This is just a short list of tips I wrote last year. These, by the way, are lists I originally made on my Tumblr. I figure they may do some good on here.
Let's just get right into it. Your characters need to be dynamic. They need to seem like they could be real people and not robots. Make them cruel. Make them compassionate. Make them individuals. Make them real and remember events they go through will effect them. Character development sheets can help out a lot with this. Just look up “Character development sheet” on google and go. After that, you can write out their characteristics and make it come to life and apply it to your writing.
If you aren’t going to make an outline, at least go into it with at least a basic understanding of what the piece will be about. I made the mistake of just going at it and I paid for it. I had to do so much editing to make something of my first book because I had no idea what I was going to write about. So, please, at least think your story through. Once you have the major details worked out, you can deal with minor details later.
I’m not sure of the amount of people that pay attention to small details, but personally, I think you should make sure there are no holes in the story. When I read books, a lot of the time I’ll notice holes in a story and they’re usually small details but it bothers me that people are that careless. Fill in holes. Make sense of what you’re writing.
That's it for now. I'll post more another time. Have a nice day. :)
Friday, January 9, 2015
Thursday, January 8, 2015
Sexual harassment in writing
Alright, I've seen a decent amount of YA authors get slammed with this subject in the past years. It's a touchy subject, definitely. So touchy, in fact, I'm a bit uneasy about even covering the topic right now. But reviewers seem to be a bit out of touch with the reality of it and I was actually questioned about it in my own writing.
Readers and reviewers seem to think sexual harassment and molestation (God forbid I say the R word) are extremely traumatic events that leave the victim restless, rocking back and forth in a corner, drenched in their own tears and self-loathing. This just isn't the truth. The events can definitely be traumatic, but not so much that the victim can't function properly, can't go a moment without thinking about the events they went through.
As I said, this is a touchy subject, for many sensible reasons. Touchy for myself, a victim of the crime. Touchy to readers and the public in general, seen to be bad juju or something. I think it needs to be discussed though. There is a major misconception in writing about what it does to a person's mind. So many YA authors have been given bad reviews because they didn't write their MCs to be royally screwed up after being molested once, twice, however many times.
Here's the truth though. I know people that were molested every day of their life for years. I know people who trusted someone who wound up taking innocence from them against their will. They didn't break. They didn't sit awake at night trying to figure out what they did to deserve what happened to them. They went about their life silently, only remembering when they saw the face of their molester or, maybe in a worse case, when another person laid a hand on them. It doesn't leave the victims broken. It leaves them weary, yes. It may cause anxiety, depression, haphephobia (fear of being touched by others, usually of the opposite gender depending on what caused the phobia). We don't lose ourselves to despair though. We don't fall apart, unable to go about our days like a normal human being.
I know, it's all meant to be constructive, but as a victim of these things, It becomes a bit exasperating being told I need to reevaluate my characters mental state because their behavior isn't realistic enough for a victim. These are the truths of it as I see it. Maybe you don't agree and that's fine. This is just how I see it in myself and how I see it in others I know.
Honestly, all I hope for is that reviewers and editors will let it go when someone's MC isn't torn to pieces in these events.
I apologize for the topic. Like I said, I'm well aware of how touchy it is. I just needed this to be said.
Readers and reviewers seem to think sexual harassment and molestation (God forbid I say the R word) are extremely traumatic events that leave the victim restless, rocking back and forth in a corner, drenched in their own tears and self-loathing. This just isn't the truth. The events can definitely be traumatic, but not so much that the victim can't function properly, can't go a moment without thinking about the events they went through.
As I said, this is a touchy subject, for many sensible reasons. Touchy for myself, a victim of the crime. Touchy to readers and the public in general, seen to be bad juju or something. I think it needs to be discussed though. There is a major misconception in writing about what it does to a person's mind. So many YA authors have been given bad reviews because they didn't write their MCs to be royally screwed up after being molested once, twice, however many times.
Here's the truth though. I know people that were molested every day of their life for years. I know people who trusted someone who wound up taking innocence from them against their will. They didn't break. They didn't sit awake at night trying to figure out what they did to deserve what happened to them. They went about their life silently, only remembering when they saw the face of their molester or, maybe in a worse case, when another person laid a hand on them. It doesn't leave the victims broken. It leaves them weary, yes. It may cause anxiety, depression, haphephobia (fear of being touched by others, usually of the opposite gender depending on what caused the phobia). We don't lose ourselves to despair though. We don't fall apart, unable to go about our days like a normal human being.
