Progress has been going very slow for me recently. Though ‘slow’ may be a massive understatement. Other things in my life have just sucked all the will, the desire out of me to get on with my writing. And I’m not talking about my usual magpie-like tendency to get distracted by shiny… oh, look at that!

Some of these worries are somewhat related to what Matt was talking about last week, so I’ll have a look at those in this post.

Giving your Work a Facelift…

I completely get where Matt is coming from when he talks about waning enthusiasm for a project. But even when a flash of inspiration gets you out of it, it’s still not all a bed of roses.

I’m not sure if I mentioned this in a previous post, but I had a sort of breakthrough like that on my last project (which I was halfway to implementing before my magpie mind got distracted by this bright shiny new epic project that has since begun to stagnate) (not sure this is what you’re referring to, but it’s similar – Matt).

Grumpy cat says, “writing makes me grumpy.” Image by Jonathan Keelty on Flickr.

I was having trouble finding motivations for my protagonists, antagonists, and the direction of the plot in general. Wasp Whisperer is one of my most established pieces of writing – as most of my writing friends will attest – and while my style of writing (and my attitudes in writing) have changed over the years, I have tried to stick religiously to the through-line of this project since I started it.

This has caused massive problems in the editing, because new ideas have been introduced, some have been scrapped, but the ultimate through-line has remained an almost constant – even beyond the point where it not only stopped making sense, but actually hurts the project. So I tried to find a way to make it work.

Inspiration hit me as I was making some random notes on it one day, and the more I thought about it, the more perfectly it seemed to fit. By completely changing the antagonist’s motivation. It was one of those things that made so much sense, I can’t believe I didn’t think of it previously. Not only did it remove a lot of the issues regarding plot inconsistencies, it made me feel like the whole project flowed far more smoothly. And this was without changing a single word! Obviously I’d have to in editing, but that wasn’t necessary until ‘the big reveal’.

So on this occasion, I was fortunate. But like I said, I had been heavily resisting change to the main thrust of this project for years. I guess I was afraid of the masses of work involved in changing huge portions of the story in order to fix something, even if it would have been for the better.

When the Well runs Dry…

Then there is the flipside of getting an idea to help you out of a fix, or to give your project a boost – the fear of idea drought! Bad enough I find it difficult to get my current ideas into words.

Maybe it’s a subconscious thing – the reason I started such a big project was that it would mean I wouldn’t have to even think about working on anything else for a long time. I already mentioned that when I was younger I felt far more prolific, and that’s partly because I wasn’t so entrenched in ‘the big five’, my projects I am serious about, that I can foresee writing a lot of material for.

All’s well that ends… ah, fuggedit! Image by Phil Parker.

Where are all the new ideas? Where are the new projects that might spring up one day? Matt has repeatedly advised me to maybe work on something new, fresh, and small, just a quick short story to overcome this slump I’ve found myself in, but if I’m honest, I’ve got no new ideas for that. My creative mind has become so entrenched in ‘the big five’ that any time I even vaguely think of something new, my mind automatically finds some way of fitting it into the framework for one of those.

I can’t recall the last time I had a totally new idea that didn’t somehow relate to something I’ve already written or established. And even less so that didn’t feature any of my oft-recurring themes. Maybe I don’t have anything new left to say, and everything I do have to say resides in the projects I have already started…

Over to you:
Do you have worries and fears in regards to your writing, similar to my own, or ones particular to yourself? Share them in the comments section below, like a wordsmith’s AA meeting…

So So

So I’m working my way through my little ideas journal, and it’s like a journey back in time. When I started my latest batch of stories, I chose the freshest idea I had. After that I was flicking back through the pages.

The thing is, I went into the draft for that fresh idea with gusto, and bashed through it. I’m very pleased with that one – it is about the length I was aiming for; is unusually snappy for me (normally my stories are slower and more pensive); and in the end, I feel all the bits are in the right place, and there’s very little editing for me to do.

So all good right? Awesome in fact – that very rarely happens to me.

The next story I was less enthusiastic about, but still got through it fine. It will need some heavy editing – plenty of cutting. But, whatever, that’s par for the course (the previous story was an eagle or whatever).

So, remember we are going back in time, and we’re on an older idea now. And my enthusiasm has dimmed considerably. This one feels like a bogey.

There’s another bored monkey somewhere on this blog – can you find it? This image courtesy of Artandbeautyfreak.

The annoying thing is, I remember being rather psyched about this story when I first thought of it.

This is not new, and it’s not like I’m the only one to have ever experienced it. Writer’s often talk about ideas going stale, and many’s the time I’ve let an idea slip away because I didn’t do something with it immediately.

So What?

Is this a problem? Well perhaps not if you’ve got ideas tumbling out of every orifice. I don’t got that, so each idea is precious.

And I can’t just wait until the next fantabulous idea comes along and let the unworked ones fall by the wayside. I can’t afford that drop in my productivity! Think of all the practice I’d miss!

So the question now becomes, “how do I deal with this?”

