Statius
Dark swallows Light
- Joined
- May 23, 2023
- Posts
- 1,777
Yep. 'Miss Vickie'. Over 31k reads and still growing daily.
Advice for New(-ish) Authors
- Thread starter iwatchus
- Start date
BobbyBrandt
Virgin Wannabe
- Joined
- Apr 7, 2014
- Posts
- 2,273
I have a story here that is 81 pages, and 8 more that are over 20 pages.
Every one has a red H.
ElectricBlue
Joined 11 Years Ago
- Joined
- May 10, 2014
- Posts
- 18,684
There are many long stories here on Lit. The longest single submission I've seen was 80 Lit pages, around 300k words, and and anecdotally there's a long serial story pushing a million words...
TheWritingGroup
Writing Group
- Joined
- Jun 30, 2024
- Posts
- 1,804
Others have said something similar, but:
You've written a conversation. It has powerful emotions, believable dialogue, it reveals character and sets up the next chapter. You think it's crafted better than any conversation you've ever written.
Be willing to cut it out because it doesn't fit the actual story you wrote. Don't cling to something that you wrote if it doesn't help the reader's experience.
--Annie
You've written a conversation. It has powerful emotions, believable dialogue, it reveals character and sets up the next chapter. You think it's crafted better than any conversation you've ever written.
Be willing to cut it out because it doesn't fit the actual story you wrote. Don't cling to something that you wrote if it doesn't help the reader's experience.
--Annie
Kelliezgirl
Debauched Dilettante
- Joined
- Oct 17, 2023
- Posts
- 3,498
On that topic, you will get a ton of writing advice based on "rules".
What Annie is referring to is covered under "Kill your darlings."
The key to any of the "rules" is understanding the INTENT of the rule, not the letter of it.
We don't kill our darlings just because. We cull it because it doesn't fit the story.
Another one you will hear a million times is "Show don't tell".
Great rule. Don't say, "Jack was mad."
Say,
Jack slammed the phone into its cradle, and walked across the room before punching the wall.
"That backstabbing motherfucker," he said before punching the wall again.
One tells, the other shows.
But the thing is, showing takes significantly more words. Sometimes that "showing" distracts from the story, slows your pace down and doesn't help the reader experience. You have to decide which makes more sense for your story at that moment.
Actingup
Mostly Harmless
- Joined
- Feb 12, 2018
- Posts
- 1,814
Congratulations on having this published mate! I can see why it was held up - not just for review of content, but for its blunt honesty. 5 stars, but you can’t please everybody of course.
I don’t really have anything big to add. I think that one of most important insights is the reminder that the readership is huge and somebody will be into what you’re writing (so write it well). That’s been well covered.
The very most important thing I’d focus on is to respect the readers. LW readers get a hard time in the forum, as you’ve noted, but it’s universally the case that if you treat your reader as a human who is choosing to read some of your work above other ways that they could be using their precious time, you will be better received.
I don’t really have anything big to add. I think that one of most important insights is the reminder that the readership is huge and somebody will be into what you’re writing (so write it well). That’s been well covered.
The very most important thing I’d focus on is to respect the readers. LW readers get a hard time in the forum, as you’ve noted, but it’s universally the case that if you treat your reader as a human who is choosing to read some of your work above other ways that they could be using their precious time, you will be better received.
Statius
Dark swallows Light
- Joined
- May 23, 2023
- Posts
- 1,777
Yes! This! Kind of what I was talking about. When to cut, when to elaborate. Ok this is a different type of example of that, but yes.
TheWorldBuilder
Planetary Scientist
- Joined
- Sep 19, 2019
- Posts
- 11,514
It's not on the story side, but a lady 100 miles away and I collaborated on a 65,000+ word slow-burn SRP a few years ago. Use as many words as you need to tell the story, provided you're not diving down blind alleys or needlessly waffling.
EmilyMiller
Perv of the Impverse
- Joined
- Aug 13, 2022
- Posts
- 14,344
My current record is 27 pages (albeit split into six parts).
