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How long does it take to publish in a magazine?

How long does it take to publish in a magazine? I have had a piece under consideration—with a fair number of emails and discussions with the editor—for five months with the editor still on the fence ...
David_Ave's user avatar
0 votes
1 answer
19 views

How Exactly Are You Supposed To Write A Paragraph That Maintains A Consistent Theme Throughout?

I have noticed as a writer that one of my greatest weaknesses is writing paragraphs. I never really learned exactly how a paragraph is supposed to support one single theme. For instance, this is a ...
SmartBulbInc's user avatar
9 votes
4 answers
2k views

Is there a way to make text feel like an unhinged rant while still being readable?

I want to write a passage of text that makes the reader feel like the person writing it is deranged or otherwise not in the right state of mind. It seems relatively easy to write incoherent, ...
Finley Baker's user avatar
1 vote
3 answers
54 views

Language of other countries

I write the little girl calls her grandmother Bunica Rose. The father calls her Bunica Rose also. In the narrative, I use the words, Grandmother Rose. Is this appropriate to do?Will my reading get ...
Jane Miller's user avatar
0 votes
3 answers
130 views

Adult Fantasy with a protagonist like Arya Stark

I'm pitching an adult fantasy book with a young protagonist much like Arya Stark in temperament and capabilities, and I'm having difficulty setting that expectation with my comps. There are plenty of ...
IchabodE's user avatar
  • 692
0 votes
0 answers
55 views

Are there any websites that hire people to type up written documents?

I would like to find work typing out manuscripts and books. I don't want to edit them. If I see a typo, I may correct it, but I am not an editor. I can turn a written document into a typed one. Does ...
Shelley's user avatar
1 vote
2 answers
104 views

Past progressive in a novel

I have been reading a lot of different options on how to write a novel. Many people suggest that the past progressive tense is most often used in fiction to describe interrupted actions (in relation ...
Piermo's user avatar
  • 11
0 votes
1 answer
59 views

What does it mean when people say your dialogue should have its own line? [duplicate]

So, I've been trying to write a novel and some people have read it and said it was great and I've also received some criticism saying I needed to give each line of dialogue it's own line. Does it mean ...
Mahailey Davis's user avatar
0 votes
1 answer
61 views

Am I legally allowed to expand someone else's short story into a novel?

For years I told a short story in my kindergarten classroom. It was written and freely shared by the writer. I rewrote the short story (2-3 pages) into a middle grade chapter book, expanding the plot, ...
HRWriter's user avatar
0 votes
3 answers
94 views
+50

Which Is Clearer: 'Being pressed' or 'Pressed'?

Consider these two sentences: [1] Being pressed against the wall, he struggled to break free. [2] Pressed against the wall, he struggled to break free. I've recently spent some time reading grammar ...
MJ Ada's user avatar
  • 103
1 vote
2 answers
68 views

Does it come off as weird/offensive to describe someone as 'brown' in partial reference to their skin color, but in absence of a specific descriptor?

I'm not talking about describing someone as 'brown-skinned' or 'having brown skin' or even specific phrases like 'brown people', I should expect the former two to be acceptable and the I know the last ...
user61513's user avatar
0 votes
3 answers
57 views

Can I switch the POV of a main character? [duplicate]

So I'm momentarily writing a fictional story for a class I'm taking, and I've run into a problem. I have one main character, but there is a scene where that character passes out. Is it possible to ...
Nils's user avatar
  • 3
0 votes
0 answers
29 views

meaning of a poem [closed]

This poem is from Christian Wiman and is called All My Friends Are Finding New Beliefs (the full poem is included in the link). Can you please help me understand the meaning of the lines in bold? All ...
jml's user avatar
  • 1
2 votes
3 answers
52 views

Describing exclaimations from a group

My character, an old woman, has been knocked down, injured and can't get up. There is a crowd of people, spread across a park, who all witnessed the accident. From her view, at ground level, she is ...
Janine C's user avatar
4 votes
2 answers
543 views

How can I recognize and take constructive criticism?

Personally, for me, I have ADHD and mild autism, so at times I don't have the same views as the majority. For example, I like the ending/plot of this one book/show/movie, only for me to find out that ...
AmateurWriter's user avatar
1 vote
1 answer
41 views

Tagging dialogue lines with character names using hotkeys

Is there a program/tool that can use to deal with boilerplate such as indicating who is speaking in my text on the go with hotkeys? What I'm imagining is, for example, when writing a back-and-forth ...
Pomacanthidae's user avatar
1 vote
5 answers
96 views

Is there a smooth way to indicate that third person pronouns don't matter so much in my worldbuilding in English?

