Writer's Advice

[Lisa Denton]

I sit around the house in dirty jeans and a tee shirt, but when I go out I dress. I think publishing sloppy stuff is embarrassing and insulting.

Stroke factor isn't the driving force for me. I want to write stuff that'll pick people up and shake them till their molars rattle. I put the sex in so they have something to do while I close my hands on their throats.

I get wet when my molars rattle but I don't like that really rough stuff.

I like your thread dr.M cause I am learning, I like to post jokes and keep things light also. how come your jeans are dirty when your sittin around the house? Nevermind, I prolly don't want to go there and keep your hands away from my throat.

If, with everyone else's help here, you could write up some little editing lists for wannabe good writers like me I would appreciate it. So when I have my ideas down in words and first start editing. You can make little lists with less for the more advanced writers, and longer ones for people like me. I think it would be great to have something printed up to look at when I start doing the serious editing. When I click on Word's Grammar Check I get lots of helpful stuff and also lots of bizarre crap.

Maybe you can make lists and ask posters to quote and add to it, like:



Editng list for serious but beginner writers like Lisa:
1- Take some writing course cause its hopeless. (huh)
2- Spellcheck, yes even I know that before editing but remind me.
3- What should I wear? What color shoes go good with editing?
4- ADD IN MORE HERE


Then you could have the same for other advanced writers.

Editing list for advanced writers:
1-You don't need to be reminded to spellcheck, but did you?
2- When editing a flashback within a flashback (I love that Karen) never write it from the POV of a newsman flyin over the scene in a helicopter.
3-Add IN MORE HERE


Dr.M you could make things like these and ask people to quote and add in.

 

[TheEarl]

And if you read all of this, you wasted 5 minutes since I could only tell you about MY problems, not YOURS.

Sincerely,
ElSol

I thought all of that was bloody good advice actually.

The Earl

 

[silverwhisper]

there's tons of really great stuff here!

i'm a chronic self-editor: if left to my own devices, i'll edit forever. i find that i need someone else to tell me when to stop. i've literally changed 1 word in 1 passage twice/day for 3 days, vacillating as to which usage felt better.

the only advice i have for writers:

1. write.
2. edit.
3. get someone else to edit as well
4. for god's sake, please don't use the word "rosebud" as a euphemism for anus. i've seen it a lot and frankly, is starting to make me look at flowers kinda weird. :>
5. all of this is advice, not holy writ. sometimes, you gotta deviate from the conventional wisdom. for example: sometimes, the passive voice can actually serve a story purpose, if you have an observer protagonist who isn't interacting w/ what's going on.

ed

 

[cantdog]

Start.

Quite so.

 

[elsol]

Isn't Watson first person?

#L

Technically, yes.

But the narrator might not be a presence in the story, like Lemony Spicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events. The narrator is telling the story of someone else. That's why I consider it more of a third-person narration where the narrator is the Impact Character.

It's a strange narration style that I consider THE best for erotica; because it allows a panoramic view while keeping things intimate.

In a erotica; a lot of males focus on the female, they want to know what she feels, etc. The story has to be about HER. But you can satisfy the other side of the coin, the readers, like myself, who are not comfortable in HER mind by using a male (the actor upon her) to tell HER story.

It's writing a BDSM story from the perspective of the Dominant where the entire story is about the Submissive.

The Dominant is telling the story about she was tempted, danced around the issue, and finally capitulated.

so why not use the third person then?

Because you also catch the readers that want to step into the main character's shoes and hold the whip.

The downside is some people are prejudiced against first person.

The upside is at the beginning a first person story is a lot easier to write... at least it has been for me. There are less factors to deal with in a first person narration than in a third person narration.

Sincerely,
ElSol

 

[BlackShanglan]

Excellent advice, El Sol - but I do query this:

a) Third person narrators, outside the Watson POV's, do not have opinions.

If they do, it is the writer's opinion... and the writer has TOLD rather than SHOWN.