StillStunned
Mr Sticky
- Joined
- Jun 4, 2023
- Posts
- 10,960
Write an Incest story. Make it the most cliché thing you can imagine, but give it a title that draws in the readers.
This will immediately satisfy your craving for views. Once you've got that out of your system, you can experiment with whatever weird stuff the Plot Bunny dumps on you.
This will immediately satisfy your craving for views. Once you've got that out of your system, you can experiment with whatever weird stuff the Plot Bunny dumps on you.
Z_TheWriter
Impertinent Romantic
- Joined
- Nov 8, 2025
- Posts
- 284
I am not an experienced writer, and so perhaps have no business giving advice. The one thing I feel like I might get away with trying to impart anyway is this:
Ask yourself: Who is telling the story?
Yes you, but that's not what I mean. Inside the story, whose eyes are we seeing through? What matters to this person? What would they focus on? What details would they miss or just ignore?
Obviously the answer can be that it's the omniscient 3rd person narrator, nothing wrong with that. But if it's a character the narration itself could and perhaps should have a personality to an extent.
What do I mean by this? In the one story I have published so far, there's barely any description of secondary characters, only one is even given a name, not a lot of environmental description either. The reason for this is that the story is told through the eyes of one of the two main characters. It mostly covers them first meeting, and during this time, both of them have trouble focusing on anything but each other.
Is it well done? perhaps not. Was it a good idea? Who knows. But it was done with intention, and made the writing process more interesting.
You might have a story featuring a POV character who is kinda dumb, so they don't always understand what's going on, thus the narration hints but doesn't spell it out to the reader either. Maybe your POV character changes during the story and the style of narration with them. You might see a repeat of the same event, but now in a completely different light, or it might just be that internal monologues use different swear words. There are a lot of possibilities to use this for storytelling purposes too. For instance, could a POV character at times actually be lying to themselves in their thoughts and thus also to the reader?
Obviously you can tell amazing stories without any of this, and some of your author's voice will likely cut through everything regardless. But considering these things and incorporating them is a lot of fun, and is something that I at least personally enjoy a lot as a reader too when I notice it.
Ask yourself: Who is telling the story?
Yes you, but that's not what I mean. Inside the story, whose eyes are we seeing through? What matters to this person? What would they focus on? What details would they miss or just ignore?
Obviously the answer can be that it's the omniscient 3rd person narrator, nothing wrong with that. But if it's a character the narration itself could and perhaps should have a personality to an extent.
What do I mean by this? In the one story I have published so far, there's barely any description of secondary characters, only one is even given a name, not a lot of environmental description either. The reason for this is that the story is told through the eyes of one of the two main characters. It mostly covers them first meeting, and during this time, both of them have trouble focusing on anything but each other.
Is it well done? perhaps not. Was it a good idea? Who knows. But it was done with intention, and made the writing process more interesting.
You might have a story featuring a POV character who is kinda dumb, so they don't always understand what's going on, thus the narration hints but doesn't spell it out to the reader either. Maybe your POV character changes during the story and the style of narration with them. You might see a repeat of the same event, but now in a completely different light, or it might just be that internal monologues use different swear words. There are a lot of possibilities to use this for storytelling purposes too. For instance, could a POV character at times actually be lying to themselves in their thoughts and thus also to the reader?
Obviously you can tell amazing stories without any of this, and some of your author's voice will likely cut through everything regardless. But considering these things and incorporating them is a lot of fun, and is something that I at least personally enjoy a lot as a reader too when I notice it.
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AwkwardlySet
On-Duty Critic
- Joined
- Jul 24, 2022
- Posts
- 4,584
Dear new writer, whatever you do, don't even think of listening the advice of these guys here. Hacks, the lot od them.
Statius
Dark swallows Light
- Joined
- May 23, 2023
- Posts
- 1,777
Oops. 'Miss Vickie' 9 Lit pages, 'The Evolution of Jennifer' is 11 Lit pages.