So, How?

One option, which is the one I’ve been trying, is just to get the hell on with it. This seems fair enough, but it’s hard ain’t it?

Sitting down to write is harder; pushing through the session is harder; feeling like what you’re writing is empty or no good is harder, and I know editing will be harder.

But even struggling through it still feels like a waste in a way. After all, I thought the idea was good before. What’s changed? Surely there is still something there. But at the moment I’m not serving the idea well enough. How can I do better?

This delightful image courtesy of Tsahi Levent-Levi.

Sew Sew

I’m hoping I already know the answer. I was thinking about the story, ignoring the podcast I had on (which I guess is a good sign), and my wandering mind made a little connection.

What I’d done was stitch a new idea onto the old one.

This did a few things – it made sense of some of the pieces that were already there; gave me a reason to structure it the way I had (switching between two perspectives, previously somewhat arbitrarily).

But most of all, it made the idea a little bit fresher. I feel better about it now. No, it’s not the same burn I felt for that brand-spanking-new idea, but it is something, and hopefully I’ll at least be able to get my way through it.

So for now at least, if an idea feels stale, the answer is to add a new idea to freshen it up.

Now I have to decide if I stop and edit what I’ve done to make sense of that idea or carry on through the draft first. Decisions decisions…

Over to you:
But maybe this isn’t the only way to go about it – do you have other ideas on getting through a story you’re less than enthusiastic about? Maybe you have a way of preventing the staleness (some idea Tupperware perhaps)? Let us know your valuable secrets below!

So what is the “real meaning” behind write what you know? Let’s take a look at the outcome of following the phrase. If you write what you know, what does that bring to the finished piece? In theory it should make it appear more real – your own experiences and factual knowledge means you’ll write words or phrases someone else might not.

So the magical writing ingredient the phrase is trying to add to your writing is authenticity.

But there is more than one way to add authenticity to your writing. So let’s take a look at some of the things “write what you know” is hinting at.

Personal Authenticity

You know stuff. No matter your line of work (or work you’ve undertaken in the past), it requires specialist knowledge of some description. It doesn’t matter how mundane it seems to you, all can be brought to bear.

You’re a mechanic? Maybe some of your engineering knowledge can be brought to bear in a spaceship hangar, or perhaps the hangar crew share similar banter to you and your colleagues.

You’re a receptionist? High-tech body modification centres need receptionists too. Or why not make the mundanity the draw – what would the job of receptionist be like in a Bond-esque super-villain headquarters? That kind of comic juxtaposition can make for an original story.

Emotional authenticity is also important, and something everyone can draw on. Part of Stanislavski’s famous acting system asked players to reach back into their memories and pick a moment where they felt something comparable to their characters (he called this Emotional Memory).

Stan The Man. I thought I was rid of him after uni, but here he is again.

When it comes to imagining what your characters are doing or thinking, writing shares an awful lot with acting. You may not have been in the same position as the character you’re writing about, but you may be able to recall a time when you felt similar emotion. You can then relive that (to an extent) and transfer some of it to the page.

Writing for Writer’s Digest, Elan Barnehama talks about writing a lesbian character in the sixties. He found common ground with his character because she was an outsider, and when he was younger he had been too.

Tourist Authenticity

Sticking with acting, Jason Gots writing for Big Think, compares “write what you know” with the Method (an acting technique popularised in America and derived from Stanislavski’s System). The popular view of the Method is the actor literally lives out the situation of their character.

This is only partly true, because obviously there are some things you literally can’t live through, either because it is dangerous or simply not possible (fighting dragons for example).

So, if your character is a farmer, you might go and work on a farm for a while.

The same is useful in writing. Obviously, you are dipping your toes into an experience that may have taken up your character’s whole life, but you can at least get an idea, and can bring some of that to bear. As an example, Joanna Penn took a Krav Maga class so she knew what it felt like to get hit (and because her protagonist is similarly trained in martial arts).

I happen to know someone who teaches Krav Maga (no, I haven’t worked up the balls to take lessons. They sound painful). Head over to Institute Kravmaga. Tell Jon Matt sent you.

But it doesn’t have to be so specific. In an ideal world a writer should be immersing themselves (like an actor) in as wide a variety of experiences as possible. This is great for inspiration too.

Second-Hand Authenticity

And there’s always research. If you don’t have particular knowledge of something, you can speak to someone who does, or you can read up on it.

It sounds less valuable than first-hand knowledge, and I suppose it is, but sometimes all you need are one or two details to make something feel real.

K. M. Weiland calls this writing what you know “vicariously”, and I think that’s a good way of putting it.

Discovered Authenticity

This is a strange one, because it’s not entirely clear where the “authenticity” comes from. But sometimes, simply writing what you don’t know, jumping in at the deep end, can unearth surprisingly authentic details in your writing.

Maybe the act of writing digs deep inside you and pulls up experiences from your subconscious. This could come from any of the sources above – it might be a childhood memory of someone you had forgotten about, a passage in a book, a fact you learnt on television.

