Some advice

"Writing Advice: by Chuck Palahniuk

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 had always leaned on his locker when he’d go to open it. She’s 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 butt. 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. 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 roll 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 remembered 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.

(…)

For this month’s homework, pick through your writing and circle every “thought” verb. Then, find some way to eliminate it. Kill it by Un-packing it.

Then, pick through some published fiction and do the same thing. Be ruthless.

“Marty imagined fish, jumping in the moonlight…”

“Nancy recalled the way the wine tasted…”

“Larry knew he was a dead man…”

Find them. After that, find a way to re-write them. Make them stronger.”

A quoteful kind of day

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More Writing Quotes~

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Difference between a writer and an author

Writing has nothing to do with publishing. Nothing. People get totally confused about that. You write because you have to - you write because you can’t not write. The rest is show-business. I can’t state that too strongly. Just write - worry about the rest of it later, if you worry at all. What matters is what happens to you while you’re writing the story, the poem, the play. The rest is show-business.

Peter S. Beagle

In other words, being a writer is just about writing the story and having fun. While being an author is just about writing stories and getting paid to do it. 

Introducing characters ~ DON'T

A story without characters isn’t a story. There has to be at least one character, be it a person, animal, plant, alien, or mountain.

With that said, however, your characters can’t just randomly poof into the story (… unless they really do poof), or be treated as if they’ve been there since before the beginning.

• Poof! Here’s my 10-page biography 

“Let’s go get some cake,” Mark said.

Jenny also wanted to tag along. Jenny was a really nice girl, with really long chocolate brown hair and the smoothest skin I’ve ever seen. Her parents were divorced, but she was still a really happy kid. She’s shorter than me, but last year she was taller. Jenny’s also terrified of moths and grasshoppers because of an incident when she was little. When she was five…

We had never met Jenny, but that paragraph is too much for a first meeting. Going to get cake with someone new doesn’t mean you should proceed to give their life story. When you first introduce a character, I would suggest giving their name, their relation to the main character/narrator, and a few thoughts and opinions about them. We don’t have to learn about Jenny all at once, but by the time the story’s finished (and as long as she’s not a purposely-mysterious character or someone who was met within the last fifty pages) Jenny should be a close acquaintance to us.

• You’ve known me since birth

So after that example you’re understanding what I meant here, right? I think I explained it pretty well, and we’re on the same page, so let’s continue with our story.

Yes, the ‘You’ve known me since birth’ character is what I’d say to be the complete opposite of the ‘Poof! Here’s my 10-page biography’ character. If this one is the narrator’s best friend, you’ll be lucky to know their name. It’s very likely that you won’t know they’re the narrator’s best friend. It’s a confusing character because the readers are the only ones who don’t know. Every other character knows this guy (let’s call him Adam) Adam, so no one feels any inclination to shed some light on him, and it takes a very long time to learn whether or not he’s the school janitor or the president of the drama club (or both?). 

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10 Rules for Writers, Janet Fitch's style.

1. Write the sentence, not just the story 

Long ago I got a rejection from the editor of the Santa Monica Review, Jim Krusoe. It said: “Good enough story, but what’s unique about your sentences?” That was the best advice I ever got. Learn to look at your sentences, play with them, make sure there’s music, lots of edges and corners to the sounds. Read your work aloud. Read poetry aloud and try to heighten in every way your sensitivity to the sound and rhythm and shape of sentences. The music of words. I like Dylan Thomas best for this–the Ballad of the Long-Legged Bait. I also like Sexton, Eliot, and Brodsky for the poets and Durrell and Les Plesko for prose. A terrific exercise is to take a paragraph of someone’s writing who has a really strong style, and using their structure, substitute your own words for theirs, and see how they achieved their effects.

2. Pick a better verb 

Most people use twenty verbs to describe everything from a run in their stocking to the explosion of an atomic bomb. You know the ones: Was, did, had, made, went, looked… One-size-fits-all looks like crap on anyone. Sew yourself a custom made suit. Pick a better verb. Challenge all those verbs to really lift some weight for you.

3. Kill the cliché. 

When you’re writing, anything you’ve ever heard or read before is a cliché. They can be combinations of words: Cold sweat. Fire-engine red, or phrases: on the same page, level playing field, or metaphors: big as a house. So quiet you could hear a pin drop. Sometimes things themselves are cliches: fuzzy dice, pink flamingo lawn ornaments, long blonde hair. Just keep asking yourself, “Honestly, have I ever seen this before?” Even if Shakespeare wrote it, or Virginia Woolf, it’s a cliché. You’re a writer and you have to invent it from scratch, all by yourself. That’s why writing is a lot of work, and demands unflinching honesty.