MelissaBaby
Wordy Bitch
- Joined
- Jun 8, 2017
- Posts
- 8,206
I started to write a post for this thread, then thought, "Wait a minute, I wrote all this about a year ago." So, with apologies to those who've read it before, I'll repost that here:
A few months ago, in another thread, someone said that they had run some of my stories through AI for analysis, because they wanted to figure out how to write like I do. (I told them I was uncomfortable with that and they were gracious and said they would not do it anymore.) AwkwardMD made the very astute observation that, rather than use AI they could just ask me. I responded and said that my one piece of advice to anyone who wanted to learn from my writing was that they cultivate empathy.
I’ve thought more about that and I realize that it is in fact the key to everything I do, not just as a writer, but as a wife and a friend, in my work and in how I try to live my daily life.
That wasn’t always the case. I started writing seriously at a time when I was trying to pull myself up from the lowest ebb of a troubled life. I had a Tumblr account and I wrote essays about substance abuse, about incarceration, about my relationship with my mother, and about the entanglement of my sexuality and my addiction.
That last point is why, when I got up the courage to turn my experiences into a somewhat fictionalized memoir and present it to a wider audience than the couple of hundred people who followed my Tumblr, I brought it to Literotica. I didn’t know anywhere else that might publish it.
I titled it My Fall and Rise. People often flip it to the more common expression, “rise and fall,” but the story is not about the fall. It’s about the rise. People who fall and don’t rise seldom get to tell their stories. I hoped that if I told mine, made this public allocution, my demons would have less power over me.
As I was writing, I assumed it was a one and done. But the process of writing, of expressing myself; finding the right word, conveying the right emotion, was affirming, empowering. And while the story didn’t reach a lot of readers, many of those it did reach were the right readers. I received comments and DM’s and emails from people telling me how much my story was like their own or how it helped them better understand someone close to them. And I found other writers here, who encouraged me to nurture my talents.
But of all the reactions I received, one comment stood out. It staggered me when I read it and it stays with me now, almost eight years later. The commenter said that My Fall and Rise was “the story of a young woman who feels empathy for everyone else, but has to learn to have it for herself.”
I recognized that truth. Empathy without self regard can be dangerous. It can become, “It’s my fault he hits me.” It can become, “I’m not worthy of their love.”
I read that comment and I realized that by writing my story, I had found it within myself to let go of guilt and regret.
I continued to write and it became one of the most important things in my life. Yes, I’m aware that some might say, “Well, you just found another addiction,” and there may be a kernel of truth to that, but I also found a man who loved me unconditionally. I found that I was capable of going to college and succeeding. Eventually, to find a career that fulfills me.
I described my second project, Mary and Alvin, as “the biography of a relationship,” but more than anything, it was an exploration of empathy. I spent the next three years with those characters, and I put them through many of the situations we encounter in our lives, from falling in love to losing those close to us. There were births and deaths and family fights and nights singing together around the campfire. And every word of it came from a place of empathy for each character, whether it was the leads or someone they met in an incidental encounter. That’s the heart of my philosophy of writing, a standard of “character care” I have tried to maintain ever since.
Cultivate empathy by actively observing and listening to those around you, whether they are your significant other, your rival at work, or the worker at the drive through window. Try to imagine how they see themselves. Remind yourself that they have hopes and concerns and dreams like you do, that they are the center of their own universe. Try to understand them, and if you can’t, try to understand why not.
Will doing that make you a better person? Yeah, probably, but that ain’t my concern. I’m here to tell you that it will make you a better writer. When you apply the fruits of all that observation to your characters, they will come alive in your heart, then in your words, and then in the minds of your readers. AwkwardMD has said that my characters “shine” and I don’t know just what she means by that, but I think she senses the empathy that went into their creation.
Cultivate empathy for your readers. They are not just customers or consumers. Think of your interaction with them as a shared experience. Somewhere, right now, a young couple are sharing the hot parts of one of our stories to turn each other on. Someone is reading a tender romance to their lover of many decades. Someone is reclined on their couch, shedding tears as she recognizes your character's sorrow, while another reader is sitting at the corner table in a coffeehouse, smiling gleefully at the clever turn of your plot.
You are there with them. Respect that. Honor that.
