General Q&A about the craft of professional writing, editing, and publishing. Questions about all types of writing are welcome -- fiction, technical documentation, scholarly articles, poetry, scriptwriting, blogs, and more.
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I wouldn't feel comfortable asking friends and family to read my work and getting their feedback. And I don't have an online platform to ask strangers. What are my other options?
I've heard a lot of people saying they skip descriptions if they are written as one bulk list, but others say it's important that we let the reader know what the character looks like and include al...
This seems to be a bit of a corner case. I have two articles, with the same first author, B. G. Cook. The first article has a second author, S. C. Cook. The other article has two other authors (G. ...
everyone! I'm just an English learner now, but I intend to use English in my career. I suppose everyone knows requirements to pass one of common English tests. Also I wish I became a student of a ...
There is a short story contest where the limit is five hundred (500) words and I want to know if that is a possible limit for a short story?
The premise of my scene is basically that MC is electrocuted by scientists trying to trigger some sort of power in him. I've been writing his view (3rd person) the whole time before, alas I'm only ...
Does a script usually have to come out like a play? Or, there should be a difference?
can anyone tell me whether the written Chinese name should be in the order of "surname + given name", or another way around? And of course, in academic writing. I am a PhD student in Bristol, I rec...
Let's say you decide to claim that time is absolute and not relative as Einstein said. Can you still use a title like "Einstein's time", "Relativity of time", "The geometry of time", "Time dilatati...
I am writing a book a about a normal girl investigating her friend's murder. I wanted to ask if it's possible that a normal person who is not a detective could actually solve a murder?
As a writer, I used to write short stories and poems. As a reader, fantasy is my favorite genre. I created some what of a language for my (first ) novel. It's phoneme, pronunciation, rules and ...
So I have multiple stories running in the same universe, and I want a Arc that includes all the main people from each of the stories my worry is that this will become to confusing and may overload ...
More specifically, consider the following examples: 1) Say my protagonist is a boy who has a lightning-bolt scar on his forehead, wears round glasses, and has dark hair and green eyes. His name is ...
I am looking to get a better understanding of different categories of material written in a newspaper. I had assumed two main types: 1) News (i.e. reporting of facts) -> objective (not debatabl...
Two people are dating, and one of them wants to tell the other they are humble, which they genuinely are. But I don't want it to seem like they're bragging or showing off about it. In normal conv...
So, I am writing a story based around a character that has the personality of a Computer. Emotionless, logical, does what he is told and if he can't or won't, will state it in the plainest way poss...
My sister is writing a book which incorporates elemental "magic" or control. Each person can use one of the four elements. We want to ensure that elemental control in everyday life seems natural an...
So my character is a Neko, which is half human and half cat, and I use her a lot in fighting scenes and I was wondering if anyone really knows how one could write that out, I assume that the fighti...
I'm working on a scene in a high-fantasy setting where the main characters greet each other for the first time. Part of the greeting is also a definition of what each of the characters mean to each...
I'm struggling trying to write a scene (fiction novel). I want to know if it would be confusing to write it this way: Paul shook his head, yanked away. “Sure it is, Mike. You left me there,” he...
Is the "very + [noun]" structure, as an emphasis on the noun, formal-enough for an academic paper? For example in the sentence below: "The environment had a significant impact on the state of his ...
I would love to have essays reviewed both in terms of quality writing and in terms of its content. I have researched a few sites but this service does not seem to exist.
I'm writing a thesis about the Accords by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision (BCBS). If I put a table exactly from the Accords, I write in the table note "Source: BCBS (year)". If I start...
I have been doing some research on citations and haven't been able to get a clear answer on this. When writing a project report, in which sections is it appropriate to include citations? In this...
I have a piece of dialogue which sounds great in my head, and the way the character says it is important, but it never looks right when I type it out. At first I tried this: “Looking and lookin...
I am interested in how to write compelling schemes, large-scale strategies and tactics etc. There are lots of fictional stories where the characters are amazing strategists, or incredibly intellig...
So, I understand that ancient mythologies and their characters such as Zeus etc are part of the public domain. However, what happens to individual interpretations of ancient texts? For example, a...
I wish to write an intercut scene for a novel, where two very contrasting things are happening at the same time. The technique works really well on the screen, but I think we can use the same techn...
For example: "Move!" I immediately side stepped him. OR "Move!" I immediately side stepped him. I know a new line of paragraph is needed for each speaker, but does the same rule apply in this...
I've written a short story about a true historical incident which involves a very famous person in history. The incident is true as are the people involved in it. But the story is a fictional eyewi...
I'm in the process of writing a mystery novel/novella and it conforms to the traditional/classic mystery novel, emulating that of Agatha Christie or A.C. Doyle. I'm having doubts as to the proper w...
How free are we to write a story that is set inside another universe, that doesn’t necessarily mention anyone or anything specifically about said universe? For example, let’s say that I want to wr...
I’m trying to improve my writing skills, doing both original works and facfiction, but there is a peculiar limitation to what I achieve. Despite being male, I fail to write from a male perspective ...
It is generally taken that if I tell you a joke, then have it explain why it's funny - it's not probably not funny. I continually return to one of my own short pieces. If I submit it I believe it ...
I wrote a piece of flash fiction as a mental exercise. I happened to listen to Glen Miller’s “Moonlight Serenade,” and happened to watch an episode of “Samurai Jack.” “Moonlight Serenade” is a so...
While writing blog post mostly on technical articles, I often come to dilema that does my post is too detailed for reader eventually they will skip further reading due to complexity or is it too s...
Basically, when dealing with non-fiction topics like business or security or Information Technology or any other factual topic, there is really only so many ways you can write the facts using the E...
I need to know how to make my writing more brief without maring its original meaning and message. I have been struggling with that for a while, and still cannot do that. It simply seems to me that ...
How to learn the powerful words, that usually gets the attention of readers first?
Suppose then you have an story in your mind. Then, to write down this finite series of events, you have to translate your imagination into the paper. This process isn't trivial, of course and plot ...
This question is strongly related to this one: Balance between character's point of views However, that question is asking about balancing POVs in general, whereas this one is about potentially su...
About 1/3 of the way through my story the main antagonist "wins" and is able to completely remake the world of the story into his notion of an ideal world. The "new" world shares some elements wit...
I'm having trouble with a particular sentence in my book. I had originally written: Monica’s group of friends was a diverse mixture of race, gender, and background. Having once been described as l...
I put work into making up my own names for spells. However, I feel like they come across as childish when I read over my writing This was also my impression when re-reading Harry Potter. It really...
I recently asked a question about my current project for a serialised e-story and was informed by the stalwarts that my format was not new. I contrast my own techniques with many of those being pro...
So I made a name for a character and his name is quite fancy so I have no idea what I should do with him. I named him, ready? Sir Nathaniel Charles III. Without asking for specific suggestions on ...
A personal point of view on the necessity of a new culture in fiction "A long time ago, in a galaxy far far away", "Pandora", "Dune", "Middle Earth". All quite different worlds compared to ours, b...
Something I talk about with friends when planning and sharing our projects & media we like is titles - and specifically my disdain for one-word titles. They seem to be more than dominant in mul...
I'm writing my thesis, and I use some acronyms in it. For example "MDBs" = "Multilateral Development Banks". Usually, I write "Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs)" the first time I cite it and ...