I can only respond,

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.

However little known the feelings or views of such a man may be on his first entering a neighbourhood, this truth is so well fixed in the minds of the surrounding families, that he is considered as the rightful property of some one or other of their daughters.

Whose opinion, precisely, is that?

Ms. Austen is a master of the voiced third person narrative, and a master to learn from.

Shanglan

 

[cantdog]

I detest second person stories, "you" stories. "You ate a plate of shit, then I fucked your ass with a sharpened trowel." Nnnh. They only even make any sense if they're a letter.

I backclick every one. I wouldn't read one if my closest female friend had written it.

But clearly first person can be handled well. Yui does it in the Anthology book, for instance. Hot goddam writing, and extremely involving.

But this isn't about first-vs.-third, it's about something much more important. Making the reader read your stuff, once they've decided to read the first few paras. If you can't grab their asses and haul them along, they will bail.

 

[silverwhisper]

cantdog: i agree second person can be done badly and often is, if only b/c the author has to be exceedingly judicious re: use of pronouns. indeed, it was for these reasons that i've been working on a second person BDSM series revolving around a female protagonist. those who've seen it have felt that the perspective wasn't handled badly. :>

ed

 

[Alex De Kok]

I'm afraid that I'm with cantdog here. Second person is an immediate 'No'. The only time it works - for me - is when it's written for an audience of one. One of my stories on Lit was originally written for that single person, but was rewritten for posting here. It's my most-voted-on story . . .

Alex

 

[Lauren Hynde]

I can't agree. Just because something is done badly 999 times out of 1000, it doesn't meant it can't be done well. What you need is purpose. The narrative POV of a story must have a justification, and that justification must be at the very core of the story. It has to be the only way in which that story can be told.

 

[Black Tulip]

I detest second person stories, "you" stories. "You ate a plate of shit, then I fucked your ass with a sharpened trowel." Nnnh. They only even make any sense if they're a letter.

I backclick every one. I wouldn't read one if my closest female friend had written it.

But clearly first person can be handled well. Yui does it in the Anthology book, for instance. Hot goddam writing, and extremely involving.

I found myself agreeing with you on second person when I realized I have written one myself. LOL

To be honest, it's the only one and I think it works well, given the specific circumstances.

But this isn't about first-vs.-third, it's about something much more important. Making the reader read your stuff, once they've decided to read the first few paras. If you can't grab their asses and haul them along, they will bail.

Exactly. Which means you try the best you can, no matter the subject. There's nothing wrong in writing a well crafted story. And it smacks of arrogance to think "the masses" do not appreciate the effort.

Well written smut is more exciting than smut with myriads of errors and misspellings.

 

[impressive]

I found myself agreeing with you on second person when I realized I have written one myself. LOL

I've written several ... but they all fall into the Letters realm, which practically BEGS for 2nd person. Only two are still posted, and both are very well rated.

The other was a 2nd person snippet I wrote for one of the voice challenges. If I ever finish it, I will be submitting it (whether cantdog reads it or not ). I did it on a lark, but it was kinda fun.

 

[sweetnpetite]

Oh, but first, the very best advice:


Write it!


(then do the above )

I agree.

And it's usually best not to worry too much about all those (other) rules during the first draft either, it's inhibiting. Better to write crap and fix it than to write nothing perfectly.

 

[cantdog]

I've written several ... but they all fall into the Letters realm, which practically BEGS for 2nd person. Only two are still posted, and both are very well rated.

The other was a 2nd person snippet I wrote for one of the voice challenges. If I ever finish it, I will be submitting it (whether cantdog reads it or not ). I did it on a lark, but it was kinda fun.

Letters, epistolary things, are different. I can read the POV in a letter, so long as its "you" is some other character, not me, not the reader.

 

[Lauren Hynde]

Letters, epistolary things, are different. I can read the POV in a letter, so long as its "you" is some other character, not me, not the reader.

