A place to discuss the craft of writing: tricks, philosophies, styles

[AG31]

I'm my own biggest fan. Simply because I write exactly what I want to read. And I reread most of my own stories quite regularly. And you know what? Usually I'm quite impressed.

I write for myself in the sense that my intended audience is a reader just like me.

Ditto and ditto again.

Simply put: my opinion isn't the only that exists and I want to to know when the consensus points to whether I'm right or wrong about a thing I've written. My view of my self and my work is distorted and I'm aware of that and I'm trying to figure out how deep those distortions go as well as how to combat those thoughts.

When you say "whether I'm right or wrong," are you talking about your style? Did you get your point across? Or are you talking about more fundamental things, like how we best understand our human experience?

 

[StillStunned]

A thread specifically about holding the reader's attention: Making the reader finish.

 

[NuclearFairy]

As someone whose formal education, to put it in polite words was crap I really appreciate this thread. Because oftentimes, I don't even know what I don't know.

Sometimes I just feel like a blind guy flailing around with a paintbrush, never sure if there's even paint on the brush or how often I'm actually touching the canvas, or if there's anyone in the room to ask advice from. (Yeah I know, bad analogy, a blind man would be able to feel the difference in weight of a loaded and not loaded brush and would be able to feel when the brush is against something, and could very likely hear the mother fucker stifling their laughter across the room.)

But anyways, this thread has been a huge help.

 

[FrancesScott]

A place to discuss the craft of writing: that's what the AH is, according to its description. To socialise too, but I think we get enough of that.

So let's discuss the craft. Don't be shy of you're self-taught, or if you're just mucking around, or if you've got terrible imposter syndrome. If you've written anything, and particularly if you've published it for people to read, you're a writer. And for at least a short space of time your words and imagination have lived in other people's minds. You've occupied their head, they've occupied your world. You're a writer, you've lived the craft.

I'd like this to be a thread where we can share our tips and tricks, our philosophies, our styles, our likes and dislikes, our frustrations and our triumphs. What worked and what didn't, and what we learned from both. Whatever moments you've had as a writer that you've thought "This is part of what makes my stories." Whatever helps you to get the words out of your head, onto the page and into the reader's head.

Like I mentioned above: don't be shy. I once had a professor who said, "The only stupid question is the one you don't ask." Likewise, I say, "The only useless thought is the one you don't share." So let's also make this a positive thread and not crap on anyone else's offerings. We're all at different stages in our development, we all have different approaches, we all have different ideas about what we want to achieve, and we all have different priorities. What seems trivial to you is quite possibly quintessential to someone else's experience.

I often start with just the seed of an idea. It’s frequently related to something to do with real life.

So, in my first story here (but not my first story), I was visiting my folks and went to an ice cream place I used to like when growing up. There was a cute young woman serving, who had her hair pulled into a ponytail through a baseball cap. And I was sure I knew who she was. Turns out I was right, it was the younger sister of a girl I knew at high school. Anyway, that turned into Ice Cream, the initial idea was someone going back to their childhood home and recognizing a younger woman.

But then I turned it all around. The narrator ended up being a guy, because why not? He visited the ice cream shop alone, whereas I had been accompanied. He’d just got divorced, fingers crossed I haven’t. The appearance and age of the woman were different. The story is entirely made up.

I’d also just finished re-reading one of my favorite novels (though I’ve seen people here saying it’s overrated), and I had the crazy idea of taking my ice cream concept and turning it into a short story pastiche of the author’s canonical 1920s style.

I mention this not to boost my humble story, but to say that I often start in one place, add in other factors, and end up in quite a different one.

My process is often asking questions? Why did the guy leave his hometown? Why did he get divorced? Why might the younger women be so interested in him? How are the answers going to be revealed in the narrative? And so on.

It’s an almost playful process.

 

[FrancesScott]

Not to beat a dead horse, but another example. My lesbian short story, Bilingual, started as no more than thinking about the literal meaning of the word.

 

[MelissaBaby]

Not to beat a dead horse, but another example. My lesbian short story, Bilingual, started as no more than thinking about the literal meaning of the word.

The genesis of my lesbian romance Oyster River came simply from the thought that that would be a cool title. It's a real river in midcoast Maine.

I thought about the sexual connotations of the word "oyster" and its symbolic relationship to the vagina. So...lesbian story.

Thinking about coastal Maine, I mulled over one of the central social facts of life there, the love/hate relationship between the local working people and the summer people and tourists.

So, a local girl and a summer girl fall in love.

It's a typical city mouse/country mouse set up, how to change the formula? Make the country girl the experienced one, and the city girl the innocent.

Mix in my favorite theme, second chances, and you've got a story with a 4.86 rating.

Because I saw a sign that said "Oyster River Road."