The Ultimate Compilation of Writing Resources

Rym · Jan 2, 2014

So I found this webpage while skimming the internet for some sources on writing first person exposition (how to balance it well and what not). This is, hands down, the best compilation of writing advice I've ever seen - figured I'd post it up here for others to browse through. It might do well as a sticky for authors.

It links to articles covering pretty much everything imaginable: plot/structure, subplotting, worldbuilding, characters, dialogue, POV, genre, NAMES (names you can use in your stories from all different cultures), history references, editing/revision, writing software, prompts, etc etc.

The linkage is here

Also, Brandon Sanderson's 2013 lectures are up as well, just fyi, and they're great as always.

Enjoy.

Skeletaure · Jan 2, 2014

From that list, this article on dialogue is golden:

http://terribleminds.com/ramble/2011/07/05/25-things-you-should-know-about-dialogue/

Trig · Jan 2, 2014

Writing tip from Chuck Palahniuk that always resonated with me: (c/p'd from a text file, sorry for the formatting)

In six seconds, you’ll hate me.
But in six months, you’ll be a better writer.

From this point forward – at least for the next half year – you may not use “thought” verbs. These include: Thinks, Knows, Understands, Realizes, Believes, Wants, Remembers, Imagines, Desires, and a hundred others you love to use.

The list should also include: Loves and Hates.
And it should include: Is and Has, but we’ll get to those, later.

Until some time around Christmas, you can’t write: Kenny wondered if Monica didn’t like him going out at night…”

Instead, you’ll have to Un-pack that to something like: “The mornings after Kenny had stayed out, beyond the last bus, until he’d had to bum a ride or pay for a cab and got home to find Monica faking sleep, faking because she never slept that quiet, those mornings, she’d only put her own cup of coffee in the microwave. Never his.”

Instead of characters knowing anything, you must now present the details that allow the reader to know them. Instead of a character wanting something, you must now describe the thing so that the reader wants it.

Instead of saying: “Adam knew Gwen liked him.”

You’ll have to say: “Between classes, Gwen was always leaned on his locker when he’d go to open it. She’d roll her eyes and shove off with one foot, leaving a black-heel mark on the painted metal, but she also left the smell of her perfume. The combination lock would still be warm from her ass. And the next break, Gwen would be leaned there, again.”

In short, no more short-cuts. Only specific sensory detail: action, smell, taste, sound, and feeling.
Typically, writers use these “thought” verbs at the beginning of a paragraph (In this form, you can call them “Thesis Statements” and I’ll rail against those, later) In a way, they state the intention of the paragraph. And what follows, illustrates them.

For example:
“Brenda knew she’d never make the deadline. Traffic was backed up from the bridge, past the first eight or nine exits. Her cell phone battery was dead. At home, the dogs would need to go out, or there would be a mess to clean up. Plus, she’d promised to water the plants for her neighbor…”

Do you see how the opening “thesis statement” steals the thunder of what follows? Don’t do it.
If nothing else, cut the opening sentence and place it after all the others. Better yet, transplant it and change it to: Brenda would never make the deadline.

Thinking is abstract. Knowing and believing are intangible. Your story will always be stronger if you just show the physical actions and details of your characters and allow your reader to do the thinking and knowing. And loving and hating.

Don’t tell your reader: “Lisa hated Tom.”
Instead, make your case like a lawyer in court, detail by detail. Present each piece of evidence. For example:

“During role call, in the breath after the teacher said Tom’s name, in that moment before he could answer, right then, Lisa would whisper-shout: ‘Butt Wipe,” just as Tom was saying, ‘Here’.”

One of the most-common mistakes that beginning writers make is leaving their characters alone. Writing, you may be alone. Reading, your audience may be alone. But your character should spend very, very little time alone. Because a solitary character starts thinking or worrying or wondering.
For example: Waiting for the bus, Mark started to worry about how long the trip would take..”

