Writing advice

[Nynah]

I can't say that I noticed his ego being massive. His demeanor seems quite normal for the level of success he's had.

Relative to the level of success that he's had in the literary world, his ego might be appropriately sized. Compared to folks like you and me... it's enormous.

He's also a good deal more open and honest about his opinion than most authors.

He is. It's a good thing he's doing the YT videos to reach a wider audience and share his knowledge. He still has a huge ego, though. You can have one and not be an egomaniac.

Can you provide some examples, links, etc?

You can probably find some on YT shorts or BookTok but by and large there won't be anything assailing his ego because again, he's by all rights still a nice guy who talks about writing. But you can acknowledge that someone has a big ego and that that is sometimes a barrier to entry to taking him seriously. If you can glean knowledge from watching his stuff without being smothered by his self-assuredness and privilege, then more power to you, you're the target audience. But a lot of us have trouble with that, as evidenced by more than a few people in this thread.

 

[lovecraft68]

I once (long time ago, now) saw a little old man driving a full-sized Hummer. Made me laugh. I described it to a friend, and his immediate response was "imagine how small his dick must be."

I used to have an operations manager with serious little man syndrome. About 5'4 and all the yapping attitude of a little dog, always barking, always using his position to bully, you know the type.

He used to drive a Range Rover, but traded it in and one day shows up with this huge F250 that he needed the step and Oh shit handle to get into. My wife dropped me off one morning and sees him getting out of it and says, "He finally bought the penis extension."

 

[iwatchus]

You never took a single composition class or a 101 level lit class?

Nope

 

[SkyBubble]

Nope

Wow. I've never heard of that. Almost every college I know of requires at least one basic survey course.

 

[lovecraft68]

You tube has been putting out some of the Masterclass sessions for free. They're abbreviated of course because the company still is hoping you'll sign up but what they do put out there still has value.

I watched this one not too long ago.

 

[ChloeTzang]

You never took a single composition class or a 101 level lit class?

Me neither - I did some Creative Writing workshops AFTER I started writing here and they were a good starter, and then I sat dwn and worked my way thru a few different books but that's the extent of it -

A few ones I like: in no particular order - and a good number of these were suggested to me by KeithD way back when I first started. I find the best way to use these is to skim thru them, pick out key points, make notes and then try to apply them to whatever I am writing

"The First Five Pages" - Noah Lukeman
The Plot Thickens - 8 ways to bring your fiction to life - Noah Lukeman
No Plot, No Problem - Christ Baty
Story Struture Architect - Victoria Lynn Schmidt
Manuscript Makeover - Elizabeth Lyon
Spunk & Bite - a writers guide to comtemoporary style - Arthur Plotnik (KeithD suggested this one to me)
The art of Tomance Writing - Valerie Parv
The Novel Writer's Toolkit - Bob Mayer
Conflict, Action & Suspense - William Noble
Beginnings, Middles and Ends - Nancy Kress
The 38 Most Common Fiction Writing Mistakes - Jack M Bickham
Story - Robert McKee
The Marshall Plan for Novel Writing - Evan Marshall
Outlining Your Novel - K M Weilland
The Emotion Thesaurus - Angela Ackerman and Becca Puglisi
Scene and Structure - Jack M Bickham
Plot - Ansen Dibell
Writing Dialogue - Tom Chiarella
How to Develop Tension - Amy Deardon
The Writers Journey - Christopher Vogler
20 Master PLots - Ronald B Tobias
Sin and Syntax - Constance Hale
Steal this Plot - June and William Noble
How to Write a Dirty Story - Susie Bright
How to Write Romances = Phyllis Taylor Pianka
On Writing Romances- How to Craft a Novel that Sells - Leigh Michaels
How to Write Action Adventure Novels - Michael Newton
Make a Scene - Crafting a Powerful Atory One Scene at a Time - Jordan E Rosenfeld
Plot and Structure - James Scott Bell
Writing Deep Point of View - Rayne Hall
Writing About Villains - Rayne Hall
Writing Vivid Settings - Rayne Hall
Thinking Like a Romance Writer - Dahlia Evans
Writing with Emotion, Tension & Conflict - Cheryl St. John
How to Write Dazzling Dialogue - James Scott Bell
Romancing the Beat - Story Structure for Romance novels - Gwen Hayes
Writing Fight Scenes - Rayne Hall
How NOT to Write a Novel - Howard Mittelmark and Sandra Newman
Revision - A CReative Approach to Writing and Rewriting Fiction - David Michael Kaplan
Grammatically Correct - the Writers Essential Guide to punctuation, spelling, style, usage & grammer
Getting the Words Right - How ro revise, edit and rewrite - THeodore A Rees Cheney
Writing the Breakout Novel - Donald Maass
Self Editing for Fiction Writers - How to Edit Yourself into Print - Renni Browne & Dave King
The Elements of Style - William Strunk and E B White
90 Days to Your Novel - Sarah Domet

 

[ChloeTzang]

So, I spent most of the weekend watching Brandon Sanderson's lectures on writing SF&F, .......

