Writing advice

I wrote a bunch over the years, and learned some tricks, that I've been sharing on my journal and blog. But mostly my advice boils down to,

Don't listen to advice about writing. Most of it is bad. In particular:

• outline if you like, but don't feel obligated;
• rewrite if you like, but don't feel obligated;
• write as long or short as the story demands.

That said, in my experience it's a lot easier to add than to cut, so if in doubt write sketchily and flesh it out later.

Links

This is good writing advice: Most writing advice is free, but the value varies. So Don’t Let Prescriptive Writing Advice Silence Your Authorial Voice. And consider the Fairy Tale as MFA Antidote, or as the author describes it, some writing advice from the stories that eschew all the writing advice.

Also this: Dear Olivia Rodrigo: Ignore the internet. “Originality” is overrated; I disagree with the explanation however: people expect "original" works because they've been conditioned to by old farts perpetuating Romantic notions.

More specifically, much roleplaying advice goes for writing too:

• Creativity versus Technical Skills
• please make your TTRPG characters Mary Sues
• Mind the Gap: some thoughts on writing for interactivity and the concept of leaving gaps in your writing

On a different note: The Boulder is Over His Conflicted Feelings: a rare nuanced take on the idea that conflict supposedly drives stories, which causes so much harm. Speaking of which, have d20 Power Relations. See also: Western vs. Eastern Storytelling, a thread on the Lemma Soft Forums, and more recently Reimagining Conflict on the SFWA blog. While we're at it, have a controversial one: Active Protagonists are a Tool of the Patriarchy. (Clickbait title, excellent point, especially for someone like me who wrote at least two novellas with passive protagonists.) And then, yet more about Worldwide Story Structures. More recently, there's Why I Hate Three Act Structure [sic], from which I'll quote just one line:

Not every story features an active protagonist. Not every story features an external conflict, either.

For more specific advice, try Dialogue in fiction: Part I – How to write authentic dialects and foreign accents. And still in the way of language, The Case for Semicolons: There are very few opportunities in life to have it both ways; semicolons are the rare instance in which you can; there is absolutely no downside.

(For a different kind of check, Are You Creating a Bigoted Story?)

But perhaps my old-time favorite is Dean Wesley Smith's series Killing the Top Ten Sacred Cows of Publishing, in particular #3, Rewriting.

Last modified: 28 November 2023; more writing.