After all, isn’t writing supposed to be a voyage of discovery – not just for the reader, but the writers as well?

Fiction, at its very essence, is all about what we don’t know

K. M. Weiland, Write what you know (and what you don’t), Wordplay

Often it is that probing, feeling, edging your way into the unknown (or hell, just barrelling straight into it) that gives the most authentic-feeling insight. The details of a character that make them seem most alive, most real are not the ones dreamed out on a character sheet. Not to knock preparation – it often helps to have somewhere to start – but some of the best stuff comes at the most unexpected times – when you’re in the thick of it, pulling things out of thin air.

It’s not always easy or comfortable, but I’ve learned to trust my characters and I’ve learned that the story truth is found in writing into the unknown [...] When I trust my characters to decide what must happen, I give myself opportunities to stumble onto the unexpected truth, the accidental truth, the story truth, which is so much more interesting than my memory truth.

Elan Barnehama, Why you should write about what you don’t know, Writer’s Digest

So don’t write “what you know”, write The Truth, in whatever way that phrase has meaning for you. Often The Truth is a combination of truths – facts, personal feelings, an atmosphere, a point of view, combined to reveal something that would not have been discovered if you had not been writing.

So you can now forget about this post and just write. Write and the truth will come.

Over to you:
What do you think of this controversial maxim? Is there some wisdom hidden in the phrase after all? Or is it still the worst advice ever? Let us know in the comments below (see, I do poetry too!)

What it means on the surface and why that’s bullcrap

“Write what you know” has always sounded controversial to me. It’s one of those phrases that manages to make complete sense, but at the same time make one baulk at its absurdity.

Of course, writing about what you know about lends it a realism that might otherwise be difficult to fake. And many writers have made a successful career out of it. John Grisham is a popular example – an ex-lawyer who writes thrillers about law firms and lawyers to the exclusion of all else.

But on the other hand… what? How can one write only about what one knows? If that’s true, then entire genres are suddenly laid to waste, or assumed to be pointless drivel. Say good bye to Lord of the Rings or Dune and countless other favourite sci-fi and fantasy stories.

And of course, all fiction writing involves something that has been made up (I’m sure Mr. Grisham’s former vocation wasn’t half as exciting as his novels), that is why it’s fiction. No fiction writer writes only what they know.

A Dangerous Idea

So, we’ve established that we are not, in fact, drowning in a sea of autobiographies (though looking at the shelves of WHSmith’s makes me think I’m wading at least waist-high).

But before I unpick the real meaning of the phrase I want to express how damaging this surface-interpretation might be to a fledgling writer.

First, it’s one of those rules that pretends with all its might to be hard-and-fast. This is the way to write, it says, and no one will accept any substitute.

Thought-provoking image courtesy of Chicago Art Department on Flickr

That is off-putting enough in itself, but worse than that is that the limits appear well-defined. You can write about your own life – your job, your family and friends (or very close approximations thereof), your home-town, but cast your net no wider. Now, I’m sure some very interesting stories might well be told about such things, but it’s limiting, and in such a dull way.

Moreover, at the very least it limits events, places, objects, people to things that can exist. But the very things that are most likely to excite a young mind are those things we know can’t exist. When I was growing up (I haven’t finished yet to be honest, and I hope never to), it was the dragons and the aliens, the sorcerers and the saucers that got me reading. I wanted to read about the impossible – that was the point!

I read around when I was researching this topic, and after some thought I have come to my own conclusions about this particular piece of advice. I’ll share them in my next post. While researching I came across this wonderful post by Amy E. Yergen. I encourage you to go read it afterwards.

One of the striking things about it is that this very piece of advice stopped her from writing when she was young.

I think part of the reason this advice can have that effect is that, perhaps more than other writing maxims, it’s delivered with little discussion. The phrase appears self-explanatory so it’s left hanging in the air, as stony and real as a mallet ready to whack your dreams.

Needless to say, it’s not a piece of advice that Amy spreads around:

I don’t say that I write what I know, but I do say that I write what I feel, I write what I think is beautiful, and I write what I enjoy.

Amy E. Yergen

So I should… write what I don’t know?

Umm… er… ooh… well, things are never that straight forward are they. Yes and no, I reckon is the answer.

But I’ll be talking about that some more next week as I delve deep into the phrase to discover the grains of truth in this sandcastle of lies!

Over to you:
So, this literal interpretation of “write what you know” – dangerous? Or the best advice ever (or something in-between)? You know what I think, but I want to hear from you fine folk – get your comments out and whack them on the space below.

So I may be getting somewhat pre-emptive with this, since I’m still a long way from the end of part one of ‘The Project’, however, this was a subject on my mind this week, so lets discuss…

How to end a project. 

Matt raised an interesting point last week: 

A writer writes, an author finishes. 

Because the all-important finish is the ultimate goal, is it not? This doesn’t just apply to the mammoth type of fiction I am writing, but to all fiction. So I think it’s important to consider it right from the outset, even if you’re not at that point in your writing – it needs to be on your mind. 