Cultivate empathy for yourself. This is often the hardest to do, as I well know. Write to express yourself, or write just for kicks. Whatever brings you satisfaction. It’s not a competition, there is no objective standard of success. As someone said earlier, if you write, you’re a writer. Take pride in that. Treat yourself to an ice cream or something.
A few months ago, in another thread, someone said that they had run some of my stories through AI for analysis, because they wanted to figure out how to write like I do. (I told them I was uncomfortable with that and they were gracious and said they would not do it anymore.) AwkwardMD made the very astute observation that, rather than use AI they could just ask me. I responded and said that my one piece of advice to anyone who wanted to learn from my writing was that they cultivate empathy.
I’ve thought more about that and I realize that it is in fact the key to everything I do, not just as a writer, but as a wife and a friend, in my work and in how I try to live my daily life.
That wasn’t always the case. I started writing seriously at a time when I was trying to pull myself up from the lowest ebb of a troubled life. I had a Tumblr account and I wrote essays about substance abuse, about incarceration, about my relationship with my mother, and about the entanglement of my sexuality and my addiction.
That last point is why, when I got up the courage to turn my experiences into a somewhat fictionalized memoir and present it to a wider audience than the couple of hundred people who followed my Tumblr, I brought it to Literotica. I didn’t know anywhere else that might publish it.
I titled it My Fall and Rise. People often flip it to the more common expression, “rise and fall,” but the story is not about the fall. It’s about the rise. People who fall and don’t rise seldom get to tell their stories. I hoped that if I told mine, made this public allocution, my demons would have less power over me.
As I was writing, I assumed it was a one and done. But the process of writing, of expressing myself; finding the right word, conveying the right emotion, was affirming, empowering. And while the story didn’t reach a lot of readers, many of those it did reach were the right readers. I received comments and DM’s and emails from people telling me how much my story was like their own or how it helped them better understand someone close to them. And I found other writers here, who encouraged me to nurture my talents.
But of all the reactions I received, one comment stood out. It staggered me when I read it and it stays with me now, almost eight years later. The commenter said that My Fall and Rise was “the story of a young woman who feels empathy for everyone else, but has to learn to have it for herself.”
I recognized that truth. Empathy without self regard can be dangerous. It can become, “It’s my fault he hits me.” It can become, “I’m not worthy of their love.”
I read that comment and I realized that by writing my story, I had found it within myself to let go of guilt and regret.
I continued to write and it became one of the most important things in my life. Yes, I’m aware that some might say, “Well, you just found another addiction,” and there may be a kernel of truth to that, but I also found a man who loved me unconditionally. I found that I was capable of going to college and succeeding. Eventually, to find a career that fulfills me.
I described my second project, Mary and Alvin, as “the biography of a relationship,” but more than anything, it was an exploration of empathy. I spent the next three years with those characters, and I put them through many of the situations we encounter in our lives, from falling in love to losing those close to us. There were births and deaths and family fights and nights singing together around the campfire. And every word of it came from a place of empathy for each character, whether it was the leads or someone they met in an incidental encounter. That’s the heart of my philosophy of writing, a standard of “character care” I have tried to maintain ever since.
Cultivate empathy by actively observing and listening to those around you, whether they are your significant other, your rival at work, or the worker at the drive through window. Try to imagine how they see themselves. Remind yourself that they have hopes and concerns and dreams like you do, that they are the center of their own universe. Try to understand them, and if you can’t, try to understand why not.
Will doing that make you a better person? Yeah, probably, but that ain’t my concern. I’m here to tell you that it will make you a better writer. When you apply the fruits of all that observation to your characters, they will come alive in your heart, then in your words, and then in the minds of your readers. AwkwardMD has said that my characters “shine” and I don’t know just what she means by that, but I think she senses the empathy that went into their creation.
Cultivate empathy for your readers. They are not just customers or consumers. Think of your interaction with them as a shared experience. Somewhere, right now, a young couple are sharing the hot parts of one of our stories to turn each other on. Someone is reading a tender romance to their lover of many decades. Someone is reclined on their couch, shedding tears as she recognizes your character's sorrow, while another reader is sitting at the corner table in a coffeehouse, smiling gleefully at the clever turn of your plot.