That's exactly the point. 2nd person POV stories only work if the perspective is justifiable, and practically the only way it can be justifiable is if the "you" is a clearly identifiable character.

 

[Rumple Foreskin]

I agree.

And it's usually best not to worry too much about all those (other) rules during the first draft either, it's inhibiting. Better to write crap and fix it than to write nothing perfectly.

Correct as usual, S & P. To requote big Ernie Hemingway, "All first drafts are shit." Of course, some of us create much larger piles than the average writer. Use the first draft to get the story on paper (or its electronic equivalent. Worry about all the rest while working on later drafts.

Rumple Foreskin

 

[sweetnpetite]

Correct as usual, S & P. To requote big Ernie Hemingway, "All first drafts are shit." Of course, some of us create much larger piles than the average writer. Use the first draft to get the story on paper (or its electronic equivalent. Worry about all the rest while working on later drafts.

Rumple Foreskin

some of my first drafts are pretty good. (I won a school prize on a first draft) but many more are just crap. Trouble is, you rarely can tell which is which *while* you are writing it.

 

[Black Tulip]

I've written several ... but they all fall into the Letters realm, which practically BEGS for 2nd person. Only two are still posted, and both are very well rated.

The other was a 2nd person snippet I wrote for one of the voice challenges. If I ever finish it, I will be submitting it (whether cantdog reads it or not ). I did it on a lark, but it was kinda fun.

If I count letters as well, I have two. But letters are directed at somebody else, so the reader is kind of third person himself.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

When in Doubt, Start a New Paragraph

Nothing turns a reader off faster that big, monlithic blocks of text.

Nothing invites the eye like plenty of white space in which to gambol and play, rest and delight.

When in doubt, always start a new paragraph.

And by the way, when you post to the boards, always double space between paragraphs.

 

[elsol]

Excellent advice, El Sol - but I do query this:


Whose opinion, precisely, is that?

Ms. Austen is a master of the voiced third person narrative, and a master to learn from.

Shanglan

Good point.

The problem is the people that get stuck in the middle... this is Miss Austen's Voice. A very good voice... but when a new writer puts in.

Jason was an asshole.

Most of the time it's not a function of Voice, but of interjecting themselves in a story.

Decide at the beginning what the narrator will sound like, if the narrator is a 'camera' then the camera does not have an opinion. If there is a cameraman, then that needs to be obvious too.

That's why I advice someone start with the first person narrative; it does not require flattening, or paying attention that opinion is a matter of some character's perspective.

It's more freedom in a confined space.

Like I said though, the advice I give is only the things I have learned about my own writing.

It might be relevant, but most likely it is not.

Sincerely,
ElSol

 

[BlackShanglan]

Good point.

The problem is the people that get stuck in the middle... this is Miss Austen's Voice. A very good voice... but when a new writer puts in.

<snip>

Most of the time it's not a function of Voice, but of interjecting themselves in a story.

Decide at the beginning what the narrator will sound like, if the narrator is a 'camera' then the camera does not have an opinion. If there is a cameraman, then that needs to be obvious too.

I think I mostly agree with you here. That is, the narrator in Austen is in many ways a character, at least in the sense that there is a voice and a recognizable personality and perspective. However, there is no actual character in the sense of first-person narration - no Watson, Marlow, or Ishmael. It's not a "camera" per se, at least not if that implies an utter lack of personality or opinion, but it's not a traditional individual character either. I think my point with Austen is that she is actually infinitely preferable to the "camera" approach that provides no emotional or psychological insight into anyone, speaker or character. C. S. Lewis takes a similiar approach in "The Chronicles of Narnia," with similarly excellent results. His narrative voice is never tied to a character, but it has a distinct personality and makes comments and asides on the action and characters.

