So I have at two books in my head, which are both nearing the point where I can start writing with a coherent vision in mind. But I just don't know which one to start first. I keep changing my mind, it seems to change with my mood. Does anyone else have or has had this problem?
My method in this situation is usually to start writing both and see which one holds your interest consistently. If working on one just makes you miss the other one, you'll have a clearer picture of which one you can push to completion.
Which one's going to be easier to write/sell? Start with that one, and do the more challenging one when you have more experience.
Write whichever you are inclined to at the time, then see it through. Doesn't matter which you pick. Spend the time writing and not trying to figure things out.
I've skipped between a couple in the past, and eventually one of them takes charge and makes the decision for you.
Hi, newbie here! So, I've written a fair amount in my time, but lately there's been a bit of a (long) hiatus. I have a lot of trouble with finishing stories. Now, I'm thinking of getting back into my old story, but the problem is: I wrote this, when I was a teen and I just feel like the content is a bit immature/overly cheesy now. I do however still love it a lot, since that story is my baby and it spent a lot of time festering in my brain, before I got it out on paper. My question: should I rewrite it or just straight up start another story? I feel like I've also gotten a lot better at writing, since then(embarassingly cause I've written a lot of fanfic .) and some passages make me cringe with incorrect use of british English in a story set in the USA( not a native speaker myself). so, yeah, just looking for advice. I want to get back into writing and get cracking, but idk with which content.
Welcome to the forum. Based on your description, when you say "rewrite", you mean go back and start over with the same story, but writing it again from the beginning, using the same concept, not just editing it. If the choice is between that and starting out with a completely new idea, I would say go with the one about which you have the strongest sense of story. Good luck with it.
Ditto to the above. Go with your gut. I can relate to this. I have unfinished longform things in my files from when I was a teenager who wrote stories instead of paying attention in class. I would also add, aside from the nostalgia factor, figure out what you like about the old story. The characters? The plot? The setting? Those can be re-worked into something new. Then you don't have to deal with having to read the cringe-worthy old stuff over and over to get something good out of it. I have a trio of characters I've "known" since I was 13. And they will be back.
1/ Why are you using British English for a story set in the USA when you're not a native speaker? 2/ It's hardly surprising that something you wrote as a teen now strikes you as immature. 3/ It's hardly surprising that (you believe) your writing has improved with age. a) You will have experienced more writing by other people. b) You will have developed you critical faculties. c) You will have used English (I'm assuming) more in your everyday life, so your English will have improved.
I can understand this. I also have quite a few stories I started when younger, that when looking back on them, I cringe a bit. Ask yourself this: - Is it the writing that is immature, or the plot? -If it's just the writing, but the plot is great, maybe a rewrite would be best. Are there parts of it you can salvage and re-use? -If the plot is immature (I'm thinking of my own cringe-worthy story 'The Elves of Kyala Valley' that I began in middle school) ask this: Can it be salvaged? Do you want to salvage it? How can it be made more mature? What makes it immature, and can that be removed? In my situation, I put it on a shelf as "aww, my first attempt" and walked away to begin something new. But it really depends on you, and whether the plot still speaks to you. Do you want to invest the time to re-write it all? If the answer is no, find something you're more excited about, and go with that. If this story still excites you, and the idea of re-writing isn't tedious, then maybe you have more to say on the subject and should explore that.
Welcome to the forum! I remember being a newbie myself a few years back, you will get a lot of help and support from all of us. I get the impression that your teenager's story is unfinished. Depending on how far along it is, I would recommend taking it as is, and finishing it. There is such a sense of accomplishment in reaching "THE END" that it will motivate you to do another. Don't look back at what you have done (other than to pick up the story's thread), just charge ahead. You will fix the immature and cheesy parts when you edit. And you WILL edit! That is the hardest, most unrewarding and most important part of writing, but it is critical. So don't edit your story (in the sense of major revisions, not minor SPaG), while you are still writing. Editing will kill the positive enthusiasm you need to have while writing creatively. I did much the same thing with "The Eagle and the Dragon" after a hiatus of 13 years when it was about 1/3 done. Other than some revisions at the opening to account for some new things I had learned during that time, which amounted to new writing rather than revision, I just re-read what I had done to pick up the story, then charged on. To give you a feel for the editing process, I finished in 2015, but then made seven major revisions, one professional edit, and innumerable SPaG fixes, before I published 18 months later. It took longer to edit than to write the remaining 2/3 of the book! I have a friend who has publsihed about 40 books in as many years. He says to edit until you can't stand to look at it again, then edit it again.
That's essentially what I was going to say when I read your OP, @Inkinthepen . If the story you were writing when you were younger still appeals to you, by all means go back and finish it, maybe using a more mature outlook and tone. As @Lew says, there's nothing as satisfying as finishing a story. And you can go back and edit what you wrote, to bring it up to speed. (In fact, you should!) However, if the story itself seems juvenile to you, and you no longer think about (or even care about) the characters or what happens to them, then I'd advise you to move on to a new story that means something to you now. But whatever you do, get into the habit of finishing what you start. And do continue to have fun!
Hey, y'all! A few starter questions: 1. How did you begin your current work-in-progress? 2. How did you decide on a beginning? 3. Has that beginning changed throughout the writing process? 4. Do you do small excerpts (for lack of a better word) in the beginning before the prologue/opening chapter? I've been agonizing over the start of my story because I wrote this small (less than 800 words) start that I think is a good taste of what's to come. However, it's too short to be a chapter (or that's what I think) and I don't know what to do with it. I'm lost on the beginning of this story so I'm hoping to gain some insight from what y'all have done.