4. Variety is the key. 

Most people write the same sentence over and over again. The same number of words–say, 8-10, or 10-12. The same sentence structure. Try to become stretchy–if you generally write 8 words, throw a 20 word sentence in there, and a few three-word shorties. If you’re generally a 20 word writer, make sure you throw in some threes, fivers and sevens, just to keep the reader from going crosseyed.

5. Explore sentences using dependent clauses.

A dependent clause (a sentence fragment set off by commas, dontcha know) helps you explore your story by moving you deeper into the sentence. It allows you to stop and think harder about what you’ve already written. Often the story you’re looking for is inside the sentence. The dependent clause helps you uncover it.

6. Use the landscape. 

Always tell us where we are. And don’t just tell us where something is, make it pay off. Use description of landscape to help you establish the emotional tone of the scene. Keep notes of how other authors establish mood and foreshadow events by describing the world around the character. Look at the openings of Fitzgerald stories, and Graham Greene, they’re great at this.

7. Smarten up your protagonist. 

Your protagonist is your reader’s portal into the story. The more observant he or she can be, the more vivid will be the world you’re creating. They don’t have to be super-educated, they just have to be mentally active. Keep them looking, thinking, wondering, remembering.

8. Learn to write dialogue. 

This involves more than I can discuss here, but do it. Read the writers of great prose dialogue–people like Robert Stone and Joan Didion. Compression, saying as little as possible, making everything carry much more than is actually said. Conflict. Dialogue as part of an ongoing world, not just voices in a dark room. Never say the obvious. Skip the meet and greet.

9. Write in scenes. 

What is a scene? a) A scene starts and ends in one place at one time (the Aristotelian unities of time and place–this stuff goes waaaayyyy back). b) A scene starts in one place emotionally and ends in another place emotionally. Starts angry, ends embarrassed. Starts lovestruck, ends disgusted. c) Something happens in a scene, whereby the character cannot go back to the way things were before. Make sure to finish a scene before you go on to the next. Make something happen.

10. Torture your protagonist.

The writer is both a sadist and a masochist. We create people we love, and then we torture them. The more we love them, and the more cleverly we torture them along the lines of their greatest vulnerability and fear, the better the story. Sometimes we try to protect them from getting booboos that are too big. Don’t. This is your protagonist, not your kid.

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WRITE

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Synonyms

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Use them and your writing won't sound boring. 

Show don't tell

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Read this to the end because it will definitely help you on how to show not tell. 
Secret paragraphing
How to show not tell

More links that you'll find useful

Rules for writing fiction

Authors telling you their rules for writing fiction. 

Part I
Part II

Seven things that will doom your novel. 

There are seven things you shouldn't do to your novel and that includes quitting, so here are ways to avoid them.

What is the difference between the prologue, introduction, and the first chapter? 

A writer that has the answers to your question about beginnings. 

Mistakes that you can make on the first page. 

There are about thirteen mistakes that you can make on the first page alone so read the link so you can avoid them.

What people shouldn't say to writers.

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Whisper Synonyms

Instead of whispered, consider:

• murmured
• mumbled
• muttered
• breathed
• sighed
• hissed
• mouthed
• uttered
• intoned
• susurrated
• purred
• said in an undertone
• gasped
• hinted
• said low
• said into someone’s ear
• said softly
• said under one’s breath
• said in hushed tones
• insinuated

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Just Write

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Just write, elves aren't going to do it for you, you know. 

Synonyms for emotions

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10 words you need to stop misspelling

http://infinite-swag-blog.tumblr.com/post/12632854678

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Just click on it, because the pictures are slightly sick minded (no nudity I swear), but they're funny.

An example would be these two pictures taken randomly from the post

And this one isn't inappropriate or funny just plain useful. 

So please, please, please, please don't forget the space between a lot. It's not one word peoples! That's probably my one worst pet peeves, in this world. When people think a lot is one word, when it's actually two. 

How to create a character and their personality.

Article found here on SUPERHERO NATION.


1. Find a list of character traits. I would recommend using the list from  SN, there's plenty of them, trust me. Or if you want something more visual...

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2. Now choose a couple of traits that are noticeable in your character(s). It can be two positive traits and one negative traits, or two positive and negative traits, or two negative traits and one positive trait. Just make sure your character has at least one positive and negative trait. No one can be perfect or that bad either. Plus it makes your readers want to connect to your character if they find traits that are like theirs, if that makes sense. 

3. Now ask yourself why your character is like the traits you chose out for him/her. 

So, why? 

It's probably a bit more helpful if you read the original article, because it might make a bit more sense. 

