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It's okay to say "I can't write" for a day, or a month, or a year. Sometimes your brain is hosed up and won't do what it needs to do. That's different from 'eh I don't really feel like it', you definitely need to work at writing and build it up as a habit, but...you don't need to write every day or even every month to make it as a writer.HIJK posted:I have a question re: the writing badly is essential thing. What do you do when you write the bad stuff but you know it isn't working and no amount of plotting, outlining, drafting, and "focusing on other scenes first" is fixing it...and then, out of the blue you get that thunderbolt idea that is totally different from anything you considered before but it finally ties the story together? How do you work with that? I am on a deadline and I can't make it work (I've thrown out 700k on this book) and it really sucks  I don't have any good advice, just commiserating.
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Mar 21, 2016 18:19
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I write what I want when I want to because I have a desk job to take up the rest of my time, but I generally do find that good ideas, or at least the ones that give me a functional plot, give me a sort of "buzz" before I start working on anything. With longer-form works I need to repeat that process in pieces, but the principle's the same. I also never outline anything and just think about what I want to do and how to do it 'til it gives me a migraine but that is not advisable procedure for anyone. I like being a hobbyist. Prefer it to banging out millions of words of tepid porn with ever-shrinking profit margins, at least.
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Mar 21, 2016 18:23
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HIJK posted:I have a question re: the writing badly is essential thing. What do you do when you write the bad stuff but you know it isn't working and no amount of plotting, outlining, drafting, and "focusing on other scenes first" is fixing it...and then, out of the blue you get that thunderbolt idea that is totally different from anything you considered before but it finally ties the story together? How do you work with that? I... can't really answer that because I don't write novels so most of the time my stories are short enough that lightning bolt leads to a story pretty much. Most of the time, I don't really even get that lightning bolt until I start writing. It's only after a couple words or sentences in that I find that if a story starts to grab me, it will. That's hard, of course, because I have to start writing with nothing and it doesn't work out a lot of the time, but it's my process and it works sometimes and that's just how it goes for me. I have had in some of my stories where I've written scenes with the full knowledge that they are going to be deleted. They're there because they have to be there for me and I keep writing just to get that boring nonsense out of my brain and to clear it up. It's mostly that your brain latches onto something quick and easy (and usually bad) which distracts from the actual good stuff, so I find it's great to just write the most obvious thing possible just to clear your head of it. Then, with your brain warmed up with thinking and the obvious poo poo out of the way, you can think of the good stuff. Hopefully. Then, I go back and look at the scenes I had written early that were bad and see if there's an off chance that it's good (it's probably not) then I delete it. I think for a novel, a good outline with all the plot threads written out will help out a lot if you treat the outline as something malleable. So then when you get that brilliant idea you go look at your outline and see where it can fit, what it does in the overall narrative, and see if it changes anything after/before. Of course, I don't write novels so this could all be useless  . It sucks to throw poo poo out but I think it's a good thing, personally. Hell, I'd written about 15k words last month that are pretty much in the dumpster and that's ok. Also, if you do get that inspiration, then go right for it. Don't finish whatever scene you're working on if you have something better that you want to write. It's a rare moment when you get those bursts of inspirations so you need to take advantage of them whenever. Just write it first and edit it later (this might actually be terrible advice for a novel since it would seem like a bunch of scenes stitched together, but whatever). General Battuta posted:It's okay to say "I can't write" for a day, or a month, or a year. Sometimes your brain is hosed up and won't do what it needs to do. That's different from 'eh I don't really feel like it', you definitely need to work at writing and build it up as a habit, but...you don't need to write every day or even every month to make it as a writer. I agree, but I think waiting for inspiration is a bad way to go about it. I think of writing a lot like sports, where if you want to get better you have to go to practice even if you don't want to (and it's usually those days that you don't want to go and you go anyways that make you a much better athlete). If your goal is to become a good writer then you're gonna have to write, no way around it. If you're having like bad days with depression or other issues (you don't go to practice if you have a broken leg, to continue that metaphor), that's understandable but just saying "well, I'm just not in the mood for writing" is an excuse and you should try to write anyways.
