I'm good at all the things a good writer needs to be good at. The question is whether I'm good enough...
What comes effortlessly? Obscure and potentially gross jokes, descriptions, and similes. Wait, that's not a strength, is it? I've ended up scrapping most of them, of course, and since I write together with @T.Trian, he can police my stupid, effortlessly-coming suggestions.
I'd say that my strength is the realism I care so much about, though many people would not see it as a strength. Contemporary political correctness has pulled the wool over everyone's eyes, and a writer's rationalistic values are increasingly shunned.
@KaTrian : You and my husband share a talent there It's actually a good one to have, means your mind easily goes off on a tangent in terms of ideas, quick-witted as they call it. @Kekec : I know what you mean, and I tend to agree. On one hand I wish there was more honest, in-depth portrayal of characters that happen to have deeply objectionable views, because that is much more effective then typecasting and the rest of it, but on the other, I think such people are usually the loudest anyway, so, are we really missing anything? Still, I think it should be present, as long as the character isn't just a mouthpiece for the author's objectionable views.
Due to being an avid comic book fan I'm able to make seamless action scenes. But sometimes my action goes too fast apparently (as I've been told)
Weeell... from my perspective, the lion's share of the stupid, gross jokes come from me, but I guess we're both kinda like that. Maybe we lived in Royston Vasey in our previous incarnations? And were both called Dave... I'd say my strengths as a writer, in addition to inappropriate humor, are coming up with new characters and story settings, violence, sex, and cheesy hero(ine) stuff. To parahprase Beck, I tend to be into stuff that's considered either inappropriate or corny. Oh, and I'm ok at dialogue. But I suck at just about everything else.
I am very good at dialogue and characterisation. Pretty much all my stories are centred around what my characters do and say. If the reader learns something about one of my characters its usually because someone has said it or seen it. The downside of this is it makes my stories very long, and I am not naturally good at descriptive prose or narrative, and the narrative I use tends to reflect the tone of the character being narrated about. I was reading an opening to a Steven King book the other day where he described an entire town and some of its history in one compelling paragraph. I can't do that. I have to 'send someone' to that town and then they observe and talk about it. One consequence of this though, is that my characters have very eventful lives, so although my work tends to be long, according to my wife at least, it is pretty action packed and compelling. I know that you might think that my wife might not be a very honest broker in this, but if my wife was your wife you woudlnt say that. I wrote some really terrible stories that I cared about incredible deeply in my early 30s and gave them to her to read. I felt as though I were handing over a fragile baby bird to her care. She eventually told me that as a literary criticism major, they were so terrible she couldnt bear to read any more. We had an immense falling out over it as I felt she had crushed my baby bird to death, and I stopped writing for several years in a fit of pique. My latest project, which came to me in a flash of inspiration is much better. Since then I have had ideas for books and stories on a daily basis, all of which I store incredibly insecurely, on Evernote.
I am often appreciated for my narration, the way I start the story slowly, get the readers into the characters, then end each chapter with a suspense. I hope once I publish the book, the readers think the same!
Scientific accuracy. I'm still working on improving my skills at coming up with interesting plots and characters.