Finally a big thank you to @TheRedLantern (and I guess indirectly @ChloeTzang ) for pointing me at the lectures. I do think it will make me a better writer and reader for other writers.

Well. it was @TheRedLantern who pointed me at Sanderson and I'm still working my way thru them - very long-winded LOL (well, I guess he has to fill that lecture time) but some great takeaways - like the books above, I'm taking notes as I go - I like to do that and then apply them on whatever I am writing and I'm finding Sanderson has some very good writing suggestions that are easy to grasp and rather more diffficult to apply - the concepts are straightforward - the challenge is in putting it into words, as always

 

[ChloeTzang]

K M Weilland btw has a good series of clips on youtube too - I liked her book on Outlining

https://www.youtube.com/@KMWeilandAuthor

 

[TheWritingGroup]

Me neither - I did some Creative Writing workshops AFTER I started writing here and they were a good starter, and then I sat dwn and worked my way thru a few different books but that's the extent of it -

A few ones I like:

And then almost 50 books.

"Few".

Do you by any chance read fast?

--Annie

 

[ChloeTzang]

Do you by any chance read fast?

--Annie

LOL. My normal reading speed is about 700 wpm and has been since I was 10, but I actually try to read fiction slower to make books last. I did a speed reading course as well and I can go way faster, which is useful for skimming thru but I really don't enjoy speed reading. It IS useful when you go thru books for info tho - you can skim thru to find the useful bits and then slow down to absorb the useful content, which is what I do with stuff like this.

It's a nightmare when you get a good novel tho - they go far too fast

 

[ElectricBlue]

Wow. I've never heard of that. Almost every college I know of requires at least one basic survey course.

In America, maybe.

I did a double English major here in Oz, and none of it was creative writing, all analytics. If you wanted to write poetry or fiction, you did that on your own.

I did get a comment very early on, here on Lit, from someone who said, "You must be a graduate from the Iowa Writers' Workshop," which puzzled me until I found out what that was. I never sorted out whether it was an endorsement or an insult. The same bloke also mentioned Frances Ponge, who I'd never heard of either, so the comment wasn't completely useless.

 

[TheLobster]

Grammatically Correct - the Writers Essential Guide to punctuation, spelling, style, usage & grammer

I'm not sure I'd trust this one...

 

[iwatchus]

In America, maybe.

I did a double English major here in Oz, and none of it was creative writing, all analytics. If you wanted to write poetry or fiction, you did that on your own.

I did get a comment very early on, here on Lit, from someone who said, "You must be a graduate from the Iowa Writers' Workshop," which puzzled me until I found out what that was. I never sorted out whether it was an endorsement or an insult. The same bloke also mentioned Frances Ponge, who I'd never heard of either, so the comment wasn't completely useless.

All of my education was in the US. My undergraduate school (one that was considered an elite college) assumed that anyone it was admitting was a competent writer already. I am not sure if their requirements have changed almost 50 years later or not.

 

[ChloeTzang]

I'm not sure I'd trust this one...

Blame mine LOL

There's a reason I got that one

 

[onehitwanda]

You should check out the Princess Bride book, it has all kinds of helpful tips about cutting this or that bit out and why all disguised as storytelling.

Give me back my father, you son of a bitch.

 

[StillStunned]

Give me back my father, you son of a bitch.

"I am looking for a man with six fingers."
"I have six fingers on this hand, but I'm a lesbian."
"A six-fingered lesbian? Come with me, the ULA has work for you!"

 

[onehitwanda]

"I am looking for a man with six fingers."
"I have six fingers on this hand, but I'm a lesbian."
"A six-fingered lesbian? Come with me, the ULA has work for you!"

We have a ROUS(*) who needs pleasing.

* raconteuse of unusual (in)satiability

 

[SkyBubble]

In America, maybe.

I did a double English major here in Oz, and none of it was creative writing, all analytics. If you wanted to write poetry or fiction, you did that on your own.

I did get a comment very early on, here on Lit, from someone who said, "You must be a graduate from the Iowa Writers' Workshop," which puzzled me until I found out what that was. I never sorted out whether it was an endorsement or an insult. The same bloke also mentioned Frances Ponge, who I'd never heard of either, so the comment wasn't completely useless.

The point is, the poster claimed not to have taken a single English course at all. Not composition, not a lit survey course, not analytics, nothing. I don't know of any college you can go through without taking at least one English course.

 

[iwatchus]

The point is, the poster claimed not to have taken a single English course at all. Not composition, not a lit survey course, not analytics, nothing. I don't know of any college you can go through without taking at least on English course.