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Mar 21, 2016 18:50
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flerp posted:I... can't really answer that because I don't write novels so most of the time my stories are short enough that lightning bolt leads to a story pretty much. Most of the time, I don't really even get that lightning bolt until I start writing. It's only after a couple words or sentences in that I find that if a story starts to grab me, it will. That's hard, of course, because I have to start writing with nothing and it doesn't work out a lot of the time, but it's my process and it works sometimes and that's just how it goes for me. I have had in some of my stories where I've written scenes with the full knowledge that they are going to be deleted. They're there because they have to be there for me and I keep writing just to get that boring nonsense out of my brain and to clear it up. It's mostly that your brain latches onto something quick and easy (and usually bad) which distracts from the actual good stuff, so I find it's great to just write the most obvious thing possible just to clear your head of it. Then, with your brain warmed up with thinking and the obvious poo poo out of the way, you can think of the good stuff. Hopefully. Then, I go back and look at the scenes I had written early that were bad and see if there's an off chance that it's good (it's probably not) then I delete it. I think for a novel, a good outline with all the plot threads written out will help out a lot if you treat the outline as something malleable. So then when you get that brilliant idea you go look at your outline and see where it can fit, what it does in the overall narrative, and see if it changes anything after/before. Of course, I don't write novels so this could all be useless You are definitely right and I do my best to put down whatever comes to me in that moment as soon as possible. It's frustrating though when I've been trying to write this same lovely chapter for six months now, in stops and starts and fits and bursts, and I don't owe anyone anything and it'll go in my desk drawer at the end of the day probably, but goddammit why can't this opening scene just work?
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Mar 21, 2016 19:00
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"Being a writer" means you should be writing. It's fine if you do this as a hobby, and especially if your end goal is "have short fiction published in respectable places, and I don't care about the money," then you can achieve that without writing furiously. If you do write furiously, however, your odds of achieving that goal are better. "Writing a novel" shouldn't be a two-year project that you chip away at only when you've have a brilliant flash of inspiration. Just sit down and write the loving thing. 2k/day five days a week, and a 100k-word novel will be done in less than three months. 5k/day five days a week and you're done in one month. Even if you're working a full-time job, 2k/day is basically an hour to an hour and a half after work. 5k/day is still doable but will wear you the gently caress down, and if you have kids or a husband/wife who wants to see you, it will be hard. I know so many "writers" online who have novels that have just been sitting there for 2+ years. People have restarted the same novel like two or three times: just totally thrown it the gently caress out. I'm actually amazed that Battuta said he did this--and he's the only one I'm not condemning here because he's actually successful--but so many of the people who have these never-ending novels don't even have day jobs and are just playing MMOs for like six hours a day while complaining that they can't get motivated to write. The "long walk" threads often had people setting monthly goals of like 3,000-5,000 words for a month. If you are a hobbyist and have modest goals, that is totally cool; but if you have this novel in your head that you want to get done, you need to write way faster and take this way more seriously than 5,000 words in a month. You really, really need to finish stuff. FINISH the novel, because no matter what your goal with it is, when you finish one novel, the next step is to start writing another. Don't finish a novel and wait a year to start another one. Don't think that once you have a publisher take your book that you're set...you need to have more novels ready to sell. The more the better. The more you write, the better you'll get at it. Set yourself a deadline, finish the novel, then immediately go through and do your editing pass. Don't kill the thing in editing, and don't write the novel in 3 months and edit it for six months. Get it good fast and start something else.