For context, I am nonbinary, and also East Asian. My language of fluency is English, but I know other languages and also have an anthropology degree. (Japanese, Korean, a tiny, tiny bit of Mandarin, ...
Kim Yoonmi--Surname first's user avatar
0 votes
1 answer
66 views

How to create dialogue in a book?

This question may sound strange to you, but I am starting to write my book for the first time, so I hope that everyone will understand me. My question is that I do not know how to write the dialogue ...
Анна Орищук's user avatar
1 vote
1 answer
91 views

Should Greek or Norse mythology be used?

When writing, what of these two mythologies should be used, in terms of quality and preservation of the original sources? (I am not listing other mythologies like Aztec, Mesopotamian, Caribbean, ...
Odin Laufeyson's user avatar
1 vote
1 answer
68 views

How do I make a situation that looks like a planet will be destroyed, but without actually destroying it? [closed]

Here are some details for context: There are two civilisations, A and B. B is significantly smaller, around a few hundred people. B is visiting A's home world via a magic item that can teleport a ...
thirteen's user avatar
0 votes
1 answer
62 views

Using the stages of grief to fall in love

I would love to utilize the stages of grief in a way to show the progression of a character's resistance to fall in love. I have some ideas for each. What are some other ideas? I have a vigilante ...
humblePancakes's user avatar
2 votes
1 answer
53 views

Citations while writing a summary

My professor has me doing a paper that will be a summary of five different sources covering a specific mental disorder. Will I need to use citations from the information I am summarizing or will I ...
Tiffany's user avatar
  • 21
3 votes
1 answer
446 views

Blending First and Third Person: A Wording Question

I'm writing a book with a blending of first and third person, and it switches whenever I need it to and not across chapters. The third person follows every character until the perspective changes to ...
Lily N's user avatar
  • 33
0 votes
1 answer
29 views

Approach to handle editorial oversights to new annotated edition of older work

Long preparing a new annotated edition of a well-known 20th-century architect's most significant publication, originally published in the mid-1950s, for republication in collaboration with the ...
Typothalamus's user avatar
5 votes
3 answers
704 views

What is this called? Using one word that has a one meaning but then is given new meaning in a subsequent clause or sentence

This is done in songs and I'm sure it's done in poetry too. For example, in the song Gray and Blue by Jaymay, she sings, "I'm with another boy (he's asleep, I'm wide awake) / And he tried to win ...
tylertrotter's user avatar
0 votes
4 answers
108 views

How does one write a paper "in character?" I don't know how to begin

For the course project, you will write about a historical event between 1865 and the present day from the perspective of a historical figure who participated in the event. You will need to research ...
Madalina's user avatar
5 votes
2 answers
626 views

Should I use 1st-person or 3rd-person perspective for an alien character alone in a post-apocalyptic world?

This has been a difficulty for me for a bit. I'm writing a story about an alien character alone in a post-apocalyptic world. Them being alone makes me think it'd be easier and better to chose 1st ...
WalllyIsBestBird 5's user avatar
1 vote
1 answer
45 views

Thoughts on using "looking to" in marketing content

I've been writing content for years, and over the last 6 or so, in marketing for software companies. Very often, I'll see sentences include "looking to" as a way to explain that the reader ...
DKBingham's user avatar
0 votes
1 answer
52 views

How and where can I submit a finished novel?

I wrote a novel. It took me 15 years to write it. How do I submit it to a publishing agent? How do I choose one? Will they be good? Will they take care of everything? When will I see the book in print ...
Eldin Smajlović's user avatar
1 vote
2 answers
136 views

How to come up with a good scenario of events between the characters of my book?

I can't figure out the middle of my book! I've figured out the beginning and the end, but I don't know what should happen between my characters so that everything ends well and happily? Could someone ...
Анна Орищук's user avatar
2 votes
3 answers
74 views

Can my narrator's thoughts be in the same paragraph as another character's dialogue?

I'm writing a scene where my narrator (character A) is listening and reacting internally to character B, who is giving a long-winded explanation of something. Though is is a problem I run into ...
Meg's user avatar
  • 23
0 votes
1 answer
40 views

Article was not published within agreed time, how do you avoid/handle this situation?

Recently I ran into a situation where an accepted article (by an online publication) was not published the month it was agreed on. The article had time-sensitive paragraphs for events that would ...
Paul-Beyond's user avatar
4 votes
4 answers
2k views

Should I change my character's name if it's a variation of mine?

I'm trying to name a character, and I found one that fits him perfectly. It makes sense for the setting, it supports the theme and his character arc, and it supports his parents' characters (mainly ...
Ravenr1r2r3's user avatar
4 votes
2 answers
95 views

What should I do while waiting for alpha readers?

