New answers tagged creative-writing
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Can anyone provide some more examples of picturesque speech?
Here's one:
"The sky wearing a necklace of wild geese"
Citation: unknown author from Bing
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During the "resolution and closure" phase of a story, can you start a new arc for a sequel story, or do you absolutely need to close the story?
Sure, it can be signaled. When the Death Star explodes, we are shown quite explicitly that Darth Vader escapes. But that is not mentioned at all in the rest of that movie. It sets up the sequel, ...
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During the "resolution and closure" phase of a story, can you start a new arc for a sequel story, or do you absolutely need to close the story?
Do not end a book in a cliffhanger.
You always want your readers to be satisfied. If the end provides the satisfying resolution that the readers seek, they will look for more books by you. A ...
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During the "resolution and closure" phase of a story, can you start a new arc for a sequel story, or do you absolutely need to close the story?
Hinting at a potential sequel is absolutely fine, but just make sure you don't leave the readers unsatisfied. If you do, then they'll be expecting a sequel. If you're going for traditional-publishing, ...
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Definition of "bridge," "verse", "chorus" and "outro"
There are no universal standards, because different styles of music approach these differently (many don't even use verse-chorus-bridge) and even within a style, there's always individual variation.
...
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Is there anything too important to "offscreen" in a comic book?
Is there anything too important to "offscreen" in a comic book?
That's a very vague question. There are many reasons why elements of a story may remain offscreen, and no general answer can ...
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Is there anything too important to "offscreen" in a comic book?
The problem with skipping dramatic and important scenes is that it requires more (if perhaps different) skills to suggest what happened in those scenes. The reader needs to know enough to follow the ...
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How to safely pose this Mary Sue character?
Once upon a time, I stumbled upon a character named Broadway.
Broadway was a super hero. She could summon anything she could imagine into being, control gravity, make herself giant... you name it. She ...
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How to safely pose this Mary Sue character?
Place a restriction upon her powers. She cannot hurt or help any people directly with her powers, only teach. The prohibition could be absolute, in which case she has to have a poker face that makes ...
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How to safely pose this Mary Sue character?
Maybe your hero can only use a limited amount of magic because it is tiring.
Analogy: Give me a 1 kilogram stone in a backpack, and I can carry it around all day with little trouble. Give me a 10 ...
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To rewrite or not to rewrite?
I'll offer different advice: don't decide now.
Try continuing where you currently are in 1st person and see how it works. Nobody writes perfectly the first time and you can't edit a blank page, ...
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To rewrite or not to rewrite?
As you can see from the responses, it is a balance between style and the best perspective to tell your story. I prefer third person limited, as I find perspective, perception, and person comes through:...
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A Novel Based Off A Song...How Close Can It Get?
Questions about citing song titles or song lyrics have been asked before (use the site search to find them). The consensus is that you should not cite song lyrics without written consent of the ...
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To rewrite or not to rewrite?
I hate writing in first person, it feels very limited to me.
Even in your examples, the thoughts seem strained and scattered in first person. Contrived, to describe the scene.
But in 3rd, the narrator ...
- 99.6k
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To rewrite or not to rewrite?
Great question!
I believe that the person you write in does not limit stylistic choices. You can still have descriptive passages in first person.
Just to illustrate this, I modified your first person ...
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How to safely pose this Mary Sue character?
Actually her magic does not make her a Mary Sue. It might even hinder her in her mission:
Just imagine her telling someone: "Look, this stone over there does not move without any force being ...
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How to safely pose this Mary Sue character?
The right thing to do is probably to go with Faith, Authority, and Stupidity as the main antagonists, since they will work quite well.
Alternatively, why not relativistic physics? Your main character ...
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How to safely pose this Mary Sue character?
Considering her mandate and the magical abilities she has to carry that out I do think the last magical power seems a bit of an oddity. Also it removes a LOT of reasons to even use her other magical ...
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How to safely pose this Mary Sue character?
Those powers sound more interesting than the mechanics she wants to teach
Your Mary Sue has all sorts of powers - but what about social skills? What about expectations she comes in with? What about ...
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How to safely pose this Mary Sue character?
The problem is, I've endowed her with too many magics.
I don't think this is necessarily a problem. There are several stories with effectively-omnipotent main characters, and they work. However, if ...