Not Just the End

Because it isn’t only about finishing the project, it is about concluding it in a satisfying manner for the reader. It’s about wrapping up the loose threads, bringing the character arcs to a satisfying conclusion, and – at a basic level – returning to the status quo. 

Which isn’t easy. 

In a way, writing epic fiction allows you to cheat this a little. Because – chances are – the book you’re (and by that I mean “I’m”) writing has a good chance to be the first book in a series. So if it’s a given there will be a follow-up, you need to consider the ending differently. I’m not talking about a sequel here though. Sequel hooks are a different matter, and I’ll look at them in a bit. 

In an ongoing series, it is pretty much a given the adventure continues, but even if that is the case, the first book (particularly the first book) needs to have some kind of closure. Even if it just one plot strand, or one character arc, or something. 

An Example

Let’s look at an example shall we? Star Wars, there’s a good one. The first film (and by that I mean Episode IV) wraps the primary story up nicely. Death Star is destroyed (sorry, spoilers), the rebels have their award ceremony, and look! Even R2 is fine! All is great with the world! 

Star Wars successfully concludes Episode IV, whilst still leaving an as yet unseen Big Bad to deal with in the following films

Except it isn’t. Darth Vader is still out there, as is the rest of the Galactic Empire. This is just a battle that has been won in an ongoing war. The good thing here is it leaves a lot of leeway for possible sequels. The main threat of the piece has been neutralised, but the greater threat (the man behind the man, as it were) is still out there.

What Star Wars does, (like a lot of epic fiction) is drop the viewer (or reader) into the middle of the action. The greater struggle is ongoing. This is where having a well planned out back story comes into play. As long as it feels there is a greater world out there, a living breathing world, which exists, and in which things happen detached from the characters you’re dealing with, then you can get away with a lot. 

Another cinematic example (one which I don’t think deals with this so well) is The Matrix. The grand enemy here is “The System”, far more nebulous than the Galactic Empire. The face of the system in the first film – the main threat – are the Agents. Particularly Smith. At the end of the film (again, spoilers), Neo fights Smith, destroys him, and ends up flying off into the, well, the camera. 

Yes, billions of people are still trapped in the system, but there isn’t really any sense of the man behind the man. The first film concludes without any real sense this story needs to continue, which is why – in my humble opinion – the sequels fail. 

Drifting off track. 

The ending needs to be satisfying enough that the reader doesn’t feel cheated, but – in the case of epic and ongoing fiction – needs to have enough mystery remaining that the reader will want to return to this universe for more.

The Matrix so desperately needed a figurehead for “The System”, it not only resurrected Agent Smith, but also created a weird baby face thing in the trilogy’s final moments. Like a lot of things in the sequels, neither fully made sense.

The Sequel Hook

Now obviously the cheapest way to do this is to have a cliff-hanger of an ending. I say ‘cheap’ instead of ‘easy’ because as I said above, the reader can feel cheated. It may be a case that the plot of the book has been wrapped up, but then some character may say ‘but he wasn’t the real killer.’ Possibly followed by a ‘dun dun DUN!’ 

Or, as in the case of those old Saturday morning serials, have the hero in some dire peril from which there appears no escape. 

Again, this can be frustrating, especially if the reader has to wait a year or two to find out whether said hero actually survives. 

The soft version of course is to have the main story wrap up, and have our plucky heroes ride off into the unknown. Literally the adventure continues. From what I recall when reading it, this is what happens at the end of The Passage, by Justin Cronin. The plot of the book wraps up, but there are still stories to tell. 

The best sequel hook however, is to have something with a little more subtext. Yes, the main thrust of the plot has been concluded for now, but there are other dangers out there, and since our hero/heroes/heroine has defeated ‘the bad guy’, then the man behind the man now has his or her full attention on said hero/heroes/heroine. And they are pissed. 

The Project

So yes, while the end of my own project is a long way off, I’m feeling the need to formulate how it’s going to conclude. I have the major critical points, though they are more in relation to the grander scheme of things. 

I am loathe to admit I have been working on basic storylines for the follow up. I guess part of me has been so focussed on the bigger picture I’ve overlooked the smaller picture for the time being. I have a greater sense of where the universe is going in the piece, when I should be focussing on where the characters are going. 

I have mentioned before that I have several different major plot strands going on. Well, I know where the majority of them end up (and its not looking good for the characters), but I’ve focussed less on how they actually get there. It’s sort of a ‘top down’ approach, making sure the drama is all where it needs to be for the next instalment, when I guess I should be working a little more on the ‘bottom up’ approach, in getting everything established. 

Sort of like I’m writing a prequel, when the actual book it is a prequel for doesn’t exist yet. On the plus side, I have an actual ending to work towards. 

Over to you:
Do you find reaching the end particularly troubling? Do you find it difficult to deliver a sufficiently satisfying conclusion to your tale? And for those of you who may write longer ongoing fiction, how do you cope with the conclusion/continuation balance. As ever, comments below.

