Bittersweet Candy Bowl

Are you a budding author who wants to start writing fanciful stories of mystery, intrigue, and talking cats? Don’t know where to start? Feeling intimidated by your lack of experience? Then come on down to The Writing Aid Center! Where we transform you from a kid with an idea, to a fully fledged author!

Seriously though. Some people were asking for some writing tips, and I thought that this might be a good oportunity for the writers who have some skill and experience under their belts to step up to the plate and help out others who are less experienced and are looking for some tips, advice or strategies.

Obviously, I’m more than happy to help give any advice I can to those who ask, but I’d also request that some of the other writers who know a thing or two lend their knowledge to the cause.

If you’ve got some general tips, share them! Got a question that someone hasn’t already covered? Want to know how someone specific does something? Ask! It’s that simple people

Now, let’s get this show on the road!

Whenever I go to post my fanfiction under NSFW, it says that the page afterward where it should post is empty. Is something wrong?

To start things off, I’m going to perform some coppy-pasta, and repost the stuff I’ve already covered elsewhere.

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Tips!
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Write What You Know:
This ones pretty obvious, but until you find your feet and your confidence bolsters, write about familiar topics. Things that you personally know about or have experienced. It’s easier to draw from something real at first. Once you’ve mastered that…

Experiment:
Go outside your comfort zone once you’re feeling brave enough. Tackle a topic you know little to nothing about, or something that interests you, but you’ve never tried before. This is how you expand and grow. Write about a topic that you personally find unsettling! You’ll find that it can start to come through in the story if you are just as disturbed as your characters.

Obey The Rules:
Make sure you know the limitations of the world your creating, and stick to them. Do super heroes exist? Is it the same rules as reality? Are there mystical creatures? Can someone dodge a bullet? How much punishment can a character endure? Know the answers to this sort of stuff, and keep them consistent. This especially applies when you’re working in someone else’s established world, ala fan fiction.

Know Your Characters:
Who are they? What are their likes and dislikes? If someone were to ask you a random question about a character, you should have an answer. A well written character should practically write themselves. Think “Would this character do what I’m about to make them do?” But…

Don’t Be Controlled By Your Characters:
Remember. You are still the author. You still dictate what happens. Think a character wouldn’t do something you want them to do? Concoct a reason as to why they might! Think of a situation that forces them to make the response you want.

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Questions!
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“How do you go about organizing your thoughts in a way that you can translate them into a story?”

Well… Organizing your thoughts is sort of a subjective thing. People do it in different ways. Some people write down a time-line of events. Some people collect together all their story threads and place them in a list.

Personally? I just mentally correlate what exactly is the story that I want to tell, and how best can I tell it. I then sit down and start writing. I know not everyone can do that. But there’s so many strategies. One of the better ones I’ve heard is to keep a notepad, and make it your thoughts bible. Keep all your character notes, story ideas and scene constructs in one place that you can reference whenever you need it.

“How can you make yourself commit to writing a story once you’ve started?”

How do you commit to writing? THAT is a tough one… I struggle with that myself to be honest. Really, it’s just a matter of wanting to tell your story. Knowing that if you DON’T sit down and write it, then you’ll never be able to see people enjoying all your hard work.

Schedule some time to write. Clear an hour to just sit and write. Or alternatively, steal every free minute you have. I do the latter a lot. I write on my phone on the train more than anywhere else to be honest. Find a situation in which you’re a captive audience, and just write.

@Todd
The forums here do not work like regular forums. To create a new thread, at the bottom of the thread’s list, where you see the “Post Topic” section, you need to fill in the thread title (So in your case, the name of your story), and select the type of thread (NSFW in your case). Then you need to write the first post of the thread in the text box below the thread title, and click Post Topic with your name in the name field.

Please keep in mind when posting a story, that each post can be no longer than 5000 characters long (for reference, a character is every letter, space, or punctuation mark in the post), so double check how long the story is using word count, and if it’s too long, break it up into multiple posts. (Or alternatively, post the story to another site like www.fanfiction.net and then just post a link to it.)

Hope that answers your question!

Thank you for the tip! It’s posted and ready for feedback!

I’ll help give some advice!