Also don't forget to fill out a character questionnaire, that can be found here. I would suggest just filling out the first five questions, so you can know what your character would look like. But you can do all of them, if you want to. 

Also, you don't have to use that questionnaire, there are others out there in the world. That was just one that I remembered at the moment. 

23 writing quotes

The original article can be found here on WRITER'S DIGEST. And in no way am I associated with it at all (like the writing and the posting). Now enjoy.

“If you have a story that seems worth telling, and you think you can tell it worthily, then the thing for you to do is to tell it, regardless of whether it has to do with sex, sailors or mounted policemen.”
—Dashiell Hammett, June 1924

“The writing of a novel is taking life as it already exists, not to report it but to make an object, toward the end that the finished work might contain this life inside it and offer it to the reader. The essence will not be, of course, the same thing as the raw material; it is not even of the same family of things. The novel is something that never was before and will not be again.”
—Eudora Welty, February 1970

“You yearn to turn out a book-length, your typewriter is silently shrieking abuse, you are itching to go. First read! Read the work of top-notch writers in your field. They know how! Read first for entertainment, then reread for analysis. Soak yourself in their stuff—for atmosphere, color, technique.”
—Fred East, June 1944

“One thing that helps is to give myself permission to write badly. I tell myself that I’m going to do my five or 10 pages no matter what, and that I can always tear them up the following morning if I want. I’ll have lost nothing—writing and tearing up five pages would leave me no further behind than if I took the day off.”
—Lawrence Block, June 1981

“The trap into which all writers have, will, or should fall into, of writing The Great American Watchamacallit, is such an uncluttered and inviting one that from time to time I’m sure even the greatest have to pull themselves up short by the Shift key to remind themselves that it is story first that they should write.”
—Harlan Ellison, January 1963

“It’s like making a movie: All sorts of accidental things will happen after you’ve set up the cameras. So you get lucky. Something will happen at the edge of the set and perhaps you start to go with that; you get some footage of that. You come into it accidentally. You set the story in motion and as you’re watching this thing begin, all these opportunities will show up. So, in order to exploit one thing or another, you may have to do research. You may have to find out more about Chinese immigrants, or you may have to find out about Halley’s Comet, or whatever, where you didn’t realize that you were going to have Chinese or Halley’s Comet in the story. So you do research on that, and it implies more, and the deeper you get into the story, the more it implies, the more suggestions it makes on the plot. Toward the end, the ending becomes inevitable.”
—Kurt Vonnegut, November 1985

“Don’t expect the puppets of your mind to become the people of your story. If they are not realities in your own mind, there is no mysterious alchemy in ink and paper that will turn wooden figures into flesh and blood.”
—Leslie Gordon Barnard, May 1923

“If you tell the reader that Bull Beezley is a brutal-faced, loose-lipped bully, with snake’s blood in his veins, the reader’s reaction may be, ‘Oh, yeah!’ But if you show the reader Bull Beezley raking the bloodied flanks of his weary, sweat-encrusted pony, and flogging the tottering, red-eyed animal with a quirt, or have him booting in the protruding ribs of a starved mongrel and, boy, the reader believes!”
—Fred East, June 1944

“We writers are apt to forget that, as the gunsmoke fogs and the hero rides wildly to the rescue, although the background of this furious action is fixed indelibly in our own minds, it is not fixed in the mind of the reader. He won’t see or feel it unless you make him—bearing always in mind that you can’t stop the gunfight or the racing horse to do the job.”
—Gunnison Steele, March 1944

“Plot, or evolution, is life responding to environment; and not only is this response always in terms of conflict, but the really great struggle, the epic struggle of creation, is the inner fight of the individual whereby the soul builds up character.”
—William Wallace Cook, July 1923

“Plot is people. Human emotions and desires founded on the realities of life, working at cross purposes, getting hotter and fiercer as they strike against each other until finally there’s an explosion—that’s Plot.”
—Leigh Brackett, July 1943

“You can’t write a novel all at once, any more than you can swallow a whale in one gulp. You do have to break it up into smaller chunks. But those smaller chunks aren’t good old familiar short stories. Novels aren’t built out of short stories. They are built out of scenes.”
—Orson Scott Card, September 1980

“Don’t leave your hero alone very long. Have at least two characters on stage whenever possible and let the conflict spark between them. There can be conflict with nature and your hero can struggle against storm or flood, but use discretion. … You could write a gripping story about a struggle between a lone trapper and a huge, clever wolf. But the wolf is practically humanized in such a story and fills every role of villain. The wolf too wants something and does something about it. A storm doesn’t want anything and that’s why its conflict with man is generally unsatisfactory. It doesn’t produce the rivalry which is the basis of good conflict.”
—Samuel Mines, March 1944