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Mar 21, 2016 21:29
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^^ You own, and I'm working back up to this, because "being a writer" is the goal, and means doing exactly what you've said.HIJK posted:You are definitely right and I do my best to put down whatever comes to me in that moment as soon as possible. I commiserate. I've spent the past month banging together a sloppy and stilted first chapter only to have to refocus and start again, even though I already wrote a full first draft of the novel and outlined it. It just wasn't working, but knuckle-dragging my way through a shitload of the wrong words was necessary. The only way to prime the subconscious to work for you is to feed it words. Even the wrong ones will do, because the wrong words are a problem to be solved that will itch in your mind until it finds a solution. Feed it the wrong words and then take a break: for an hour, a day, a week (not recommended, but I'm so guilty of this). But write the wrong words down before you do, because doing nothing before you stop will grind the whole process to a halt. I'll tell you what helped me was refocusing on why I wanted to tell this story, and since it's narrated in first person, why my main character wanted to tell this story. I had to imagine my character walking into a bar or whatever and figuring out how he'd introduce himself, because that's the opening scene. It has to grab the audience's attention and also make them give a gently caress, and the way I originally started the story was the wrong way to do that, in the worst possible way. I also have to keep that why in mind for every scene, not just the opening one. I stopped writing for almost a week to figure my poo poo out, but I didn't stop completely. I wrote down every line/idea that popped into my head. I re-outlined. I read four novels last week, just to keep absorbing better words than my slug-brained dross. And every false start kept the momentum going, even if I only wrote 10 words. Anything is significantly better than nothing. Also, don't spend too much energy on the wrong words. I have to fight the urge not to polish every scene as I write, because chucking out a scene you've edited three or more times is the stupid way to write a story and I've done that way too many times. I'm not yet good enough at structuring a novel to tell if I'm writing stupid crap that doesn't fit the story, so I now get it all out in a half-assed manner and then figure out which scenes stay and which have to go. At least, I'm trying to get better at doing this, because even outlining doesn't always tell me for certain whether or not what I'm going to write is a dumbfuck idea. I still spend too much energy writing crap before I figure my poo poo out. I'm hoping to get less bad at this with more consistent effort. Stuporstar fucked around with this message at 22:00 on Mar 21, 2016 |
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Mar 21, 2016 21:45
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Just finished my second novel and I've got a few questions. First, how long would ya'll recommend waiting until I start editing to go in nice and fresh? I've heard anywhere between 1 and 6 weeks and that seems pretty drat long to wait. Secondly, I've noticed that both novels were sort of suddenly inspired by one single thing that set my imagination on fire (the first being a song, the second being the idea of people as a resource like fuel) but during the time in between books it was just this godawful drought of creativity where no concepts I thought up and no writing experiments stuck. Can you guys share some of your brainstorming methods that have helped you? I'd really hate to exist at the whim of the roll of the creativity dice. Edit: Thought I'd put this out there: First novel took a year of pre-writing, synopsis, and research and then 10 months of actual writing. Second novel took a month of brainstorming in a lovely Notepad document and 29 days of actual writing. WEeeeeeird. Al Cu Ad Solte fucked around with this message at 03:18 on Mar 22, 2016 |
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Mar 22, 2016 03:15
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I've said it before and I'll say it again, if you're serious about writing your book or whatever, force yourself to spend an hour or two in Starbucks/library/wherever a few times a week. Getting out of the house and into an environment where you can't watch youtube or play a game will do wonders for your productivity.
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Mar 22, 2016 03:24
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Scrivener 50% off until March 25th Windows / Mac
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Mar 22, 2016 11:48
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Bobby Deluxe posted:Scrivener 50% off until March 25th is that a scam? I didn't get a key, and there are a lot of people complaining about it on the comments... e: the websites all seem what they should be, i'm just going to guess it's the makers being clueless about windows sebmojo fucked around with this message at 12:09 on Mar 22, 2016 |
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Mar 22, 2016 12:06
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sebmojo posted:is that a scam? I didn't get a key, and there are a lot of people complaining about it on the comments...
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Mar 22, 2016 17:12
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Carl Killer Miller posted:Hey, any of you serious thunderdome winners want to help out with this poo poo? [examples of boring openings] serious answer tho: winners/HMs aren't judged solely on their opening sentences. A story with a weak opening can still end up being better than something with a strong opening that fizzles out. Just like meeting a dude in a truck stop bathroom and letting him give you a solid hour pounding even though he sucks at foreplay can be better than slipping your dick into a tight pieces of twink meat and finishing in ten seconds. That aside, everybody has their own personal tastes. I have not been quiet about absolutely HATING some of the winning pieces, and others have been vocal about hating something I've written that's won. Winning/HMing is more a confluence of luck and the judges' moods than anything. People who end up being able to consistently write solid pieces of fiction luck out more times than those who are more hit and miss. In the case of my story you quoted, the week's theme was "horror" and I was going for a slow burn of psychological horror, which I didn't want to start with a bang. I actually wanted to start with a sort of mundane, everyday feeling on purpose. If you found the whole story boring, ok, it wasn't your cup of tea, but it worked for the audience and the current week. I agree with you that openings are important, and there are both good and bad examples in TD. One week I in depth critted opening sentences, and almost all of them were bad.