1. Do you mean in terms of the story, or how did I prepare for it...? I assume the former, but it'll make more sense if I answer it after question 2. 2. I consider two things for a beginning: How does the main character/s change from the beginning of the book to the end? The beginning has to show the 'before' state. What is the inciting incident? The thing that begins the character's change? I start as close as possible to that. The inciting incident should either be in Chapter 1, or Chapter 1 should provide the necessary set up for it to happen (the inciting incident inciting incident, if you will.) So, to answer Q1, my WIP starts with my female main character looking after children as part of her job (social worker). It sets up the inciting incident (asking her ex if they can have another baby together) and her arc (learning to trust her ex, and believe that they can be a happy family, despite all the broken families she sees as part of her job.) 3. Not yet. Nowadays I always send my first chapter to critique partners to make sure I'm hitting the right note, so I know early on if it works or not. 4. No. I pay no attention to these as a reader, so it wouldn't occur to me to write them. Impossible to say without reading it, but I wouldn't dismiss it because of its length. I would just decide if it's something the reader needs to know upfront -"a taste of what's to come" makes me a tad wary, because sometimes writers try to hook readers in with a really exciting first scene and then backtrack to a less exciting place, which is where the story should actually begin. I also worry that, extrapolating from question 4, you see this as something that wouldn't even make it as a prologue?
Thank you! Your answers are/were helpful. For #4, I read everything, though. If it's in the book, it gets read minus the credits of who published it. I would generally agree, but I've read several books (including by Stephen King and Rick Riordan) where it starts out with something that will absolutely grab your attention before dropping back to talk about the past and be somewhat more boring. I preferred it, but it's because if the book starts off more mundane then it can be fairly tedious to get into (for me and that excludes "The Dandelion Clock" by Jay Mandal). The majority of prologues I've read have been longer than the small piece I've written, are to tell you about a quick summary of past events, or a mixture of both. This is if the story has a prologue in the first place.
When I answered #4 I was thinking more of the poems or quotes authors sometimes put in before the actual manuscript. I don't even know what you'd call a pre-prologue excerpt, but if it was something original to the book (rather than poem/quote) I would read that.
I'd include those in with #4. I read the quotes, lyrics, etc., too. Some of them are enjoyable to read, but I'm biased because one of my favorite authors is notorious for including lyrics or poems before chapters or changes in the book.
1- My chapter one starts out with my MC and his best friend talking about his best friend moving, which the MC finds distressing because his best friend is his only friend. His best friend invites him on a mystery double date, setting up chapter 2. Also, I introduced the antagonist at the end of chapter one. 2-It took a lot of thought, and I mean A LOT. I'm not even 100% sure what I have right now is good enough, but it's worked so far, so fingers crossed. 3-It did change, actually. My "first draft" (a cringeworthy 22,000 word count very rough *and short* draft) Had a very different beginning, but I scraped that idea because I felt like it didn't set up the story completely for what it's going to be. 4-No. I don't believe I've ever seen that before? I don't read as much as I should though, so... If you really think it's too short to put in, can you just make it longer? If you make it a prologue, it can definitely be shorter than what the actual chapters are, word length-wise. Perhaps you can somehow merge what you have with something else that might be important for the reader to know up front?
"Normally, I'd never go near a thrift store. Only, I'd been down on my luck so long... No, scratch that. I'd made really bad decisions and failed at so many things..." (The MC, previously accustomed to a degree of self-serving dishonesty in all his endeavours, is now impelled to tell the truth.) I had to get those shoes, asap. This is a short story with no words to waste. No. In fact, the first four paragraphs are all that I'm happy with. I've been stuck at the second pivotal event for three weeks now, and it's driving me nuts. Sometimes a description or speech pops in and I jot down - to use at the appropriate point, or, just as often, not. As a rule, though, I go sequentially from beginning to end. The length of chapters is nowhere cast in concrete. However, 800 words is really very short. You can make it a prologue, or stick on the front of Chapter One with a ~ or something between it and the body of the text. Or just continue on. Or turn it into a front flap blurb. The point is to get on with the story. If you can't move past this beginning, put it aside and work on the plot outline or setting descriptions, character cards, or research into terminology - whatever you can do to make progress. Me, I wrote two flash fictions - and I'm still no closer to solving this plot problem. As Forrest Gump famously said: ()it happens.
If you're stuck at how to make your first chapter longer than 800 words, how long do you think your novel is going to be? Seriously, it's hard to make too much happen in 800 words. The story should still be on lift off. Something is going to happen after those 800 words so write it. I don't see why what you wrote is stuck at 800 words. If you were being paid be the word, I bet you could come up with some more to say. Just keep the story going. I think it's very hard to even know if you've got something when you are only at 800 words.
This is patently not helpful. If the question had been about struggling to pare the first chapter down to less than 10k words, would your advice simply be to "write less stuff happening"? Of course, that's ultimately what needs to happen, but putting it like that isn't helpful.
Do you feel that it's mandatory for you to write the story in order? Because my first recommendation, if you don't feel the need to write in order, would be to just move past the moving parts at the beginning, and start writing wherever you can.
I'm wishy-washy on that. I'm okay with writing small blurbs that may or may not occur later, but if I write too much out of order then it starts to make me anxious.
