Formating: Paragraph and Indentation

[deepedia]

I just found out that after I try to wrote my stories with indentation at the start of paragraph, literotica was messing it up, and didn't recognize the indentation, so any way to give indentation at the start of paragraph or just forgot about it and use the alternative (line spacing) to make the stories passage look nicer?

 

[Bramblethorn]

I just found out that after I try to wrote my stories with indentation at the start of paragraph, literotica was messing it up, and didn't recognize the indentation, so any way to give indentation at the start of paragraph or just forgot about it and use the alternative (line spacing) to make the stories passage look nicer?

Yeah, Literotica uses the line-spaced formatting, no indent. Don't worry, readers here are used to it.

 

[BelleCanzuto]

I just found out that after I try to wrote my stories with indentation at the start of paragraph, literotica was messing it up, and didn't recognize the indentation, so any way to give indentation at the start of paragraph or just forgot about it and use the alternative (line spacing) to make the stories passage look nicer?

From what I know, Lit's formatting doesn't recognize indentations.

So, yes, use line spacing to break up paragraphs. Stories will be rejected if there are no apparent paragraphs. And it pays to make the paragraphs shorter than you'd typically find in a book, due to the experience of reading on a screen.

Also, a friendly word of advice to run your story through a grammar checker, and look out for typos before submitting.

 

[KeithD]

I just found out that after I try to wrote my stories with indentation at the start of paragraph, literotica was messing it up, and didn't recognize the indentation, so any way to give indentation at the start of paragraph or just forgot about it and use the alternative (line spacing) to make the stories passage look nicer?

Literotica didn't mess it up. Just like all publishers, it has a format style. This style flushes all content lines left and puts an extra line feed between paragraphs. That's the style here. It's for the authors to follow the style.

 

[Emirus]

I just found out that after I try to wrote my stories with indentation at the start of paragraph, literotica was messing it up, and didn't recognize the indentation, so any way to give indentation at the start of paragraph or just forgot about it and use the alternative (line spacing) to make the stories passage look nicer?

Far more important than paragraph indentation is to avoid 500 word paragraphs. Glancing at just one of your stories it doesn’t seem you have that problem. A reader will skip over them, lose interest in the story, and never come back. You may come across someone who gets so annoyed they bomb an otherwise good story.

Also what looks like a short paragraph when reading on a pc can be a long paragraph on a smartphone.

 

[Zeb_Carter]

The only thing worse than a wall of text on the screen is describing in detail using measurements either a man's dick or a woman's tits. Just my opinion though and it's worth what you pay to read my stuff here.

 

[mynameisben]

I never liked the look of indented paragraphs. It bunches up the text of consecutive paragraphs too much. I would be happy to see the convention dropped universally. A single line space gives the breathing room a paragraph deserves.


Ben

 

[JanusGoneAwry]

To echo what others have said here, short paragraphs are better in the format that Lit publishes for consumption. My advice is to scan your story in the review stage of publishing it to look for visually long paragraphs then go back and break any long ones up before finally submitting your story for publication.

I don't get enough readership to worry about cell phone readers but I realize that is a whole other consideration to take into account.

My 2 cents

 

[SamScribble]

I never liked the look of indented paragraphs. It bunches up the text of consecutive paragraphs too much. I would be happy to see the convention dropped universally. A single line space gives the breathing room a paragraph deserves.

Ben

Hear, hear

 

[Zeb_Carter]

I never liked the look of indented paragraphs. It bunches up the text of consecutive paragraphs too much. I would be happy to see the convention dropped universally. A single line space gives the breathing room a paragraph deserves.


Ben

Yes. I have a reader that takes my Word docs and deletes the extra line and indents. Sometime it even loses it's mind and just makes it a wall of text.

When I submit items to Smashwords or Kindle I always use the same format as here as I usually use the same word doc for both. Only on Lit, I copy and paste into the submission text box where on SW and K I submit the word doc.

 

[SimonDoom]

I think the eye gets accustomed to whatever convention is used, when it comes to indented or non-indented paragraphs. I've never had any difficulty with the way Literotica does it.

I agree with what others have said -- that it's a good idea to avoid long paragraphs with online stories. They're definitely harder to read. Break them up. The eye craves variety -- white space, dialogue, paragraphs of different lengths. Mixing it up makes the story much more readable.

 

[8letters]

I just found out that after I try to wrote my stories with indentation at the start of paragraph, literotica was messing it up, and didn't recognize the indentation, so any way to give indentation at the start of paragraph or just forgot about it and use the alternative (line spacing) to make the stories passage look nicer?

You can achieve the effect you want through HTML. For example:

    Indented paragraph number one, which needs to be much longer for the indentation to look nice<br>    Indented paragraph number two, which should not have a line between it and the above paragraph

That would come out looking like:

    Indented paragraph number one, which needs to be much longer for the
indentation to look nice
    Indented paragraph number two, which should not have a line between it
and the above paragraph

It'd be really difficult to edit such a document. But what you could do is write a macro in Word or something to take the story you want to publish and add the HTML code to it as a step before publishing it.

That being said, the idea of indenting paragraphs to me doesn't work with fiction because of dialog. But I can see doing something like that if you're wanting to create the effect of reading a document within a story, particularly if you italicized the paragraphs.

 

[XerXesXu]

Death of the Paragraph.

I agree with what others have said -- that it's a good idea to avoid long paragraphs with online stories. They're definitely harder to read. Break them up. The eye craves variety -- white space, dialogue, paragraphs of different lengths. Mixing it up makes the story much more readable.