I am that poster and it is absolutely true. I am not going to post my transcript (for obvious reasons) but I already explained that the school issued (rightfully so) that you could already write. When I was there, the school had n distribution requirements what so ever. I had maybe a dozen courses where I had to wrote a significant paper (several 30-50 page ones). It was just expected that we knew how to write.

By the time my SO was finishing (several years after I did), they were talking about very basic distribution requirements, but that was guaranteeing a breadth of perspectives towards knowledge and reasoning, not a set of skills. Everyone there was in the top couple in their high school, there were not skill deficiencies to back fill. By the way, I think I would have met the new proposed distribution requirements; I was a physics and philosophy double major, which got me a good step up towards it. Starting as a film major -- I dropped it when they wanted me to take lit courses -- gave me more and I am a history buff as well.

 

[SkyBubble]

I am that poster and it is absolutely true. I am not going to post my transcript (for obvious reasons) but I already explained that the school issued (rightfully so) that you could already write. When I was there, the school had n distribution requirements what so ever. I had maybe a dozen courses where I had to wrote a significant paper (several 30-50 page ones). It was just expected that we knew how to write.

By the time my SO was finishing (several years after I did), they were talking about very basic distribution requirements, but that was guaranteeing a breadth of perspectives towards knowledge and reasoning, not a set of skills. Everyone there was in the top couple in their high school, there were not skill deficiencies to back fill. By the way, I think I would have met the new proposed distribution requirements; I was a physics and philosophy double major, which got me a good step up towards it. Starting as a film major -- I dropped it when they wanted me to take lit courses -- gave me more and I am a history buff as well.

I'm not questioning you, but I find it odd. As I said, I've never heard of a college that didn't require at least a basic lit course.

 

[iwatchus]

At least 50 years ago, it was typical for the elite liberal arts colleges. I passionately did not want to be forced to take such a course then. You think I am hard headed now, you should have seen me then.

By the way, your phrasing of "a poster claimed" does connote a lack of belief in my statement. I expected that anyone writing would understand the implications of that phrasing.

 

[Comshaw]

I once (long time ago, now) saw a little old man driving a full-sized Hummer. Made me laugh. I described it to a friend, and his immediate response was "imagine how small his dick must be."

So if a huge ostentatious vehicle or a flashy sports vehicle (like an 810 HP Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat) says you have an itty bitty weeny, what does driving a poop brown '72 Pinto wagon with a crushed in left rear quarter panel and a cheap, rusty aftermarket luggage rack strapped to the top say about the driver? I drove one like that for 20 years and 400,000 miles. Extrapolating from your comment, I guess I'd better tuck the head of my dick back into my shoe so it doesn't drag on the ground, huh? Either that or maybe I should be tested to see if my IQ is above the minimum mark. I are smart, I are a Pinto driver!


Comshaw

 

[NuclearFairy]

When I got my GED at a community college I took some remedial classes to make sure I'd be able to get my tests in one go. According to my teacher and counselor at the college if your college admissions exams were high enough then you could skip some of the first year college classes. After they saw the scores on my math and science tests they encouraged me to take the tests and enroll, telling me that I'd be able to major in any science course I wanted with out having to take the first year classes.

Sometimes, I wonder, what if I'd gone for that instead of entering a trade school. But it is what it is.

Anyways, my point is if the college in question decides the student doesn't need them, and sometimes they do, then the student doesn't have to take those entry level classes.

 

[subdudeme13]

So if a huge ostentatious vehicle or a flashy sports vehicle (like an 810 HP Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat) says you have an itty bitty weeny, what does driving a poop brown '72 Pinto wagon with a crushed in left rear quarter panel and a cheap, rusty aftermarket luggage rack strapped to the top say about the driver? I drove one like that for 20 years and 400,000 miles. Extrapolating from your comment, I guess I'd better tuck the head of my dick back into my shoe so it doesn't drag on the ground, huh? Either that or maybe I should be tested to see if my IQ is above the minimum mark. I are smart, I are a Pinto driver!


Comshaw

You have a PINTO that is still running? Wow
How do you get that dick under the steering wheel?

 

[Comshaw]

You have a PINTO that is still running? Wow
How do you get that dick under the steering wheel?

No sorry it ain't running now. I bought it in the late 70's for $100.00 and my son wrecked it in the late 90's. He hated that car and I am convinced to this day he wrecked it on purpose! Twenty years, 400,000 miles, three engine rebuilds and he killed it 'cause he hated it.

I know both he and his sister were embarrassed to ride in it when they were teens. They would slump down in the seat so their friends couldn't see them when we drove past them. I made sure they did though, 'cause I had a set of air horns installed and would make all kinds of noise and hand gestures at where they were trying to hide while yelling out the window that they were there. I know, I know, a nasty parent I was. But that's a parent's prerogative. They tortured us just by being teens so it's a payback for us to torture them every chance we got.

Comshaw