Don’t under describe your settings.
If it is a place you will be visiting often in your story, tell us about it! You don’t have to describe everything but some paint on the canvas would be nice. Also,

Don’t over describe your settings. Don’t just dump a huge amount of info on us all at once. You’ll kill the mood, but just the right amount of setting description can work wonders.

Use correct punctuation and grammar! Kinda an obvious one but some people honestly don’t think people care about this stuff if they have an awesome story.This is never, ever true.

Don’t make every single one of your characters awesome. This gets annoying and old very quickly. Instead make a well rounded character and then let the audience slowly see how cool they are.

Not everyone has a terrible dark past. Not everyone’s parents are dead, abused them, or raped them. They weren’t all loners and outcasts. They didn’t all become orphans in a terrible car accident. They didn’t all kill their best friend. No one likes a constantly moody, annoying character.


And that’s all for now!

This page is just what I need. Now my editor’s work is cut in half!

Tee hee. This is marvellous. ^_^

*Clap clap clap*
Brilliant idea with this thread, Maverik! Brilliant idea. I’m not sure if I’m experienced enough to give tips or anything like that. I think I’ll just read and learn as new tips come.

I am trying to write a fic about the ever-loquacious Amaya. Conveying thoughts through emotion is a lot harder than I previously expected, and writing in the first person just pisses me off. Any thoughts?

@Sammy
I think the best way to write a fanfic where Amaya is the main character should be done in the first-person. Unless you are already doing that, in which case I’ll shut up.

No, I was writing it with a thought-pattern as speech, and any character interaction done through nods and smiles, which has become quite difficult..

eesh..I’ve been told I’m a decent enough writer but I personally have trouble getting started…

Just write it out however comes naturally. You can start it however you want, it doesn’t have t always be “Once apon a time”…

Writing AIDS! Teehee~

So I have a tip to throw out:

Spend as Much Time as You Can Reading: Stephen King puts a good time to shoot for as four to six hours a day. It’ll keep you thinking about a lot of things important to writing and storytelling in general.

i have a couple tips. i know, surprising.

Do Not Get Attached to Your Characters: now some people might say the opposite, but if you get too attached to a character, and its their time to kick the metaphorical bucket, bitch needs to die! if your too attached to a character however, it will make all the harder for you.
Call a Friend for Help: your friends are probably one of your best resources when it comes to things like but not limited to; feedback, editing, and being there when your down.
Write all of Your Ideas Somewhere: it may seem tedious, but it’s a great help. especially in those times of “writers block”.
Spelling like la commie said, grammar and punctuation. i’m adding spelling to the list.
Humour: know when to use it, and when not to use it. very important.

and all this from a guy who doesn’t write. (i edit though, don’t worry)

When writing a mass of dialouge, how would you separate it so it’s not “…” “…” “…” “…” (Not nessacerialy (spell fail) pauses, but you get what I’m saying, right?)

… your not being very clear… maybe an example?

Oh, kay.

“A blabla (goes on for 2 paragraphs),” Said the turtle.
“A blebla (paragraph),” said the rabbit.
“hfvhfd,” said the turtle.

And it kinda goes on for a good bit. How would you divide it and make it seem, I don’t know, realistic.

tab the beginning of the paragraph? sorry if im not being very helpful, very tired right now…

EDIT: oop, you could embelish more with speachyness..

ie: the turtle said “blablabla”
“blablabla” yelled the rabbit, “blabla”
“blablabla” countered the turtle

(not sure if thats what you were looking for or not… )

Well it’s worth the effort, thank you. ^_^

I know it’s kinda confusing. It’s okay. :U

@Jinx, slip little descriptions of the character’s actions or facial expressions every few long sentences. You don’t want this:

“I could be you any month, and week, any day at any time.” The rabbit said.

“I would like to think that I could beat you if I really set my mind to it. In fact, I accept you challenge of a race.” said the turtle.

Not saying you should do something like:

The rabbit scoffed, “I could beat you any month,” He held his head high, “any week,” He smiled proudly, “Any day at any time.” He crossed his arms with a smirk.

