have to. I think every story has a particular length it should be; some things should be short, and I haven't had trouble keeping THOSE things short; but some things are just supposed to be long. Some stories are just more detailed and lengthy that way. However it seems just about every other writer out there sniffs at anything that runs over 100,000 words (i. e., publishable length), even if the person writing it doesn't intend to seek publication. I have a series that's ongoing at over 1.5 million words so far and when I mentioned this, somebody said snootily, "I wouldn't read a million words, unless it was a DAMN GOOD million words"--like I'd sit here and write a million words of junk just because my story is that long! How rude. My stuff is lengthy but that doesn't mean I'm spewing out junk. I'm not saying my writing is fantastic but I hate how people frown on length without even seeing if the writing is any good. I would like to write shorter things just to get more readers, but it doesn't happen. My stories aren't short stories, plain and simple. It's also practically impossible for me to write standalone stories--featuring new characters and not set in any of my existing storylines. Just can't do it.
Same. Description on setting or character appearance is usually lacking in anything I write. I also struggle to put events in a logical order. The overall picture of what happens is complete but I find it hard to plan the scenes imbetween, so structure is a problem.
I think dialogue is my toughest task. I've studied it, I keep practicing it, but there are just so many facets to it. However, it is also a component of writing I am most critical of in published writing, too. I've generally seen better-written dialogue in the mystery genre than in SF, and some of what I see in fantasy is just plain awful. Not coincidentally, I see a strong correlation between the quality of overall character development and the quality of the dialogue. Whether this is because good dialogue shapes more believable characters, or whether well-constructed characters are easier to give a good voice to, I just don't know. Probably a bit of both.
I would so agree to the descriptions. I never know if I am describing too much or not enough. And even then, trying to organize which order to describe everything. It's like wanting to describe what the huge buildings are like and how crowded it is, but then there is a stray sentence, like what the hot dogs smell like, that you want to add so badly, but it doesn't fit anywhere.
Ha, it may sound like a cool problem to have, but if the detail isnt to ones likeing than good luck holding anyones attention And like someone else said, i have this whole world in my head that i know all too well, and its easy to xpress it in detail that i understand, but some others might just not get..
Yeah I think it's the detail. I struggle to add detail and then I don't know if it is interesting and will hold the readers attention.
Telling my inner editor to go away and be quiet is the hardest part of writing for me. Moving the story along is a close second.
Ditto. But it's also dragging my butt to the chair to write. Also, I tend to not put enough detail, or make things too short.
The transitioning from one scene to the next scene gives me a lot of trouble. Because I'm doing nanowrimo, I've had to figure out a quick solution for it. I'm now just trying to take each scene as a separate being. Once I've written one scene, I've tried to just focus on the next scene as if I've started writing a new book--not quite, because of course the storyline is still threading along. Anyway, I'm thinking at the end of the 30 days, then I'll have to string the scenes together. I'll probably find a different solution as I go along. This is all so challenging.
I find used to find writing climaxes difficult, in one herrendous storie the climax consisted of 2 sentences, now I've got better and I need to find the balace of what to go into detail and drag out and what to forward through quickly.
As awful as this sounds, and I know it does, it gives me a huge amount of comfort that someone as proficient as Cogito, can struggle with dialogue too! I am absolutely awful at dialogue, and that has to be the hardest part for me. I'll be happily pootling along but then someone will come to say something and although I can hear it in my head, for the life on me on paper it looks rubbish, false and clunky. I try to get a handle on it, or at least enough of one so that it doesn't ruin my work, but I struggle. That and momentum, but I find a good routine/schedule solves that. Perhaps in light of the above quote, I might have to get reading more mysteries...
Since i have started writing i find nearly every thing a challange. To me thats the best part, if its not hard its not worth doing.
This is really vexing me now. Does anyone complete their chapter and read it through and think it's ok. Couple of days later you read it again to fine tune some points, get a small way in and feel like just throwing it away and starting on something completely different?? Is self doubt normal, is this high level of self critique normal? I know what I like to read and sometimes (maybe because I've read it so much), I just hate reading where I'm up to and think it's crap and the worst thing ever penned. It demoralises and demotivates me to despair Suggestions and opinions welcome.
You can always fine-tune. Anything can be fixed. Some recommend going away from that writing and writing something else, then coming back to it. Another thing, I got myself into a rut that I'm only now getting out of, don't fall into my pitfall: Don't keep revising and revising and revising. Move on. If there's something you want to improve, make note of it, but keep pushing through the rest of your book. Then go back and make your changes. I spent months and months on one chapter, going over and over it again and again trying to make it perfect. Bad idea. Don't do that. Move forward! The author Richard Bach once wrote, "We teach best what we most need to learn," so I'm speaking to myself too. Oh, and don't throw it away. If necessary, pack it into a box, seal the box, and put it in the corner of your basement. Stephen King did that on two occasions I know of, and each time, he took it out years later. One was the very successful "Dark Tower" first book, and the other was "Pet Semetary." If he hadn't packed them away, we'd never have been able to read them! Charlie