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Mar 23, 2016 15:33
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More talk from someone who's writing full time. I left my job in December and after about a month of good productivity, I tanked pretty hard in being able to meet my day to day writing and business goals. My usual tools and resources weren't working for me any more. Deadlines, pomodoro technique, writing in other physical locations, word wars, toxx clauses, really nasty self-talk, and regular old cloistering until I'd gotten something done were basically failing. Losing the structure I'd gotten used to from school and an office job made it much, much harder to use my new glut of time really well. So after 3 months of doing more research, trying more techniques, and exploiting just about every resource I could to do this alone, and any connection I could to have external accountability for getting drafts done and out, I decided to get my head checked. I went in for a neuropsychiatric evaluation that cost like half of one of my old pre-tax paychecks and came out with  , counseling referrals, a script for some sort of freakily comprehensive blood panel, and a bunch of new advice on how to manage my anxiety and probable inattentive adult ADHD. The problem with getting words out is always with you the writer; but sometimes the exact problem isn't what you think it is. Anyway, this morning I launched on a brand new voyage of brain chemistry and loving yoga so I dunno, we'll see.
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Mar 23, 2016 19:34
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congrats? hope it works out for you.  ALSO STOP BY TD IRC MORE WE MISS YOU
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Mar 23, 2016 20:27
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crabrock posted:serious answer tho: winners/HMs aren't judged solely on their opening sentences. A story with a weak opening can still end up being better than something with a strong opening that fizzles out. Just like meeting a dude in a truck stop bathroom and letting him give you a solid hour pounding even though he sucks at foreplay can be better than slipping your dick into a tight pieces of twink meat and finishing in ten seconds. Hey, thanks for this as w/ all crits and also me knowing that this thread exists. It seems like the TD stories that are well-received have a kernel of a good idea in them, although they're often really unpolished. That'll lead to a certain type of story that... oh, I think I get TD
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Mar 23, 2016 21:16
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i'm permahmed user djeser. i would advise all people who "get" td to be careful because that likely means you have a predisposition to a mental illness. peace.
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Mar 23, 2016 22:11
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Djeser posted:i'm permahmed user djeser. i would advise all people who "get" td to be careful because that likely means you have a predisposition to a mental illness. peace. 
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Mar 23, 2016 22:30
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td is word horseshoes played with poop clumps
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Mar 24, 2016 01:11
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euphemism posted:td is word horseshoes played with poop clumps
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Mar 24, 2016 01:22
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FYAD jokes aside, has anyone in this thread written YA before?
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Mar 24, 2016 01:26
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change my name posted:FYAD jokes aside, has anyone in this thread written YA before?
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Mar 26, 2016 02:53
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change my name posted:FYAD jokes aside, has anyone in this thread written YA before? SurreptitiousMuffin posted:Paging DocK to fiction advice. Paging DocK to fiction advice. What do you consider "writing" YA? I wrote about half a novel's worth of YA and then moved on to other projects b/c I don't know how to finish the plot, and life and stuff. I have a lot of thoughts about YA though, and read a ton of YA fantasy, so maybe I can still say something useful.
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Mar 26, 2016 05:29
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I was more interested in doing a YA sci-fi (like Armada, but good) but sure, I'd be willing to hear what you think.
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Mar 26, 2016 16:34
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change my name posted:I was more interested in doing a YA sci-fi (like Armada, but good) but sure, I'd be willing to hear what you think. What questions do you have? Docklock has done a lot of good advice, hit the ? for a sample. sebmojo fucked around with this message at 01:07 on Mar 27, 2016 |
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Mar 27, 2016 01:05
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change my name posted:I was more interested in doing a YA sci-fi (like Armada, but good) but sure, I'd be willing to hear what you think. Well, as always the first step is to read books in your genre. Have you done that? This post makes me think you just read Armada and thought "come on, even I can do better than this!" which is maybe a decent motivator, but won't really get you anywhere. It's most likely to lead to a boring re-tread of the same stuff. Also, Armada is a pretty specific kind of book, not only YA sic-fi, but also a bit of a parody of the genre, I'm pretty sure. Is that what you want to write? Or just YA sci-fi? There are a few other books that look similar: The Rest of Us Just Live Here, by Patrick Ness Steelheart, by Brandon Sanderson (subversion of the super-hero genre, set in a futuristic world) Redshirts, by John Scalzi (not technically YA, but not far off in terms of themes, style, etc.) and some classics: Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Series, by Douglas Adams (pretty much can't discuss comedic sci-fi without throwing this in there) The Last Starfighter (this is a movie, but it's the inspiration for Armada) So yeah, read. Did you have a specific question or anything?