Truer Words…

It is often the case that well-worn phrases lose their power. After hearing the words, “writers write” about a billion times, I failed to notice what it really meant.

I write, and have been writing for years. But until recently I didn’t write.

A month or two ago I went through a change in my writing schedule. Having written for a while, I was struck with how little I’d actually finished. I was spending a lot of time polishing and rewriting, and stopping to do so meant frequent breaks in drafting, which in turn lead to frequent stalling generally.

Enough was enough! I realised my role as a content-creating machine. It doesn’t sound like art, for sure, but it’s a solid truth about the writer.

My fingers are typebars – I’m a writing machiiiiiine! Image courtesy of Nils Geylen on Flickr.

Now I draft every day, and I don’t intend to pause for editing, going straight from one story to the next. Editing will be done, but less so than before and at a different time of day. In short, I decided this was the best way to improve as a writer, to keep me enthused, and to build a body of work I could sell. My job was to produce as much work as I could.

It sounds a little silly now, but it really was an epiphany moment, one of those times when a switch clicks and the gears of your mindset do a revolution and slot into new positions. My perspective had changed.

I was a writer again. And writers write.

Never Enough

But the phrase does not tell the whole story. There is still the nagging reminder I had not finished much, and although I would be editing less, and so shortening the distance to the “finish” line, my new routine made no guarantees I would finish anything at all.

Without any finished works a writer remains just what the maxim implies – a writing machine, constantly pouring out words, but not living off them, forced by some mysterious need to type ad infinitum, impoverished by their craft.

You know the word for someone who’s forced to work for free? Yeah, a slave.

Writing is not enough, then. In order to live from their craft, a writer must finish their work and get it out there. They must become not just a writer, but an author.

So I would complete the phrase:
A writer writes, an author finishes.

You might also want to add sells on to that, because it’s true, but we’re going for pithy here!

Writing alone doesn’t grab you the monies. Image from Images_of_Money.

My first story draft since this newfound attitude has been resting for just over a month now. It is time to retrieve it for a swift, sharp round of judicious editing. I have just finished a “final” edit from a much older piece (I say “final”, but it is yet to go through the critiquing process, and I desperately want some validation) so the timing is all slotting into place.

So the proof of this particular pudding will be in the editing. Can I do a swift and deadly swipe of editing and then give it up for critiquing? Will I be able to leave it alone? Will my editing take longer than I want, leading to a huge backlog of first drafts?

And does it matter? In a way, that will be a nice problem to have. Writing is the first and most essential step, because it gives you options. Without it, you have nothing but ideas in your head.

Over to you:
Well, that’s what I think anyway, but what about you? Do you agree? Disagree? Let’s start the discussion going, shall we?

We are building up quite a bank of maxim take-downs here at Getmewriting. If there’s another you’d like us to tackle, pop that in the comments as well!

I have made very little progress this past week. I’ve hit a tough spot in the redrafting that I’ve found very hard to get through. There isn’t anything necessarily wrong with what I’ve written (in the context of the larger piece), but reading through it, I feel that there is that certain something missing. 

Looking for the Problem

While it can slow you down, and in certain cases be counter-productive, the truth we have to face is that – if something feels wrong – it has to be fixed. You need to find the core of the problem, no matter how deep you have to dig. Better to find it fast and remove it, than to ‘leave it for a while’ and find it corrupting the rest of your work. 

Still there. Image by Gene Selkov on Flickr

But how do you identify what the problem is? You could look at the core elements… 

• Character – What are the characters doing? Are they behaving correctly? Are they fleshed out (if you’re introducing new characters) and do they have motivation?
• The Scene – What is happening in the scene and why? How does it influence the overall plot? Above all, is it interesting to read?
• Pacing – Is the scene snappy enough? Does it have that immediate sense of forward momentum? Is it slowing the piece down?

I guess deep down I feel the section I’m at is taking too long. I have a lot of information to convey and trying to convey that through action, instead of drawing a flowchart for the reader, is proving difficult; I feel like I’m tripping over my own words; I don’t know how to make it succinct. 

Taking a Break

Sometimes, you do just have to do this. Not to stop writing altogether mind, but perhaps move onto some other exercise to keep things fresh. Especially when writing a much longer piece.

I’ve been trying to work out where the story goes after the major crisis point of the first part. With lots of plotlines going on with a ton of characters it’s not difficult to find something I can plan. But that leads to a potentially dangerous practice… 

Writing out of Sequence

I’ve been tempted to do this here, to move past this troubling section and write the next ‘new’ section (generate the raw material of it, I mean) because I know – roughly – how that’s going to work. 

This is where writing an epic becomes problematic though. Because so much of the overarching plot feeds into itself, writing new material without first getting the foundations laid out will mean having to work double-duty in editing later on. There may be some detail that happens in the new material which needs some sort of foreshadowing in the ‘troubling section’. I’ve already encountered this in editing, I’ve had to go back and throw in some extra scenes here and there just to cover some plot point which as come up. 