You are there with them. Respect that. Honor that.
Cultivate empathy for yourself. This is often the hardest to do, as I well know. Write to express yourself, or write just for kicks. Whatever brings you satisfaction. It’s not a competition, there is no objective standard of success. As someone said earlier, if you write, you’re a writer. Take pride in that. Treat yourself to an ice cream or something.
Z_TheWriter
Impertinent Romantic
- Joined
- Nov 8, 2025
- Posts
- 284
Fucking shit, I was not ready for that while casually browsing on a lazy Saturday.
This thread isn't about that, so I won't elaborate, but know you have touched a kindred spirit.
I will definitely find some time to read your story.
iwatchus
Older than that
- Joined
- Sep 12, 2015
- Posts
- 2,665
You will not regret reading her Fall and Rise story. Or anything else of hers.
alohadave
Doing better
- Joined
- Dec 6, 2019
- Posts
- 3,672
With any genre story, hit the tropes, and hit them hard. Fans of the genre will eat them up and ask for more.
sailbad
Sailbad the Sinner
- Joined
- Dec 11, 2004
- Posts
- 4
Do us all a favor:
- “Hot” is not the only adjective in the world.
- Women do not ejaculate.
- Young boys do not have 10-inch penises.
- Semen is not molten hot.
- "Fuck me! Fuck me! Fuck me!" does not add anything to a story.
MillieDynamite
Millie'sVastExpanse
- Joined
- Jun 5, 2021
- Posts
- 11,058
But it does add a little bit to the fun when Jo says it to me as soon as we hit the bedroom!
lovecraft68
Bad Doggie
- Joined
- Jul 13, 2009
- Posts
- 46,533
1-Write, write and write some more.
2-Always write the idea you want.
3-Do not worry about length, category-other than putting it the right place-don't worry about how big the audience is.
4-Ignore the ones telling you that you and your story sucks, that's not useful by the same token "Best ever!" is flattering but its just as useless.
5-Don't ignore comments that say they did or did not like it and give actual reasons, these are things you can learn from
6-If you're struggling with a topic check the Lit How To category, there's a lot of great essays written by experienced authors.
7-Do not obsess over your score or other stories scores in the same category. Don't worry about H's top lists or any stat, worry about getting those stories out there, the other stuff comes along eventually.
8-Use your time here to goof off, procrastinate and make some friends. Do not consider this place as somewhere you can learn how to write. You can only learn that on your own and everyone here thinks their way is the best, and it is for them, but not to push on others.
9-Write what you like and don't push yourself to go into topics that make you uncomfortable. Its negative energy and waste of time. Who do you have anything to prove to other than yourself?
10-When you find yourself worrying about something go back to step one and just let it fly. You can always edit later but you never want to waste the creative burst.
11-Take all advice here, including mine, with an open mind, some may work for you, some many not but make sure you go with things that have you nodding and don't force anything.
2-Always write the idea you want.
3-Do not worry about length, category-other than putting it the right place-don't worry about how big the audience is.
4-Ignore the ones telling you that you and your story sucks, that's not useful by the same token "Best ever!" is flattering but its just as useless.
5-Don't ignore comments that say they did or did not like it and give actual reasons, these are things you can learn from
6-If you're struggling with a topic check the Lit How To category, there's a lot of great essays written by experienced authors.
7-Do not obsess over your score or other stories scores in the same category. Don't worry about H's top lists or any stat, worry about getting those stories out there, the other stuff comes along eventually.
8-Use your time here to goof off, procrastinate and make some friends. Do not consider this place as somewhere you can learn how to write. You can only learn that on your own and everyone here thinks their way is the best, and it is for them, but not to push on others.
9-Write what you like and don't push yourself to go into topics that make you uncomfortable. Its negative energy and waste of time. Who do you have anything to prove to other than yourself?
10-When you find yourself worrying about something go back to step one and just let it fly. You can always edit later but you never want to waste the creative burst.