I know, it's all meant to be constructive, but as a victim of these things, It becomes a bit exasperating being told I need to reevaluate my characters mental state because their behavior isn't realistic enough for a victim. These are the truths of it as I see it. Maybe you don't agree and that's fine. This is just how I see it in myself and how I see it in others I know.
Honestly, all I hope for is that reviewers and editors will let it go when someone's MC isn't torn to pieces in these events.
I apologize for the topic. Like I said, I'm well aware of how touchy it is. I just needed this to be said.
Wednesday, January 7, 2015
Tips from an amateur
Howdy howdy.
As my first post, I figure it should have something to do with what I'm dealing in-- writing. So I've come to give some maybe/maybe not helpful tips for people writing fiction. I know, I know, "You're so young. What information could you possibly have that's helpful at all?" The thing is, as a reader, I've read enough books and spoke to enough other readers to be able to pinpoint the issues people have in writing their stories. It's not rocket science. Enough people have found my tips helpful that I feel like it won't hurt to try, so here they are.
Firstly,you can’t be a successful writer without being able to take criticism. People all the time ask for feedback, but once they receive real feedback, they get defensive. Everyone is going to criticize your writing. Publishing companies, readers, reviewers, agents-- they’ll all criticize your writing. Learn to deal with it and be humbled. Don't get me wrong, there is a difference between someone telling you to change something and someone suggesting you change something to better the story. Learn to tell the difference. In the end, it's your story. You decide what stays and what goes.
The voice in your story is extremely important. If your writing doesn’t have the proper tone or no tone at all, it’s going to seem like the story is just droning on and on. Readers won’t want to read it if you don’t have a good voice.
Diction. Diction is a pretty big deal in writing. If you keep using the same words over and over again, it’ll be a workout for the reader to even get through a small portion of the writing. For example, using the word cold and not using a substitute for it. If nothing else, just get a thesaurus out and do it that way. It’s important enough to waste the time on looking words up.
People seem to have forgotten how paragraphs work or that they exist at all. Paragraphs exist for a reason. They keep the thoughts organized and keep it looking clean.
As my first post, I figure it should have something to do with what I'm dealing in-- writing. So I've come to give some maybe/maybe not helpful tips for people writing fiction. I know, I know, "You're so young. What information could you possibly have that's helpful at all?" The thing is, as a reader, I've read enough books and spoke to enough other readers to be able to pinpoint the issues people have in writing their stories. It's not rocket science. Enough people have found my tips helpful that I feel like it won't hurt to try, so here they are.
Firstly,you can’t be a successful writer without being able to take criticism. People all the time ask for feedback, but once they receive real feedback, they get defensive. Everyone is going to criticize your writing. Publishing companies, readers, reviewers, agents-- they’ll all criticize your writing. Learn to deal with it and be humbled. Don't get me wrong, there is a difference between someone telling you to change something and someone suggesting you change something to better the story. Learn to tell the difference. In the end, it's your story. You decide what stays and what goes.
The voice in your story is extremely important. If your writing doesn’t have the proper tone or no tone at all, it’s going to seem like the story is just droning on and on. Readers won’t want to read it if you don’t have a good voice.
Diction. Diction is a pretty big deal in writing. If you keep using the same words over and over again, it’ll be a workout for the reader to even get through a small portion of the writing. For example, using the word cold and not using a substitute for it. If nothing else, just get a thesaurus out and do it that way. It’s important enough to waste the time on looking words up.
People seem to have forgotten how paragraphs work or that they exist at all. Paragraphs exist for a reason. They keep the thoughts organized and keep it looking clean.
This is more of a suggestion more than anything. Make your story different from the rest. Books these days seem to be the same thing over and over again, especially in YA books. More often than not, the stories unfold like so: Girl meets strange boy. Girl falls in love with strange boy in the time span of a week or so. Things happen. They break up for some miserable reason. More things happen. They wind up getting back together. End of story. Make your story interesting. Change it up. There’s a reason the books that are popular are where they’re at. They changed it up.
This is a big problem with aspiring teenage (girl) writers from what I’ve noticed. They will write a story that is pretty much the same as another popular YA book, only changing the characters and setting. It’s unoriginal. Too many times I’ve seen young (I mean young) girls post a chapter or so of their writing, saying it’s their “original” story. Then, I read it and it’s exactly like The Hunger Games or Divergent. This is not very imaginative. Don’t do it.
Also, don’t do spinoff stories of a book that isn’t your own. Only the author of the original books should do that. Also not sure if that’s even legal but I’ve seen people do it often enough.
This is it for now. I'll almost definitely be posting more tips like these in the future. If it was helpful, great. If it wasn't, then that's fine too. Ya win some, ya lose some.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)