Weaving the Web

Which could all have been avoided if I wasn’t determined to make the whole thing so damn complicated. In some places I’ve thrown in a lot of detail, without knowing if it’s actually interesting to other people (guess I’ll need someone to critique it – See what I did there Matt?). The first chapter especially has a lot of that kind of detail. However, there it flowed from me easily, not like this recent section which isn’t flowing well at all. 

If your story looks like this, fine, but be prepared to take serious measures to ensure it all makes sense! This image comes from the Highways Agency’s page on Flickr.

I’m also concerned about giving each plot strand enough time in the limelight. There is a balance I need to work out due to the many angles and viewpoints, which I’ve never had to do before. I know (at least I have an idea of) how each of the different threads feed into the overarching story, but right now, I’m still pretty much in the set-up phase. 

As I said, its very tempting to move ahead, write some new material out of sequence, just to feel like some progress has been made, instead of wading through the editing of what I’ve already got, but doing so will mean having to go back and do even more wading through editing later. 

Once I’ve made it through this section though, I feel like there will be much less resistance, and I’ll be able to progress at a much faster rate. 

Over to you:
So, Have you ever been tempted to write out of sequence – having a clearer idea of the future as opposed to the now? Have you had any problems with weaving the threads together, and if so, what techniques did you use to overcome those problems? Comments away…!

Oh, all right then.

It has come to my attention that my collection of critiquing tips was not exhaustive and there are a few more worth mentioning.

So, without further ado, I present four more critiquing tipples (actually a tipple is a drink, isn’t it? A tipple might not be a good idea while critiquing. Need a clear head. Damn, more ado)!

Don’t rewrite it

Your job is to point out errors, and not correct them.

Actually making the corrections is the writer’s job, and they should do it in whatever way they see fit.

This is actually easier said than done, especially where you’re focussing on specific sentences. It’s very easy to suggest a rephrasing that makes things clearer, for example, but you should resist the urge.

There are exceptions, like with most rules. If something is plainly wrong (erm, see my last post on that) and there is only one, cut and dry answer, it’s fine to say, “did you mean this?” Otherwise, leave it!

Let’s get critical! Critical! I wanna get critical…

Read to the end

I feel a bit silly pointing this out, because it should be obvious. But apparently some people actually stop before they get to the end and submit their critique on the bit they’ve read.

No no no no no. You can’t see me, but I’m wagging my finger and shaking my head.

It doesn’t matter if you hate the story. You’ve been asked to read it, and have agreed to read it. So finish it. If you didn’t finish reading, then you didn’t finish your critique.

Answer any questions the writer has asked

Please don’t ignore writer’s questions – they’re there for a reason.

I like to read each story through twice, and on the second read I focus on specific questions they want answered. This allows me to get any other thoughts out first, without neglecting what they feel they need from the critique.

Not a big deal, but easily forgotten!

What if I can’t be specific?

In my last post I urged you to dig deep and really figure out why something wasn’t working for you. But, as was rightly pointed out to me, this isn’t always possible. Sometimes something “feels wrong” but no matter how hard you try you’re just not… sure… what.

So what should you do, just leave it unsaid?

If you really can’t put your finger on the problem (of, for example, why a character feels false), then I think that’s fine. My approach is to say, “maybe it’s just me, because I can’t put my finger on why, but…” At least that is giving the author a clue, and they can choose to try and act on the problem if other “critters” say something similar.

Imagine the alternative – five people found a vague problem with something but couldn’t articulate it, so they left it from their critique entirely. The author is none the wiser, but there is still a problem!

Better to give them a chance. And there might be room for further discussion – critters.org, for example, has forums and the opportunity to email critters afterwards. So if pointing something out leads to a discussion, you might be able to hone in on the exact problem together.

So I think that’s it, and we’re now done with critiquing. Next time we visit the subject it will hopefully be because I’ve had something critiqued, and I’ll be able to tell you what that felt like, and why I disagree with everything they said!

Over to you:
But wait! We might not be done! We are never done. Never. Because comments exist, and we can talk about this forever if you want. So submit your chatter below and let’s discuss!

There are a wealth of resources out there, and we even did a post here waaaay back on how to give feedback. It’s been a while though, and we’ve all learnt some stuff since then so now seems like a good time for a refresher.

I should also point you in the direction of some guides and articles on the critters.org site, since that’s where I’m doing my critiquing at the moment (by the way, if anyone has another online critiquing group they can recommend, please let me know, as it’s always good to give a choice).

Spinach sandwich

First, here’s a good rule of thumb for your general critique structure. This analogy requires you dislike spinach, so if you enjoy that mush, imagine something else instead Popeye!

A spinach sandwich is constructed thus:

Bread
  |
  v
Spinach
  |
  v
Bread

Which for our purposes, translates as something nice, followed by something nasty (but good for you), finished off by something nice.

This one has added egg. I hate egg. Image from anneheathen on Flickr.