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How to safely pose this Mary Sue character?
teaching Classical Mechanics to humans is her mission
If she were to act as the hero, there would be no villain that could even scratch her.
A villain does not need to physically scratch her to foil ...
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How to safely pose this Mary Sue character?
Just give her one power, the power of illusion. Or alternatively, instant hypnosis.
All of those things you've got? She can create illusions that do the same thing.
And as magical illusions, they have ...
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How to safely pose this Mary Sue character?
There are two primary solutions: make her weaker or make the villain stronger.
There are many methods of teaching. I'm unsure what precise setting she will be teaching in, but imagine: in a classroom ...
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Writing about a topic which you don't have personal experience in
Dated response, so apologies, but this is why I say that "write what you know" is the worst possible advice to give a new writer. I always tell people never be afraid to write what you don'...
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How to refer to alternate versions of a character in a non-sci-fi way?
Firstly, I would like to say that I deeply enjoyed your sample writing. It included details and comaprisons that made such a beautiful picture in my mind, and I think you have great potential as a ...
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To facepalm or not to facepalm
It would be very important to cover the mood / feeling of the person who's doing the facepalm, more than the description of the act itself.
With due respect, some of the descriptions of provided in ...
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How do I cope as a cultural minority in a creative writing class?
I would say that if you are unsure about understanding of U.S. cultural references, it's not a big deal because the U.S. is a major exporter of its culture, with a lot of its TV shows and movies ...
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How do I cope as a cultural minority in a creative writing class?
I think the literal answer to your question is ‘with grace, determination, and verve.’ Plus hard work. But that goes without saying since graduate school requires hard work. Grace, determination and ...
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How do I cope as a cultural minority in a creative writing class?
What is your eventual goal?
If you want to learn to write and later publish in your own language and culture, write as if you were writing for someone "back home" and answer questions that ...
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A podcast episode as a setting/scene
So my first question would be who is our POV in this scene? Are we the listener? The Host? The Guest? How do you want the audience to interpret the series? Should we take what they say as true? ...
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Should this sentence use "might be" or "might have been"?
It's a matter of using simple or perfect past tense.
She suggested it might be a surprise from Harry
This is simple past tense. It conveys "now" in the past tense, the current flow of ...
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Are fake movie titles mentioned in dialogue italicized?
Treat fake titles the same way as real titles.
There's no reason why it should be different. The only question to be answered is if that means italics or no italics.
Most fiction uses italics
The rule ...
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Are fake movie titles mentioned in dialogue italicized?
In fiction (which you seem to ask about, since you mention dialogue), in the narration, titles of movies or books are commonly printed in italics, following the convention for non-fiction:
They ...
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When writing a trilogy, should you plan the entire series before starting the first book draft?
As someone with multiple trilogies and series in her head and partially outlined, my answer to your question would be a varied answer of "yes." Although your focus is on your book, I would ...
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What's Essential In A Combat Scene?
One point that's touched on but left out in other answers - the craft of language choice. High action, fast paced combat scenes, require a change in language and structure:
Use shorter sentences. ...
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Paid beta seems to have skipped large portions of my manuscript
I think this is a very difficult question.
On the one hand, if you paid by the word and the contract was for your beta reader to read the whole text and give you feedback on all of it, then that is ...
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Paid beta seems to have skipped large portions of my manuscript
There is a huge difference between a developmental editor and a beta-reader.
A beta reader's primary role is to share how readable and how engaging your story is. If the story has problems with ...
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Paid beta seems to have skipped large portions of my manuscript
You were cheated. On Fiverr, you only get a few days (3 I think) to complain, and get a refund or get a correction. Actually you just get a credit on your account you can use for another gig, not a ...
- 99.6k
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Paid beta seems to have skipped large portions of my manuscript
I wouldn't say this is specifically a writing question - it's the same as any other substandard service you buy, and feel like you didn't get your money's worth.
First, contact the beta and let them ...
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How can I write in first person present tense without it being annoying or distracting?
First person present tense narration gives the sense of watching a stream of the hero's direct perception and experience as it is happening. It's a good choice if you want to show your reader what the ...
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How to describe an angry voice in dialogue?
I believe you may have been looking for the word gruffly:
Hearing this, I dropped to my knees, and grabbed his face, “Have you absolutely lost your mind?” I said gruffly.
I could absolutely be wrong ...
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