“The first sentence can’t be written until the final sentence is written.”
—Joyce Carol Oates, April 1986

“The writing of a mystery story is more of a sport than a fine art. It is a game between the writer and the reader. If, once in a while, a really fine book comes out of this contest, that is good; but the game’s the thing. If, on Page 4, the reader knows that the soda cracker is spread with butter mixed with arsenic, and later on this is proven to be true, then the reader has won the game. If, however, when the reader finishes the book, he says, ‘I didn’t get it—all the clues were there, plain as who killed Cock-Robin, but I didn’t get it,’ then the author has won the game. The author has to play fair, though. He has to arrange his clues in an orderly manner, so that the reader can see them if he looks hard enough.”
—Polly Simpson Macmanus, January 1962

“Authors of so-called ‘literary’ fiction insist that action, like plot, is vulgar and unworthy of a true artist. Don’t pay any attention to misguided advice of that sort. If you do, you will very likely starve trying to live on your writing income. Besides, the only writers who survive the ages are those who understand the need for action in a novel.”
—Dean R. Koontz, August 1981

“What the young writer is looking for is not a critic who will slap him on the back and say, ‘Greatest thing since O. Henry,’ but rather the one who will toss the manuscript down in disgust, with ‘You know better than that! It’s rotten! Do it all over again!’”
—Henry Sydnor Harrison, March 1923

“Make your novel readable. Make it easy to read, pleasant to read. This doesn’t mean flowery passages, ambitious flights of pyrotechnic verbiage; it means strong, simple, natural sentences.”
—Laurence D’Orsay, October 1929

“When your story is ready for rewrite, cut it to the bone. Get rid of every ounce of excess fat. This is going to hurt; revising a story down to the bare essentials is always a little like murdering children, but it must be done.”
—Stephen King, November 1973

“Loving your subject, you will write about it with the spontaneity and enthusiasm that will transmit itself to your reader. Loving your reader, you will respect him and want to please him. You will not write down to him. You will take infinite pains with your work. You will write well. And if you write well, you will get published.”
—Lee Wyndham, November 1962,

“Genius gives birth, talent delivers.”
—Jack Kerouac, January 1962

“Long patience and application saturated with your heart’s blood—you will either write or you will not—and the only way to find out whether you will or not is to try.”
—Jim Tully, October 1923

A book post

So you're a writer looking to improve your writing? Well, I would recommend a site (under writing links, it's invinsible not unless you scroll over it), but what if you didn't want to go on that site at the moment. What if you feel like picking up a book and read. Then, I would recommend a writing book, of course. Since this is a writing site. However, there's a bunch of books on writing. And I've only really read two of them, the rest I have yet to read.
So here's a writing book that I would recommend. It's easy, to get into and goes to the details a bit fast. It's also fun and interesting, and has some good writing tips in there.
It is...

Goodreads summary:

This is a hip how-to handbook on writing and publishing for aspiring young writers. In a fun, informative style, the authors show kids how to practice and improve their writing, get published, and maybe even become famous in the process. The book contains practical advice and cool insights from real kid authors. Writer wannabes will learn:

-- how to begin a career in writing


-- ways to explore the genres of poetry, journalism, fiction, and nonfiction


-- where to find inspiration for stories


-- how to approach publishers and get published


-- how to improve writing through creative exercises


Also included are profiles of ten young authors whose real-life successes send the message that getting one's work published is indeed possible.


My thoughts: It's written for teenagers, but I guess adults can use it too. It's fast to read and easy. There's some great tips in there. So if you want something that's fast and easy to read go get this book. And try the writing exercises as well.
It really helped me get into my kind of writing career, and learn what it takes to be a writer. I also learned what to do if I wanted to get my writing published. So as I said before go get it.

A quote by Alex Flinn

                A memory came to me. One time, in middle school, a famous author came to talk to our class and give a writing workshop. One of the things she told us about writing a novel was that the story should be about what the main character wants. Dorothy wants to go home to Kansas. George Milton wants a farm of his own. Amelia Sedley wants to marry her darling George and live happily ever after. The end of the story, according to the famous author, is when the character either gests what he wants or realizes he’s never going to get it. Or sometimes, she said, like Scarlett O’Hara in Gone With the Wind, realizes she doesn’t actually want what she thought she wanted all along.

- Alex Flinn, pg. 324 of Bewitching

                Think about what your character wants and try to have the plot around that. Also, think about does your character gets it in the end, doesn’t get it, or actually wanted something else all along.

Writer