I like to start and end every critique by thanking the author for sharing their work with me. It costs nothing, and you are, after all, getting something out of it too, so why not be grateful?

Other than that, it’s important to start with something you enjoyed about the piece, and also to leave the author with something positive.

Now, you may think this is pandering to the author; a watered-down version of your opinion, or you’re treating them with kid gloves. You may even think this approach is counter-productive.

I don’t entirely disagree. After all, if they are not tough enough to take your criticism, does it matter how softly you present it? Should you be preparing them for the inevitable string of rejections they will face?

Think of it this way – in all writing, it is important to remember who your reader is. In this case it is an author who has asked you to critique their work. You are writing for them. So how do you make that opinion as useful as possible?

I would argue presenting it softly does that. It makes them more receptive to what you have to say (what use is a critique if the reader can’t get passed the hurtful thing you said in the first paragraph?) and it encourages them to act upon it by convincing them there is some reason their work should exist.

If you struggle to find something positive to say, I would argue that speaks to your faults as a critic rather than to the author’s faults as a writer. I have yet to find a piece that had no worth whatsoever, and I doubt I ever will. They had a reason to write it, so there must be something in there.

Don’t be too nice

Inevitably though, you can be too nice. While it’s important to frame your criticisms with positive feedback, a critique with no criticisms is useless.

In other words, don’t forget the spinach. That’s the bit that’s really good for the author, after all. That’s where the nutrition is.

Make sure you at least include some spinach, or this guy might get biffy!

If you’re struggling to find something to criticise, I find it is normally a question of depth. By this I mean, to what degree do you critique the piece as a whole versus digging in and examining individual sentences?

Coming back to being useful, that generally means conveying the biggest problems with the piece. If for example, the whole story doesn’t hang together very well, doesn’t make sense, the characters are flat or unbelievable, then I would rather talk about any of those over the individual sentences I found to be troubling. After all, if there are problems big enough to necessitate rewrites of sections of the story, chances are the sentence you were going to criticise won’t be there afterwards.

On the other hand, if the story itself warrants no criticism, you can bet there are individual sentences that don’t feel right, have technical errors or typos, or warrant changing for some other reason. No story is perfect in everyone’s eyes, so you should be able to find something.

Be constructive

This is the most common piece of advice you’ll hear about critiques. Basically it means, “give them something they can use” (useful, see?)

It’s no use telling someone their story is crap. Aside from just being insulting, what can they do with it? There’s no clue there on how to improve. Instead you should be pointing out why the story didn’t work for you.

Be as specific as possible about the problem you’ve found. If you think a character is not believable, why is that? Is it their actions in the story, were they inconsistent, is it the way they speak? Honing in like this also means you can give quotations directly from the text as examples.

Remember, this is all your opinion…

This comes down to how you present your critique again. This is, in fact, what takes up the majority of the critiquing guidelines on critters.org.

Phrase everything with sentiments like, “I think that…” “I feel that…” “in my opinion”. Try not to be too blunt in other words. After all, the vast majority of what you say will be your opinion, and it doesn’t matter how many other people you think would agree with you, that’s all it is for the purpose of your critique – your opinion.

It goes against a lot of advice you may have had about writing. The phrases I’ve mentioned are exactly the sort of thing I was told to remove in GCSE English classes because they make your writing feel “woolly” or as if you’re unsure of what you’re saying. I guess it just proves again that different writing styles suit different applications, and you should adjust accordingly.

…Even when it isn’t

Yes, even if you know for a fact something is wrong, or frowned upon by other writers, you should still present it as your opinion.

Remember, you are only pointing out what you think is a problem. What the author does with it afterwards is up to them and none of your concern. It is not your job to persuade them to make a change.

So, it doesn’t matter what Stephen King thinks of adjectives. Just say why you don’t like it, personally.

I even went so far as to avoid the word cliché in one critique. This was for several reasons:

• The word cliché suggests some collective authority outside of my own brain has deemed the phrase unacceptable
• It could be considered an insult
• Simply calling something a cliché doesn’t quite dig deep enough. I’d rather get to the specific reason why the phrase didn’t work

So I simply said I had read the phrase many times before and to me, it had lost its power. Maybe I just defined a cliché; maybe this is excessive softness and/or detail. But that was the root of the problem, so I said it. And no one can take issue with that, can they?

Over to you:
So, any critics out there? What do you think of the rules? What about the people who’ve had their work critiqued – what was your experience like? Ever had a critique that you couldn’t act upon, for whatever reason? Hit the comments! but not too hard – they’re sensitive

]]> http://www.getmewriting.com/editing/how-to-critique/feed/ 3 http://www.getmewriting.com/longer-fiction/crafting-an-epic-part-two/ http://www.getmewriting.com/longer-fiction/crafting-an-epic-part-two/#comments Tue, 12 Mar 2013 08:30:21 +0000 Craig http://www.getmewriting.com/?p=1999 Wherein we speak of motivation, doubt, and fitting new material into the old. Part one, here.