I notice that many Lit authors have abandoned paragraphs altogether. Now a sentence is a paragraph. This is also common elsewhere on the internet.

Can anyone remember what the purpose of paragraphing was?

 

[mynameisben]

I notice that many Lit authors have abandoned paragraphs altogether. Now a sentence is a paragraph. This is also common elsewhere on the internet.

Can anyone remember what the purpose of paragraphing was?

Paragraphing is for grouping sentences together which work as a team to express (usually one) coordinated, extended thought or description.

A single sentence acting as it's own paragraph is a powerful way to make a lone statement stand out in dramatic fashion...IF the technique is used extremely sparingly.


Ben

 

[SimonDoom]

I notice that many Lit authors have abandoned paragraphs altogether. Now a sentence is a paragraph. This is also common elsewhere on the internet.

Can anyone remember what the purpose of paragraphing was?

The purpose of a paragraph is to group sentences into units that express a coherent idea, or an action sequence or incident, or a bit of dialogue.

I haven't noticed many authors being quite so extreme as to abolish multi-sentence paragraphs altogether, but in general I think shorter paragraphs work well for online erotica. I mix up the length, but I also often use one-sentence paragraphs. I think they can serve a nice dramatic purpose, and they're easy to read. I throw in longer paragraphs, such as where some description is needed, or where an action sequence is taking place.

I am fairly strict about making a habit of starting a new paragraph every single time a dialogue speaker switches. It's much easier to follow this way. I don't like reading long paragraphs with multiple speakers.

 

[KeithD]

You can achieve the effect you want through HTML. For example:

That would come out looking like:

    Indented paragraph number one, which needs to be much longer for the
indentation to look nice
    Indented paragraph number two, which should not have a line between it
and the above paragraph

It'd be really difficult to edit such a document. But what you could do is write a macro in Word or something to take the story you want to publish and add the HTML code to it as a step before publishing it.

That being said, the idea of indenting paragraphs to me doesn't work with fiction because of dialog. But I can see doing something like that if you're wanting to create the effect of reading a document within a story, particularly if you italicized the paragraphs.

Can you point to stories in the Literotica file that have such indenting? Not saying there aren't, but I've been saying Lit. doesn't accept that. Would be good to know if it does so I can stop saying it does adheres to a uniform style on paragraphing.

 

[KeithD]

I notice that many Lit authors have abandoned paragraphs altogether. Now a sentence is a paragraph. This is also common elsewhere on the internet.

Can anyone remember what the purpose of paragraphing was?

paragraphing in nonfiction (following an arc of "giving premise/supporting premise/restating premise") is quite different from paragraphing in fiction, which serves all sorts of purposes, like setting off separate speakers of dialogue, providing emphasis, or just relieving the reader of a word overload. And paragraphs on a computer screen lean heavily toward relieving the reader of a word overload.

 

[TadOverdon]

Paragraph indentation seems to be going the way of the double space after a period.

 

[8letters]

Can you point to stories in the Literotica file that have such indenting? Not saying there aren't, but I've been saying Lit. doesn't accept that. Would be good to know if it does so I can stop saying it does adheres to a uniform style on paragraphing.

Attached is how it looks in the Story Preview. I've not seen it in any story, but it should work.

 

[KeithD]

Paragraph indentation seems to be going the way of the double space after a period.

Not really. Print media continues to use the indentation for humanities publishing (fiction and most nonfiction).

Computerized copy started off with what you see now--flush left paragraphing and skipped lines between paragraphs.

Nothing has changed other than the how the readers are choosing to read or their awareness of the differences in presentation.

 

[KeithD]

Attached is how it looks in the Story Preview. I've not seen it in any story, but it should work.

Not if Literotica doesn't accept it in final presentation. Anyone able to index stories in the finished Literotica file that don't flush left the first line in paragraphs?

 

[8letters]

Not if Literotica doesn't accept it in final presentation. Anyone able to index stories in the finished Literotica file that don't flush left the first line in paragraphs?

There's the attached from the first page of my story "My European Summer Vacation" (link in sig).

 

[KeithD]

There's the attached from the first page of my story "My European Summer Vacation" (link in sig).

That isn't a case of the paragraphs being indented. That's inset poetry. All of the paragraphs of your story are flush left and and there's an extra line feed between the paragraphs.

The OP topic is indenting the first lines of paragraphs in the story. Does anyone have an example of Literotica allowing what the OP is talking about?

 

[SimonDoom]

That isn't a case of the paragraphs being indented. That's inset poetry. All of the paragraphs of your story are flush left and and there's an extra line feed between the paragraphs.

The OP topic is indenting the first lines of paragraphs in the story. Does anyone have an example of Literotica allowing what the OP is talking about?

I cannot recall ever seeing this. And from the Site's standpoint, it wouldn't make sense to allow it, just to accommodate a writer's wish. From the Site's standpoint it makes sense to have a consistent format so readers always know what to expect.

 

[KeithD]

I cannot recall ever seeing this. And from the Site's standpoint, it wouldn't make sense to allow it, just to accommodate a writer's wish. From the Site's standpoint it makes sense to have a consistent format so readers always know what to expect.

That's what I think too, and what I post when it comes up. If that's not true, though, I'd like to know that. Haven't seen evidence yet that it's not true. And it's the response to the OP. What the OP wanted to do isn't, I believe, accepted at Literotica.