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Mar 27, 2016 01:29
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Dr. Kloctopussy posted:Well, as always the first step is to read books in your genre. Have you done that? This post makes me think you just read Armada and thought "come on, even I can do better than this!" which is maybe a decent motivator, but won't really get you anywhere. It's most likely to lead to a boring re-tread of the same stuff. I have actually read/seen all of these! But no, I just wanted to know if anyone here had successfully written YA before and had some definite don'ts to point out.
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Mar 27, 2016 01:48
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do: write it for young adults dont: write it for babies / grandpas
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Mar 27, 2016 03:53
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Young Adult Lich, for ages 60-80
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Mar 27, 2016 04:06
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change my name posted:I have actually read/seen all of these! But no, I just wanted to know if anyone here had successfully written YA before and had some definite don'ts to point out. * Don't make your protag under 16 * Don't make your protag over-reliant on adults (general rule is that "adults are the enemy" -- remember how much adults sucked when you were a teen? yeah) * Don't make your characters too immature and don't talk down to the reader (teens take themselves seriously and basically believe they are all grown-up) * Don't write a bad, boring story
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Mar 27, 2016 05:04
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Dr. Kloctopussy posted:* Don't write a bad, boring story
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Mar 27, 2016 05:17
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Does anyone have some tips or tools for how to plan out a story? Particularly ones with political intrigue, a cast of initially mostly unconnected characters, a more event-driven narrative, etc?
Varicelli fucked around with this message at 08:03 on Apr 3, 2016 |
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Apr 3, 2016 07:41
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Varicelli posted:Does anyone have some tips or tools for how to plan out a story? Particularly ones with political intrigue, a cast of initially mostly unconnected characters, a more event-driven narrative, etc? MY OWN QUESTION: Hey, remember that writing app, "Justwrite" or something like that, that was distraction free writing with a timer that made spiders crawl on the screen or something? Was that Mac only? I'm on a windows laptop now, and don't have my mac with me and can't remember the name of the app. I mean, hell, all I want is for WORD to change the view - black background, white text. I just don't know enough about windows and word. magnificent7 fucked around with this message at 13:35 on Apr 4, 2016 |
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Apr 4, 2016 13:31
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You can get something like Q10 to do that. http://www.baara.com/q10/
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Apr 4, 2016 17:26
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I found some kickass free software that's similar to Scrivener, but seems to do more for storytelling, less for formatting. (So, you use this software to write it, then go format it in Word or whatever, if you need to). yWriter (current version is yWriter6) - anybody else heard of this thing? http://www.spacejock.com/yWriter6.html You create scenes, people, locations, items, set time durations for each scene to help you structure your timeline - it's overkill but at the same time super-helpful in forcing me to think ahead better. "Item? WHY would I add an item? Oh wait unless I'll use it later, or want to make it symbolize something or arty-farty writerly stuff like that." Fun stuff.
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Apr 7, 2016 16:46
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I liked yWriter but there was so many windows and clicking that it became a pain in the rear end to use.
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Apr 7, 2016 16:51
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magnificent7 posted:I found some kickass free software that's similar to Scrivener, but seems to do more for storytelling, less for formatting. (So, you use this software to write it, then go format it in Word or whatever, if you need to). I totally want to try this for  game writing, especially now that I'm experimenting with Trail of Cthulhu historical mysteries. Thanks!
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Apr 7, 2016 19:12
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HIJK posted:I liked yWriter but there was so many windows and clicking that it became a pain in the rear end to use. Oh sure now that you've put it out there, it's all I notice.
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Apr 8, 2016 12:27
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edit: oops, found it
Mr Gentleman fucked around with this message at 18:42 on Apr 8, 2016 |
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Apr 8, 2016 18:38
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A few pages ago, change my name asked for some help with his story's query letter. I recently finished the third draft of my own story and it's about ready to be sent out into the world, and I'd love it if I could get some critiques on my own query letter. I've been studying a lot of successful drafts on AgentQuery and QueryShark, so hopefully I'm not too off the mark. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1lomUQl0v4qXx-9nm-TOXCQA_AB63dx1R58giyb8jwCo/pub
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Apr 9, 2016 03:13
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Speaking of writing software, I've only used Word, but was thinking about how nice it would be to have something intuitive that easily showed different sections and let you hop between them. Maybe broken up into different panes that you could hop between; ie, characters, scenes, concepts etc. And maybe you could then dive deeper into each category in the same way.
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Apr 9, 2016 04:30
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