11-Take all advice here, including mine, with an open mind, some may work for you, some many not but make sure you go with things that have you nodding and don't force anything.
Husky_Embrace
Author mint
- Joined
- Dec 11, 2024
- Posts
- 410
Two things. Slow down, and let the characters do the talking.
Slow down
My biggest trap was that I have these wonderful stories in nu mind. It has these perfect story beats to get from start to middle to finish. So I sit down to write it and... It's absolute garbage. Not because the story is garbage, but because the steps between each story beat was so short it might not be there at all. I kept writing to get to a story beat, instead of getting there more naturally. It is like having LotR, but the parts where they walk and talk are cut to next to nothing. That is the majority of the book. This leads to my second point.
Let the characters do the talking
I made characters, I should use them. They have their own personalities. Each time you should reflect on the question "what would this character do in this scenario." You build upon this as you make them interact with each other during scenes. In general you should be able to keep them on the path of your story along each story beat, though they might take unexpected turns as they go. Rarely they might go on a party that can't return to the story, and you just hope you can adapt the story to something that fits.
I started to write on my phone. This forced me to type slowly, and thus I stayed much longer on their experience. It got me thinking about them instead of the overarching story, and it makes more sense now.
As an example, in the latest story I'm writing a spy meets a lady of power in a criminal organisation, though she knows about it. During foreplay and sex they are in both a mental power struggle and trying to get valuable information from each other. I like the story beats, but only through writing I started to fill in what the information actually was that they want. In part I rewrite their backstory, then I let their backstories do the lifting as they vie for control. I have a good idea who will be on top in the end, but their backstories might change it. The overarching story won't change. Just their personalities.
Slow down
My biggest trap was that I have these wonderful stories in nu mind. It has these perfect story beats to get from start to middle to finish. So I sit down to write it and... It's absolute garbage. Not because the story is garbage, but because the steps between each story beat was so short it might not be there at all. I kept writing to get to a story beat, instead of getting there more naturally. It is like having LotR, but the parts where they walk and talk are cut to next to nothing. That is the majority of the book. This leads to my second point.
Let the characters do the talking
I made characters, I should use them. They have their own personalities. Each time you should reflect on the question "what would this character do in this scenario." You build upon this as you make them interact with each other during scenes. In general you should be able to keep them on the path of your story along each story beat, though they might take unexpected turns as they go. Rarely they might go on a party that can't return to the story, and you just hope you can adapt the story to something that fits.
I started to write on my phone. This forced me to type slowly, and thus I stayed much longer on their experience. It got me thinking about them instead of the overarching story, and it makes more sense now.
As an example, in the latest story I'm writing a spy meets a lady of power in a criminal organisation, though she knows about it. During foreplay and sex they are in both a mental power struggle and trying to get valuable information from each other. I like the story beats, but only through writing I started to fill in what the information actually was that they want. In part I rewrite their backstory, then I let their backstories do the lifting as they vie for control. I have a good idea who will be on top in the end, but their backstories might change it. The overarching story won't change. Just their personalities.
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MillieDynamite
Millie'sVastExpanse
- Joined
- Jun 5, 2021
- Posts
- 11,058
In one of the writing classes I took, it was suggested that one should reveal the Main Characters' traits by what others say about them. But you reveal some of their faults through their thoughts. Of course, this works best in 3rd person. You can also show peti jealousy by what others say about them.
lovecraft68
Bad Doggie
- Joined
- Jul 13, 2009
- Posts
- 46,533
If something seriously squicks you, why give it a go? Is it cool to disgust yourself or make yourself angry? Or is this just another cold male insecurity comment or "no one here knows writing' comment from you to bait people.
#12 Never feel as if you have to flash your resume at hecklers. Some talk it, some walk it. Always be the one that does the latter.
SamanthaBehgs
Submissive Scribe
- Joined
- Jun 18, 2025
- Posts
- 572
What if I *want* to be the soft and half baked? What if my fantasy world is a place to escape from the darkness of my daily world? Do we all have to read and love dystopias to avoid being children, or can grown adults still enjoy pure wish fulfillment?
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