I think you are right that there has to be a coherent and consistent approach to point of view. I don't think that that means that we always have to hear from the same character; in third person you can switch perspectives if you're careful with how you do it and you are consistent enough that the reader has some idea what to expect, and I've also seen novels written with different chapters taking different first-person points of view. But as you observe, the value judgement "Jason was an asshole" doesn't make any sense unless there's someone making that value judgement. In first person, it would be the narrator. In a third person omniscient or limited omniscient, it would be a character; we see things from that character's point of view, from inside his or her head so to speak, and see the character's thoughts. Austen presents us with another choice: a voiced narrator whose opinion or statement this is. The narrator is not a character physically present in the story or taking part in the action, but there is a voice and personality providing the insight or observation.

I think this preferable to a "blank"/camera third person perspective, because the latter sacrifices enormously valuable benefits in terms of characterization and reader connection. First person narration shines when it allows the reader to know very intimately one character. Third person omniscient shines when it allows us to become emotionally connected to several interesting and moving characters. Third person voiced narrative shines when it allows the engaging voice of the narrator slide in lively, amusing, or enlightening comments on the action as it unfolds. The problem with third person "camera" is that it gives up all of those gains in characterization, humor, wordplay, and reader appeal and offers nothing in their place. It doesn't achieve anything that another POV can't do, and it sacrifices much that they can. A good work is so often the one in which every line does double or triple duty, expanding character, voice, and plot at the same time. It's very difficult to achieve that density of impact with a "camera" POV.

That's why I advice someone start with the first person narrative; it does not require flattening, or paying attention that opinion is a matter of some character's perspective.

It's more freedom in a confined space.

I agree. I think first person is a good place to start. It's structurally simpler as well. Handling the switching of perspectives in third-person narration can be a tricky thing, and it takes some practice and some thought. It's particularly vital to give voice attention as you move between perspectives; the reader should know which "third person" is observing the scene through the comments made and the voice in which they are spoken. Otherwise you end up either with "camera" or with "author talking to reader and ignoring character."

Shanglan

 

[shereads]

there's tons of really great stuff here!

4. for god's sake, please don't use the word "rosebud" as a euphemism for anus.

Because it was already done in Citizen Cane, right?

 

[cantdog]

Rosebuds do not particularly resemble assholes.

I think the masses would find "rosebuds" off-putting, too.

 

[elsol]

I think you are right that there has to be a coherent and consistent approach to point of view. I don't think that that means that we always have to hear from the same character; in third person you can switch perspectives if you're careful with how you do it and you are consistent enough that the reader has some idea what to expect, and I've also seen novels written with different chapters taking different first-person points of view. But as you observe, the value judgement "Jason was an asshole" doesn't make any sense unless there's someone making that value judgement. In first person, it would be the narrator. In a third person omniscient or limited omniscient, it would be a character; we see things from that character's point of view, from inside his or her head so to speak, and see the character's thoughts. Austen presents us with another choice: a voiced narrator whose opinion or statement this is. The narrator is not a character physically present in the story or taking part in the action, but there is a voice and personality providing the insight or observation.

Nod... by flattening I mean what you state.

The 'narrator' is a knowing camera; but opinion, emotion has to come FROM a character.

It has to be 'perspective' and not narration. Too often though there's just a statement that cannot be attritubed to anyone's perspective.

But now, we've probably drowned a few starting writers.

Uh... hell, I'm drowning

Sincerely,
ElSol

 

[Lauren Hynde]

Speaking of narrators, narrative voices and POVs, I once did something along the lines of what you are discussing that worked pretty well, I think. In my story "Plastic Love", I use a 3rd person sympathetic narrator, i.e., the narrator was only aware of what one character saw, did, or thought.

This, in itself, is not all that uncommon, and I believe it's usually the easiest way to approach a 3rd person narration.

The thing, though, was that I tried to impress something of a character into the narrator as well. Although he/she has no part in the story or a defined personality, he/she has a certain presence that is connected to the main character's. You can feel it in the language used, in the pace of some passages instead of others, in pauses made and even in value judgements - whatever feelings go through the main character's mind, the narrator would not only know, but would also be infected by them.

I was frankly pleased with the result of that experiment.