A better break-down might be: “The schedule said the bus would come by at noon, but Mark’s watch said it was already 11:57. You could see all the way down the road, as far as the Mall, and not see a bus. No doubt, the driver was parked at the turn-around, the far end of the line, taking a nap. The driver was kicked back, asleep, and Mark was going to be late. Or worse, the driver was drinking, and he’d pull up drunk and charge Mark seventy-five cents for death in a fiery traffic accident…”

A character alone must lapse into fantasy or memory, but even then you can’t use “thought” verbs or any of their abstract relatives.
Oh, and you can just forget about using the verbs forget and remember.
No more transitions such as: “Wanda remember how Nelson used to brush her hair.”

Instead: “Back in their sophomore year, Nelson used to brush her hair with smooth, long strokes of his hand.”

Again, Un-pack. Don’t take short-cuts.
Better yet, get your character with another character, fast. Get them together and get the action started. Let their actions and words show their thoughts. You -- stay out of their heads.
And while you’re avoiding “thought” verbs, be very wary about using the bland verbs “is” and “have.”

For example:
“Ann’s eyes are blue.”
“Ann has blue eyes.”
Versus:
“Ann coughed and waved one hand past her face, clearing the cigarette smoke from her eyes, blue eyes, before she smiled…”

Instead of bland “is” and “has” statements, try burying your details of what a character has or is, in actions or gestures. At its most basic, this is showing your story instead of telling it.

And forever after, once you’ve learned to Un-pack your characters, you’ll hate the lazy writer who settles for: “Jim sat beside the telephone, wondering why Amanda didn’t call.”
Please. For now, hate me all you want, but don’t use “thought” verbs. After Christmas, go crazy, but I’d bet money you won’t.
Click to expand...

Rym · Jan 2, 2014

Hey, this is a really cool thread idea actually -- people swinging by and dropping little pieces of writing advice they've picked up from random places along the way.

That's a great article by Chuck Palahniuk. It's funny actually, I just read an article (from the link I posted actually) from a copy editor discussing the same thing. The name for what he's talking about in the editing world is "filtering." And apparently, it's one of the most common errors seen in first drafts they get. It's something that marks the prose as amateur to them.

Here's the article on it that I also stashed away in a word document for later use. It states that an incredibly simple and effective way to tighten up and better your prose is to use ctrl-f looking for a list of "filter words" and then destroying them.

There are certain writing tips and tricks that get shoved around a lot: showings vs. telling, info dumps, and purple prose, for example. But there’s another big one that’s often ignored: filtering.
Filtering is when you “filter” the novel through the character’s senses, creating an extra layer of distance between the reader and the story.

There are a lot of filtering words, but here are the big ones.

Filtering Words

• Saw
• Heard
• Felt
• Tasted
• Knew
• Thought
• Realized

If you’ve never heard of filtering, you might be thinking, I use these words all the time! Unfortunately, filtering is something widely known among industry professionals (it can be a red flag that work is amateur), but it’s much less known to aspiring authors.

Let’s look at an example of text with filtering:

Tina heard a deep grown and felt breath on the back of her neck. She knew the monster was too close, and she realized the door was too far for her to get away. Her mouth tasted dry and metallic with fear, and she could feel her heart thumping against her ribs. As she turned, shesaw big drops of monster spit all over the ground and knew she was done for.

The problem with all of this filtering is that it stops the reader from putting themselves in the character’s place because they are constantly reminded of their distance from the events. It’sTina who heard the noise, not the reader. It’s Tina who tasted the fear.

So what would this look like if filtering were eliminated? There are lots of ways to get rid of filtering, and they all require you to stretch your creative muscle. Here’s one possible rewrite:

There was a deep growl and hot breath sprayed against the back of Tina’s neck. The monster was close. Too close. She squinted in the darkness, but the door was at least fifteen feet away. She’d never make it. A dry, metallic taste filled her mouth, and her heart thumped against her ribs. She turned and the toe of her shoe dipped into a puddle of monster spit. She was done for. There was no way she’d make it out now.

Do you notice how much closer you feel to the action in this second version? Do you see how much more heavily it relies on showing instead of telling?

Eliminating filtering words is an easy way to improve your writing right now.
Click to expand...

mybu · Jan 3, 2014

This should be the first sticky of 2014.

