My biggest weakness is not writing, stopping a lot. I have zero discipline. And I hate it, but once my interest wanes, so does the story. But when I like what I'm writing, I'm writing my brains out.
My biggest issue is putting voice in the six main characters. My book goes in between their perspectives and I don't seem to have too much voice differing for each one in the narration.
I think my biggest weakness is a tendency to resolve crises too quickly, not to leave enough tension. Getting better with it, though. I also still haven't broken the filtering habit, as I'm discovering as I edit my first draft ("There you go again," says my inner voice, sounding irritatingly like Ronald Reagan). In writing a historical, I've discovered (to my discomfort) another potential pitfall - to be drawn into fictionalizing the history rather than writing fiction set in history, a variant of the age-old problem of "I researched it therefore I have to write it". I actually caught myself part way through, but one of my early chapters will need some serious revising.
I wonder if there are some writing exercises that would help you with that. I'm no authority, but I think if I were doing that I would make a chart listing the characteristics and habits of the six, along with expressions they might use. I don't think I'd worry about them being stereotypes at this stage-- the slow one, the smart one, the wise-cracking one, the serious one, etc.-- you can always flesh them out later.
My biggest weakness as a writer is self-doubt. I guess it's caused by low self-esteem and lack of successful experience. People who have already been published seem to exude confidence because they know they can do it. They already have. They have a book or two already on their shelves and their agents' numbers saved in their phones. They can go to parties and say, "What do I do? I'm an author." But novices like myself don't have any proof that we can be successful at this. I need proof! What am I doing about my self-doubt? Uh... affirmations. I don't know. I kind of don't think my self-doubt will go away until someone wants to publish me.
I have lots of weaknesses. Injecting a sensible background action into a dialogue sequence, striking a good balance between no dialogue tags and too many, transitions, deciding on where to take the story next (I change my mind so often, I have trouble keeping track sometimes), getting hung up on a stubborn paragraph and forgetting I can fix it later, and loads more. Luckily, all these can be drastically improved in editing, especially if there is no deadline so I can really give it time to develop. But my biggest weakness is that English isn't my native language. Even though I speak it perfectly, still, there's a fraction of a second before my mental English kicks in, that I comprehend in my native tongue, so my brain has to work twice as hard. Also, I'm missing a youthful slang, an ability to be informal in a way one would be, if they spent their childhood in English. I have this full and effortless belonging to my native culture, which just isn't there in English. But I've been living in English speaking countries for so long, that my writing in my native tongue lacks maturity. It's a weird position to be in, and I feel I can turn it to my favour, if I only figure out the way to do it.
I used to struggle a lot with vulnerability. My characters are manifestations of the different sides of me and I used to betray them constantly because I didn't want to make my characters' feelings, and in a sense, my own feelings so evident. It's like the vulnerability you get from telling someone your secrets, but this time, you're doing it for the whole world to hear, for random strangers, despite the fact that they aren't actually real or your secrets. It felt strange and disorienting, but fortunately, I got over it. The things I struggle with now are: A) Planning - I can't plan for the life of me. I have each characters' stories all worked out, but the problem is, everyone is developing at the same time. So, I don't know who it is I should focus on. I haven't planned it out and I can't plan it out. I also don't have a plot, but my characters all naturally have tension between each other. Tension that needs to be resolved. But I don't even know what's going to be my climax yet... How I'm going to resolve this - I'm just going to have to sit my ass down, finish a first draft and see where my characters are going. Hopefully, they will do the work for me. B) Repetitive use of words - Sometimes I feel like I have a lack of vocabulary because I keep using the same words. But I know that I'm doing it because of one of two reasons. First, I might have exhausted myself from writing all day, and second, I probably find the word extremely fitting for all of those places, and so I can't help but to use it again. How I'm going to resolve this - I don't know... Read more? And read the thesaurus? Oh yeah, and sleep... definitely sleep... C) Being poetic - I took a Creative Writing class in university and the assignments that brought my marks down all have something to do with poetry. I'm getting better at it though but it's just not in my natural instincts to crank out poetic prose. I can do the usual metaphors, similes and certain literary devices when it comes to me naturally, but it doesn't usually come to me often. How I'm going to fix this - I'm going to read and write more poems.
A few things actually. 1.) Trying to please everyone to an imaginary audience. I'm just literally thinking of the possible criticisms every time I write that I make changes often. This is probably why I brainstorm a lot before writing so I can get the ideal story, setting, plot, and characters I want to do. 2.) Vocabulary. Okay, I'm not even 20 so I wouldn't expect myself to speak and write creatively with big words so either my sentences are too basic or somewhat repetitive. Luckily, I haven't decided to grab a dictionary and start using overly complicated words just to sound cleverly intellectual. 3.) Not completing a story at all. I may have written 5 page shorts in the past but when will I ever complete a full book? Either I lose motivation and interest in a story or I tend to get occupied with something else. Fortunately, there are a few stories I will always get back to when I get the chance to write.
1) I always develop my non-main characters well, but the main character is usually pretty boring. It's annoying. 2) I usually don't finish the story. I get bored or have a different idea. And I have nothing against people who work on multiple stories at the same time, but I always end up with quite a few unfinished stories. I do definitely intend on going back to some of them though. 3) My OCD need to always write the story from the beginning. It often results in writer's block or horrible first chapters. I am determined to overcome these for my current project though. Yes.
Many! I did not realise how many until I started reading this thread and thinking 'yep, I'm bad at that too,' and 'oh yes, I have no self-discipline either'.... etc.