So how have I been progressing with the Epic over the past few weeks then? Truthfully, my work has been slowing right down. For two main reasons. And those two reasons are what this post is about!

The Great Unknown

So I’ve actually been getting closer and closer to that point where I’ll move beyond the material I’ve previously written, and have to take that step off the edge, and start writing brand new material, continuing on from the point I’ve reached. In my last post, I mentioned an entirely new section I’d been working on, but that was set during the timescale I’d already drafted. That was buried deep in my comfort zone. And now that I’m closing on the point where I have to continue from where I left off all that time ago, it kinda scares me.

A little context. Way back when I started this project, it wasn’t as large scale as it is now. While the middle section was loose on the details, I had a rough idea of where it would eventually end up. However, during the writing, as is usually the case, a lot of details came up, expansions had to be made, and it became the behemoth it is today. It scares me because there is so much that I have to continue with.

Motivation

So this is what it boils down to. Motivation to write. And I think we can all agree, this isn’t particular to writing epics, but all writing. There are a number of factors to consider here, and I’ll start with the main one in this case.

Length – Writing a short story is a lot easier in terms of motivation than longer fiction. With suitable time and focus you can write a few thousand words in one sitting (first draft, of course). Knowing that something is as ‘easily’ achievable as that means you can be highly motivated for it.

Novellas are longer, but not too long that it seems daunting. Novels are slightly more daunting, and can be challenging depending on genre and content, and so you need a lot more motivation to push through. To drag out that tired old exercise metaphor again, short stories are sprints, novels can be akin to marathons and epics… a lot more.



If your manuscript starts to looks like this, it’s daunting. Image courtesy of Johann Dréo

Belief – Let’s be honest, belief is a big one. You have to believe in yourself. You have to believe in your characters, your ability to convey the complex issues you’re writing about, and above all, you have to believe that the story you’re writing is worth telling. Because if you don’t think people will be interested in what you have to say, then what is the point in saying it?

Personal Desire – Why am I personally writing this project? Because I enjoy the universe I’ve created for it. I enjoy most of the worlds I’ve created for my writing projects, because that’s what I like doing. Is this particular universe interesting? I would like to think so. It’s a bigger project than I’ve ever attempted before (as I said in my last post) and there have been some influences (subconscious and otherwise) – Neal Asher, George R. R. Martin, H.P. Lovecraft to name a few. But it is a new canvas to explore the usual themes that preoccupy me, and are evident in my other work, and it gives me opportunities to explore said themes in ways that haven’t occurred to me before.

But again, it scares me, because I’m approaching the end of the section where I know what’s happening, into the much more fluid middle section, and there are a lot of new and different threads to consider.

The Other Issue

The other reason my work has slowed this week is because the area I’ve reached in the redraft is part of what I’d written a long time ago. In the meantime, I have re-imagined a lot about the general flow of the project, and how this section fits within it. I have clarified to myself a lot of what is happening on this particular world, and why (in my original piece, this was part of the primary plot, while now it has diverged), and while the material I currently have is perfectly sound structure-wise, trying to fit the new stuff in contextually is difficult.

Yes, it’s boiling down to an editing issue.

A Fresh Take

Now I’ve done quite a lot of posts about the editing process, but this is a particular aspect that I haven’t talked about before. I know that it would probably be more productive to re-write the whole section from scratch. However, in this case, there are a lot of details in the existing material that I really like.



Must weave… old with… new! Image from sethoscope on the Flickrs.

I wonder, is this particular to just me, or do other writers do it? I’m not talking about the need to let some things go. We all know that as writers, we must be prepared to cut out favourite scenes if necessary. What I’m talking about here is that in the existing material there are turns of phrase, small character exchanges, or a particular description which I feel best sums up what I’m talking about. Just little flashes of inspiration which appeared organically out of the writing process.

Trying to keep the essence of those details while redrafting and adding new things is what’s slowing me down. It is a relatively simple sequence, I know what is happening and when, but conveying that with just the words is proving to be exceptionally difficult.

Painting the Canvas

In the original draft, I had interaction between two of my main characters and a whole bunch of nameless, faceless mooks. Cardboard cut-outs if you will. It was an interim scene, and it was quite flat. I should have (as I am now) used it as an opportunity to convey a whole bunch of information without just an info-dump.

So instead of a bunch of extras, I’ve now given (at least some of) the cardboard cut-out names and distinct personality, to flesh out the world they’re living in. In doing so, I’ve complicated the situation. Not to a great degree, in fact it’s been helpful because as I say, I’ve had a great deal of information to convey in a very short space of time, and now it’s not just dry exposition. Getting all of that information to match up and flow is a tricky balancing act.

Writing wouldn’t be fun if it was too easy though, would it?

So over to you readers. What methods do you use to keep yourself motivated to write? And how do you deal with the editing process when you hit those rough spots that remain slippy and hard to balance correctly? As ever, feed the comment monster below (it gets hungry).

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