I have finished the first draft of my first novel, a work of LGBT gothic fiction/horror. I have 5-6 people who said they are happy to look at it as alphas, but I have no idea what to do in the ...
C26's user avatar
  • 255
0 votes
1 answer
65 views

How to refer to different versions of a character?

In my historical spy thriller, there are five different characters named Miku that our protagonist has to fight. So initially, they're refered to as Idol Miku, Vampire Miku, etc. etc. etc. But then ...
WriterFromEarth's user avatar
1 vote
2 answers
121 views

Does every piece of dialogue need a dialogue tag like "she said"?

If I quote what a person says and use "she said" after the speech, do I have to state that again if I add another part of the speech after "she said"? For example: "It's a ...
Kiki's user avatar
  • 11
5 votes
3 answers
902 views

How do you know if your story is too complicated or just complicated enough?

I've been working on my current story for almost a year. It's a great story but at times it seems really complicated. How complicated is too complicated in a story?
Kexin Hooper's user avatar
0 votes
1 answer
66 views

Is the forbidden love story of an elf and prince overused?

I'm writing a short novel mostly for my own enjoyment, but I want to know if the elf and prince forbidden love has been beaten to death and if it would actually get any attention if it were to be ...
Cooper Riggins's user avatar
0 votes
2 answers
61 views

Should I flesh out the start of my fictional story?

The plot I’m thinking of goes from very normal, with fleshed out characters, to surreal towards the end. I want to wrap it around to have strange foreshadowing at the very beginning of the book to ...
Flora's user avatar
  • 11
0 votes
0 answers
19 views

Stuck...Stuck and stuck how do I overcome it? [duplicate]

I've been writing since I was little but despite the idea I've had for over a year I still haven't completed it. I'm feeling stuck but I know I have something to say with my writing. Someone on a ...
Kexin Hooper's user avatar
1 vote
1 answer
70 views

Series or standalone

I’ve been planning a book for a while and I always planned on it being a series but now I’ve been thinking that maybe I should make it a stand alone. It’s basically this big competition that had three ...
Kailah's user avatar
  • 103
1 vote
1 answer
53 views

How do I use an image as an epigraph?

There is a "picture that paints a thousand words" that I would like to use in the frontmatter of a book, similar to an epigraph. What is the proper way to lay out the page? Should it have a ...
nich's user avatar
  • 13
-1 votes
3 answers
126 views

How to make a time-constrained story not feel like a laundry list of events?

I am writing a comic, which upon first glance is a survival story about what a forgotten astronaut does to stay alive upon an inhospitable planet. Its first book spans from cycle 0 to cycle 614 with ...
Ylahris's user avatar
  • 143
0 votes
2 answers
90 views

How can I make my character show his feelings more without being excessive?

I started writing a story sometime ago, and I wrote all I could think of. I did a good job as per my imagination served me. I couldn't complete the story because I planned to go the magic and fantasy ...
Shreeyash Shrestha's user avatar
1 vote
2 answers
72 views

"Such" vs. "Said" vs. "The"

I'm a transactional attorney, but recently I've received some criticisms for my usage of the word "such" in lieu of "said" or "the" or "aforesaid" or similar ...
filiusdextris's user avatar
0 votes
2 answers
76 views

Should I Make Prose “Flow?” (Can Sounds be Overused?)

By “flow,” I do not mean rhythm or word structure or that stuff. I’m talking about phonemes. I’ve read and reread the prose of a short story I’m currently writing. Multiple times. Aloud. Even ran it ...
Quietus's user avatar
1 vote
3 answers
92 views

Writing a concluding paragraph

How can I write a favorable conclusion paragraph? I know I could just summarize the main ideas of the essay, but are there any other ways to write a conclusion paragraph?
ellara's user avatar
  • 11
2 votes
5 answers
2k views

Can I use a place from another book in my own?

I am starting to write a book. I have original characters and plot (it should be original). It is about Greek mythology but Camp Half-Blood is not in it. I want my character to go to Olympus. Can I ...
Anastasia's user avatar
1 vote
5 answers
182 views

I need ideas for what to refer to animal characters as. For humans, we have the word "people." I'm looking for a similar one for animals

The main characters in my book are all animals, and I'm writing the first scene that takes place in a large group. Recently I've come across several instances where I need to use a word similar to &...
Mochi-artist's user avatar
0 votes
2 answers
81 views

Can I divide the body of my comparative essay into 4-5 paragraphs?

I am writing an essay in which I am looking at how the portaryal of women in Disney movies has changed over time. To answer my research question, I am analyzing and then comparing three different ...
Manar 's user avatar

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