The biggest problem I have is storytelling. I do a lot of technical writing for my job, and I am good at it (or so say my boss and co-workers). Technical writing skills are very different. Technical: Be concise Creative: Expand on situations to bring the story to life Technical: Tell readers the bottom line up front, then explain the details Creative: Try to keep readers in suspense about how things will end Technical: Write objectively Creative: The feelings and opinions of the characters are often what draw readers in I constantly try to figure out how to fight my technical writing tendencies.
Hummingbird, I used to have the same problem as well. I think all you need to do is: A) Read more third person literature. Try any fiction that is touted for its ability to "show" the story, rather than to tell it. Usually, you'll find these with reviews like "I couldn't put it down! I was with the characters every step of the way." (i.e. Harry Potter, The Inheritance Cycle...etc.) You'll notice how easily you're able to meld yourself into the story. B) Try writing in third person. It usually forces me to describe the details of the scenes and actions, which is more showing than telling. The mistake that I tend to make in first person is to spend too much time in the character's thoughts, telling the readers the happenings of the story. I think the reason why this happens is because we get too comfortable writing in first person, almost as though we're writing in a diary, which is definitely telling, not showing. C) Get critiqued! The more people critiquing it, the better it's going to be, because each person will catch different lines of "telling" and maybe even other problems in your writing. Also, make sure you're willing to hear them out, as this is how you're going to improve. Hope this helps! P.S. It's okay to be concise. Conciseness may just be the strength of your writing style.
Got a few things here. Fear mostly. Fear of plagiarism. Fear that I'm unknowingly rewriting a story that already existed. For example The Hunger Games was, according to a rumor, a carbon-copy tale of an old Japanese movie with the same plot (ie, a bunch of kids are forced to fight to the death by a corrupt government.) The author of The Hunger Games swore up and down that she never even heard of the old movie when she wrote the book. That's my fear, too. That whatever I'm writing, I'm unintentionally, unknowingly, re-writing something that had already existed almost word for word. I remember a year ago learning that two of my fantasy races, the Nepurians and the Devonians, were already taken by other authors. The latter race being almost exactly the same as Lucas' sci-fi race, the Devaronians. This fear leads me to want to research every single detail online to make sure nothing had already been done by someone else, so it stifles creativity. I get panic attacks, so I stop entirely. Names. Good God, names. The worse offender was my fantasy, where the names were all over the place. It was basically a salad bowl of random real-life cultures all thrown into one pot with no theme for each race. The same race alone would have names from different real-world cultures. For instance, the main characters in my fantasy novel, both from one of the humanoid races, Akeshia and Mishu, both sounded like they would have come from two different countries had it been set in the real world. In the middle of all this, I had very clear fantasy names such as Gregreo Valmorn, who was Akeshia's father, and names that looked too lazy, like Emperess Tyrina (Empress Tyrant, get it? Get it?) One of the families I had in this story, if you only looked at the names, suggested that the father was a man from India who adopted a Scandinavian girl and a Japanese boy. The problem was that their names came from different cultures, but they were supposed to be one family related through blood. Even if it's historical fiction, it still gets me. Some of my characters have names that don't sound like it could have come from that period, and one of them even shares the same last name of a well-known fiction author. I'm surprised I didn't write a WWII story where the main character was named "Vasily Nefario", but he was French. POV. Apparently I can't stick to one POV, especially in third-person. One of my work that I gave to a creative writing class had too much of this. One paragraph we're in the head of the MC, and suddenly, just a few sentences later, we're in the head of a shopkeeper when the text clearly intended for the POV to still be in the head of the MC. The inability to end a story. Where can I end it? How should I end it? I spend more time fretting about the very beginning and ending than I do the middle, because the beginning and ending are what the readers will remember the most. Description of a setting. How can I describe something without it getting too descriptive and carried away, yet be able to show the readers where they are? How much can I leave up to the imagination?
My three biggest weaknesses in writing are: 1. Pacing: everything in my story feels rushed, and the chapter transitions are always a mess. 2. Characterization: Unless I'm writing for an existing show, it's very difficult to care about my supporting cast. I just can't seem to write supporting characters that I care about. 3. Persistence: Too often I'll start a story, then lose interest in it.
This is a very old thread, but I don't remember ever seeing it before. And so many great contributions from my fellow forum members—who have many writing issues I also struggle with. One that hasn't been mentioned yet is a tendency to over-romanticize a setting. I write historical novels, and I do tons and tons of research, so they are accurate in many respects. However, that doesn't necessarily make them true to life, or 'gritty' enough. I choose my settings initially because I find them interesting and they are places I feel comfortable being, so I find myself sometimes making things too easy, setting-wise. If something could be done 'back then' or was done 'back then,' I don't always consider how hard it was to do, or how common it was to do it. I've had to alter several of my scenes during edits, to make the setting a bit more believable. It's also easy to ignore things that don't fit with the plot I'm telling, but would have been 'around' at the time and would have affected my characters if they had been real people.
This makes me think of the fact that Female Protagonist bathes. It is a Thing—she spends money she can’t afford to get entry to bath houses, for example, and she’ll take unwise risks for access to a bath. But that all comes from my objection to a realistically dirty protagonist.
I personally lack the concept of good and evil. My writing reflects that, and I catch a lot of S**t for it.
That might be an asset, actually. We live in a morally indistinct world, where 'good' and 'evil' are nearly always relative.
Yeah, but if you write a story with a racist MC, it's pushes some peoples buttons. I do things like that quite a lot.
