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He fancied himself a writer. His thesaurus was well worn at the spine and he considered that to be as important as his grandmothers bible. To have the same descriptive word used in the same chapter made him feel like a dolt. He was a child of the 90's, and this being 2009, meant that he was fresh out of high school. He had learned all about comparing himself to a tree and believed Shakespeare was a genius, because that's what his teacher told him. He never really understood what made him a genius, but if he could emulate him somehow, he might learn the secret art of the written word.
But alas... ALAS! He chocked to death on his own ego. |
This feels like some sort of ugly literary darwinism in action. :/
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YOU GOT
SERIFED! |
In all seriousness, there are many styles of witting. And yours falls into one that makes a shit ton of money, but will never win a serious award. Romance novel. Sorry, it's a heavy blow.
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Even shitty romance novels are written better than that. Plus, they usually have more than one adjective.
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My suggestion is to write a short story in it's most basic form and then write it again adding a little detail, and then once more to flesh it out were needed. If you practice with short stories you'll eventually find out what the readers needs to know vrs what the reader should be left to imagine.
When people read books, they need to be drawn into the story, one way of accomplishing that is to let the reader connect with the character. If you tell the reader his hair is brown, let the reader decide if it is a feather cut or how long based on the characters nature. Only go into detail when it is absolutely important to the storyline or if it is playing on a clever pun. Practice on short stories though. Have a decided beginning and end and try to make them meet in 500 words or less. You'll find that things you thought were important to the story are really just fluff and stuff. It's only a practice so don't beat yourself up over it. It's only going in the trash or a folder to be worked on again if you think it can go somewhere. |
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all the lawsuits. |
Or... screw form and modality, and just tell a story. Casually. No overblown verbiage (that was used semi-sarcastically, btw), none of the ordinary cumbersome shit that makes people lose their patience and move on. Write what "sounds" right, not what you think makes you look more sophisticated.
Also, when people (especially on forums like this) are confronted with a huge block of text, it almost automatically generates a TLDR response. |
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Blowjobs.
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whatever guys this is the next most popular movie and you know it.
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If you're interested in improving your writing techniques, there are loads of websites for people trying to produce works of literature.
My suggestions? First and foremost, make the story your own. Don't try to copy the style of another writer or use a certain style because "oh, it's a romance/comedy/murder/etc novel, it should use this style of writing". Don't try to string it out or make it a certain length. Just get the story down. You can always go back later and flesh parts out if you feel they ought to be bigger. My second suggestion is to make sure you know your characters and have them developed very well. If you develop your characters enough, they'll almost make their own choices in the story. Also, if you identify with them and understand them more, it will be much easier to figure out what they'll say or do. Finally, balance out your characters' personalities. Don't make everyone perfect. Don't make everyone win. No one likes a Mary Sue. |
YES, SEE HOW WELL IT WORKED FOR HER! SHE IS COMPLETELY WITHOUT HUMOR AND CAN SUCK THE LIFE OUT OF ANY PARTY. YOU SHOULD DO THIS.
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And I actually do have several character development arcs planned, specifically for the characters Lou; who grows to actually somewhat enjoy his condition, and Ben, who learns to accept his weakness and develop his true strengths. And I do have the personalities for the chracters well-defined, such as Lou being quiet and shy, Ben being very agressive and trying to overcompensate, Timothy as enjoying his condition very much and always being chipper and playful, amongst others. But enough about that. I am goign to start editing my story now. And hooboy, it needs a lot of editing. |
The problem with florid and overblown is this.
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If you have more to add in later, you can pull an Orson Scott Card and make multiple versions of the book ala Ender's Game. |
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YOU KNOW THE STORY! REWRITE IT! PRACTICE! The fluff and stuff helped support the weak pillars. Tear it down and start a new foundation that is free from the virus that spread throughout the paragraphs. |
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STOP TRYING TO HELP
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What is the most important part of writing? The story. Really is a shame though, it would have been a perfect exercise for you. Writing a paragraph every once in a while in which you have to consider the previus people and the future writers. But if you write in there it would only be trash. |
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Well, I posted the 2nd draft of Chapter 1, so take a look and see if anything improved, and what else I need to do the chang it to make it not suck other than removing all the most unweildy and stumbling prose (which I tried to do) And what weak pillars do you see other than craptastic prose? |
Here is what I mean by weak pillar. Let's just look at 1 paragraph.
It was night, with a full moon dominating the sky, twinkling stars speckled here and there. Lou was in a forest, lush and filled with trees of a beautiful, wild green, scattered throughout the forest floor, the leaves rustling as he moved and the moonlight shining upon his face. He was running through the forest, wearing nothing, moving on his hands and legs like an animal, running in between the trees to and fro, a powerful scent driving him on . Primal, animalistic thoughts ran through his head, thoughts egging him onward, urging him to run. Suddenly, he heard a rustling sound in the distance. He leapt into a patch of bushes to hide, slowly cocking his head out of the bushes to better view his prey. He saw a buck wander out into view, wandering around for some food one would suppose. Hunger tore at Lou’s stomach as he waited, hoping that he could sate it. As the deer drew nearer, he pounced up in the air, every part of his mind eagerly awaiting the feast that would come, every muscle of his body tensed for the kill, ready to slash and bite into it’s flesh and… He woke up. Now let's break it down to it's basic. Lou was in the forest under a full moon, running on all 4s lead by the scent of prey. The buck ahead of him never sensed his approach. He leaps into attack undetected, but he wakes up in the middle of it. That is the pillar you have to work with and it can't handle the weight of descriptive writing. You don't need to make it a big paragraph. I have read many-o two lined paragraphs and thoroughly enjoyed it. Every one is going to assume the stars are out if it's a full moon. Or maybe they see the full moon under a cloudy sky. Maybe that's what they want to see, why not give them the chance to see the sky they want to see. Does it matter so much if it is full of stars or not? Do the stars form a pattern that is important later in the story and will blow peoples mind because you are being witty? No, you are trying to force the stars on the reader. It will tire the reader from the get go to have to try to imagine exactly what you are telling them and they will automatically not want to read 200 pages more of it. Sure, if it was a poem they would know it will be over shortly and they will finish it. We are talking about the opening sentence here and all that is important is the full moon! This is why I feel editing it will not work at all and a rewrite is in order. |
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