Jeram · Jan 7, 2014

These are great. I feel like I now need to rewrite everything I've ever published on ff.net. For now I'll just start with the unpublished chapter.

Rym · Jan 14, 2014

TheWriteditor = great writing blog. Here's a neat little tidbit I found helpful.

What is the goal of editing? Why do writers spend months or even years rewriting, revising, and editing their books? Why are you editing your book?

The first answer that comes to your mind is probably something like:

“I’m hoping to make my novel better and more entertaining.”

“I’m hoping to get rid of errors, plot holes, and inconsistencies.”

Or maybe even something like: “I keep getting rejected and I don’t know why.”

While all of these reasons are legitimate, they don’t get to the heart of what editing is actually all about.

The real goal of editing is to eliminate anything that might jar the reader out of the story.

That’s it.

Simple, huh?

When I tell writers (especially my clients) that this is what editing is really all about, it’s like a light bulb goes off in their head. Instead of getting hurt or depressed about hacking and slashing their novel, they get excited. They can see the true goal, the light at the end of the tunnel.

Editing isn’t about conforming to genre stereotypes or imitating famous authors. Most importantly, editing is not about following laundry lists of writing rules. The rules are just there to help steer you towards the bottom line, the end goal of keeping your readers fully engaged in your story.

Books are about the reader. A novel is nothing without the reader’s suspension of disbelief. If head hopping, tense changes, or telling instead of showing pulls the reader out of the story, your novel fails to do its job. It fails to transport the reader into a world they can fully believe and become absorbed in.

For a novel to work, the reader must believe that what they’re reading is authentic. That can’t happen when they get hung up on unusual word choices, plot inconsistencies, or characters behaving out of character. When that happens, they see your hand in the work. They see right through your characters and straight to you, the author, and just like that they’re no longer absorbed in the story.

What separates a novel from being laughably bad and amazingly engaging is nothing more than the reader’s ability to believe in it. Nothing gets a book chucked back on the shelves (or into the rejection pile) faster than a reader thinking, This would never happen in real life!

“But,” some writers might say, “my book is a Fantasy. It can’t have happened in real life!” But that’s why readers pick up a Fantasy (or SciFi or Horror). They want you to make them believe that crazy things could really happen, that there is really magic, mystery, and wonder in the world, at least for a little while, at least while they’re reading your book.

Part of the fun of Harry Potter is thinking that someday (maybe!) you might get your acceptance letter to Hogwarts. And what fun would Doctor Who be if we didn’t all secretly believe that someday he might show up in in his TARDIS and whisk us away on an adventure.

When you’re editing, no matter what you’re editing, the bottom line is that you must eliminate anything that prevents your reader from fully engaging in the story.

So there’s no need to cry for the loss of a chapter you loved or despair at the major restructuring required to make your plot believable. It’s all for the good of the story. It’s all for the reader, and that’s who editing is really all about.
Click to expand...

DLP Flash Christmas Competition + Writing Marathon 2024!

Hi there, Guest

The Ultimate Compilation of Writing Resources

Rym Auror

Skeletaure Magical Core Enthusiast ~ Prestige ~ DLP Supporter

Trig Unspeakable

Rym Auror

mybu First Year

Jeram Elder of Zion ~ Prestige ~ DLP Supporter

Rym Auror

I want to write a story where Harry is the Archetypical Slytherin

Writing Marathon 2024

Writing Marathon 2023!

Ultimate Harry

Shitty authors full of themselves : The Compilation

DLP Flash Christmas Competition + Writing Marathon 2024!

Hi there, Guest

The Ultimate Compilation of Writing Resources

Rym Auror

Skeletaure Magical Core Enthusiast ~ Prestige ~ DLP Supporter

Trig Unspeakable

Rym Auror

mybu First Year

Jeram Elder of Zion ~ Prestige ~ DLP Supporter

Rym Auror

I want to write a story where Harry is the Archetypical Slytherin

Writing Marathon 2024

Writing Marathon 2023!

Ultimate Harry

Shitty authors full of themselves : The Compilation

Useful Searches