“I prefer to think,” The turtle said with a sigh, “That I could beat you,” He took a breath, “If I really set my mind to it.” He glared at the rabbit. “In fact,” He stated proudly, “I accept your challenge of a race.”

That is WAAAAAAY to much pausing, as where:

The rabbit scoffed, “I could beat you any month, any week, any day at any time.” He crossed his arms with a smirk and smiled proudly.

“I prefer to think, that I could beat you,” He sighed, “If I really set my mind to it.” He glared at the rabbit. “In fact, I accept your challenge of a race.”

That is much better (But you could also argue that a turtle might talk slowly so putting space and pause in his speech might be beneficial.)

great im doing a personal narrative today and turning it in tomorrow realy great for a study guide in my english class and extremly helpfull in real life

Can you be more specific on what you need?

Rule #1: Never give a prison profile of a character ever. Don’t describe the protagonist from the view of his bathroom mirror, and don’t describe new chracters as ” six-foot, two with blonde hair, chin-stuble, a basketball jersey, and baggy jeans.” Let your description be a mean of describing how the person looks in the eyes of a given character, or do SOMETHING to give us more information than just bland detail. Tell us he’s a towering six feet and change with a grungy Bull’s Jersey and a cocky smile shadowed with an ill-kempt beard.

Rule#2: After writing the first draft, break the story into subcomponents and try to find a more interesting order in which to tell them. Not everything needs to be explained in perfect chronological order.

Rule#3: Where good craft and skill is the nurishment of a story, suspense and conflict is the flavor. We don’t want an encyclopedic entry, we want cliffhangers and tension. We want to see people being brought to a breaking point where the parties involved will be permanently affected by the outcome. If you have a character in a car accident and all they lose is a couple bucks because they win a new one the next day, your story will suck.

Rule#4: Posting a first draft is like stuffing your junk in the front door of a beehive. Don’t. I’ve been laughed out of journals for submitting shoddy stories on a whim and it NEVER works. You may be lucky on a forum like this where fanfics typically don’t have anywhere close to the same standards, but this rule is meant to make your stuff better, so follow it.

Rule#5: If you type your stories: print it, read it for spelling/grammar, fix it, print it again, read it aloud for clarity and word choice, fix it, print it again, read it aloud again. As the writer you have a psychological disadvantage when reading your work as you will often superimpose what you think you wrote on the screen without actually seeing the mistakes you’ve made. If this isn’t enough to rid you of immersion-killing mistakes, read each sentence out loud starting from the last one to the first. this will put your story out of context and make each sentence stand out more clearly to you.

These bits of advice were taken directly from my favorite writing professor, who I spent four semesters learning under. It’s the best advice you can ask for.

Thank you Maverik for creating this, and thank you Leaving a Comment, (Jerk), Golden and Happehface for adding to it.

Not sure what I can add at this point…

Don’t dwell on your mistakes, learn from them.

Try to get feedback from outside sources for a little unbiased assessment and don’t feel that their criticisms are personal attacks. Simply take note and try again. Writing is an art form and like any skill it requires quite a bit of practice.

Keep pressing forward and never give up.

One thing we talked a lot about in class is time spent versus stories produced. Some famous writers only averaged a sentence a day… something to think about if you’re suffering from writer’s block.

Writer’s block is best cured by writing something different. If you’re a fiction/prose kind of person, try writing non-fictional poetry, make some mock journalism entries, try your hand at train of thought writing.

Train of thought is my most powerful source of concentration and learning. When I draw i typically waste 10-15 pages on useless doodles IN INK and I throw them all away unless I happen to make something good on one or an idea comes out that I like. I take notes for math class and write this way too. It’s simple: write absolutely ANYTHING that comes to mind no matter what until you see something you like.

Example: Taking tests. Professor’s a gay eagles fan. Cool tattoos logarithims-trig-pi. Paulina’s hot. Reply.

example made me think of tests > professor > eagles > his tattoos > our subjects > Pi made me think of Paulina > I looked up and saw reply. not the best situation since I’m not TRYING to write, but that’s what works for me.

@happeh: my train of thought is like wikipedia… within 5 pages, it always leads to hitler…

Number one top for writing: READ

@Golden: Dats fuk’d up yo.