New answers tagged technique
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Let me throw this at you, not as a suggestion for what to write, but as a writing prompt regarding this or a similar character:
He was a typical martinet--such a stickler for everything being just right that he would rather eat a cold meal than have one pea out of place on his plate.
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(pulling this out of comments since I feel very strongly about it-)
Be very careful about showcasing anxiety in dialog. People love using an excessive amount of "ums" and "ahs" for this along with outright stuttering, but in my opinion this very often comes across far more like a speech disorder than nervousness. Conflating stuttering ...
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To convey shyness and anxiousness, I would recommend focusing on the non-verbal cues. For example, your character could try to appear smaller by hunching their shoulders or squeezing their limbs together when new character sits next to them. You could also include other behaviors like playing with their hair or bouncing their leg that are often associated ...
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I'd recommend to stay away from many “uhm”, err” and “uhh”.
There are many ways to show how a character is shy and anti-social. Stressing her speech issues risks making it her defining trait, like King George VI's in "King's Speech", and I'm not sure this is what you want to do.
What I recommend is to go through movies and books that you like and ...
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A prefix walks into a tabernae sopionibus scribam:
The process of taking Latin and making English words is less scientific than you might think - although it's very popular in science. Despite what English majors might want you to think, there aren't really formal rules.
Start with a functional knowledge of Latin. This is easier than it sounds, because a LOT ...
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Facts that I can search for bring me to your blog. Good writing can make me come back to see what else you have to say.
Things that make me leave a blog page:
Slathered in ads.
Uses distracting blinking, moving, wiggling, unrelated stock photos.
"May we track your entire private life" cookie acceptance pages. Assume people don't want to be ...
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When reading a blog or article through the screen of a smartphone or phone, our eyes and brains synchronize and carefully study the headings, table of contents pages. After one or two pages, if the text is not interesting, we stop reading.
Therefore, your articles may be great, but due to weak or insufficiently interesting introductions, people may simply ...
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Obviously it's hard to be exhaustive here but let's examine a couple of key factors using some highlights (and some lowlights) from the links you provided.
Repetitively repeated repetition
Hammering on the same words or phrases over and over again - it's horrible to read and to be honest it reminds me of bad SEO content from the late 1990's. An example from ...
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I'm not sure I agree that your examples point to a problem with deconstruction in general, and so I'm not sure you have a problem. Yes, you can definitely subvert expectations too much (see Game of Thrones after season 5), but I don't see that Watchmen or NGE destroyed their genres. I don't follow comics, but Marvel superhero films are more upbeat than ...
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I see two solutions.
Exercise some restraint. You can still deconstruct somewhat. You can make the reader aware that you are not naive, that you are aware of the tradition of the genre so that the plot decisions are conscious. Such a text cannot be read as pure escapism any longer but it can still be fun because the reader relates not only to the characters ...
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Speaking as a fellow-deconstructivist here, I agree that the purpose of deconstructing a concept (or in many cases an object) is to understand its workings. Therefore, if the purpose of your story is to leave the reader with a fuller understanding of anything - even if that's a fictional event, a system of magic you made up, or a genre - that is where your ...
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Consider writing comedy by deconstructing and making fun of the tropes. Terry Pratchet may be a good example, although you do not have to be that focused on nonsense and instead just using humorous dissections to make for a slightly more interesting read.
Alternatively you can use it for a kind of gritty vibe: Have your characters expect the trope and fight (...
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Vivisection: Body Horror or Anatomical text?
The critical thing in a story is to tell a great story. Period.
Okay, that doesn't sound complete. Kind of like over-deconstructing. If you read what literary agents SAY they're looking for, it's often a literary fiction take on whatever genre they follow. Deconstruction fits well with the literary tradition, ...
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In other words, when you are making a mistake, the first thing to do is to stop. Then consider....
that if you enjoy the stories that you write and feel they are what you want to express in your art, then you don't have a problem.
but if you don't enjoy your stories because you feel you've gone overboard with your deconstructionismocitiness then you'll be ...
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Depends on what you mean. If there is something in the story that seemingly doesn't make sense based on the information presented to the audience, and this is deliberate to highlight some inconsistency or plot element to the audience that the characters don't see, then what you have looks like a plot hole but isn't. The truth is that "under the hood&...
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The general advice for writing a culture or a viewpoint that isn't your own is to do plenty of research. Ideally, you want to visit or live there. Second choice is to interview people from that place. Third choice is books and other media from there --which you already seem immersed in. Definitely find someone from that culture to read your manuscript and ...
answered Jul 12 at 18:43
Chris Sunami supports Monica
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Straight up man, learn this difference:
A journalist reports on events, an artist invents. There is a difference, then, between a writer and a journalist. A journalist sticks to the facts to his or her best ability; a writer, an artist, uses facts but also twists them to forge truth from both fact and lies.
Do what you want, but don’t feel stupid for wanting ...
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The good news is that from a legal standpoint, Pakistan and America aren't too far separate and both use Common Law for their court systems (The big difference is the ~250 year divide when the U.S. broke with British and added a codified constitution to further govern it's laws (the UK is today one of the few countries with out a codified constitution in the ...
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Rethinking Genre:
Although you want to write in a contemporary setting, I'd suggest that to overcome your concerns about realism and getting details right, write in a slightly different genre. There are a wide variety of fantasy, science fiction, and alternative reality stories that would allow you to take all the unique and special elements of your culture, ...
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I would say that in dialog, a run on sentence can demonstrate the character's motor mouth or a lack of giving others a chance to get a word in. If you are quoting something someone said or wrote, it is acceptable to use their incorrect grammar rather than change it to match correct grammar. Using the "[sic]" tag at any erroneous grammar usage ...
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