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The term you want is verisimilitude. Basically, you want to avoid breaking the readers suspension of disbelief. This means that what happens must be consistent to the rules of what can happen that...
If they're on the Internet, someone has a copy of them. They are free now, and you will never have full control of them again. I won't swear to it, but I think when EL James got her book contract...
Body language and facial expressions work miracles. Using your example, if a person is scrunching their eyebrows, gritting their teeth, and glaring, we can safely assume that they are angry. The ot...
Besides my comment above about referencing the wrong item, in a more general sense, you can make a metaphor clearer by working backwards from your end result. If your end is "silence is golden," w...
Having read lauren Ipsum's comments, I am hesitant to build upon a metaphor you may be abandoning, still confronting obscurity in lyrics seems worthy of some effort. I disagree with the idea that ...
To me, there are two options: 1. Your list is a list The following fruits are healthy: apples bananas cherrys I love to eat them. Lists don't have punctuation. Even if ea...
A paragraph or chapter that outlines "possible future research directions" is a common part of many theses, placed near the conclusion. Do not treat it as "this is missing." Your thesis is complet...
Advice of that sort should rarely be taken absolutely. If you get advice like that from a reasonable person, they will not say, "Never use ..." but rather "Avoid ..." There are lots of writing tech...
Here's an idea: Make Your Story Available Get a google drive account. It's 100% free. write your story and save it on your google drive. share the document via URL -- it's easy to do -- then yo...
Often, sentences that use "thought" verbs tend to provide distance between the reader and the action. This might be intentional or not. Consider your example, rewritten without the "I thought about...
It's unlikely anyone will make that connection unaided, but, speaking as a big fan of lyrics, it's not necessarily a problem if people don't understand everything in your lyrics. Even more than is...
In first person (as Ken says) thought verbs are less necessary or unnecessary, but they can be crucial in third person and absolutely necessary. Mary knew Jack was lying, but she smiled anyway...
An essay is an essay is an essay. What I mean by that is, so long as you do not have specified requirements given to you by a professor or a publisher, your essay can reflect anything and everythin...
I'll be brief as the other answers are thorough and valuable. 1) Novels succeed because they are good stories. Three-act stories are consistently successful, but many books become bestsellers with...
It's usually better to plant yourself and describe the character through the eyes of the viewpoint character. It doesn't usually require too much of a change. Carla looked at John's gaunt face...
I agree with the other posts that if there is no story, there isn't much point in described the travel. But if you want to describe it, you should. A beautiful description is a beautiful descriptio...
For an example of just this being done brilliantly, read Harper Lee's Go Set a Watchman. A journey is a rite of passage, a gate between worlds. Handled correctly is it a fantastic way to open a nov...
You don't make him mention death eg "someday, you'll be the death of me..." Eg Star Wars You don't make him show pictures of home to his buddies. This is a DEAD giveaway (excuse my pun), especial...
Think about the purpose and effect of foreshadowing. If you are walking home and you see a column of smoke rising over your neighbourhood, you will probably rush forward with a lump in your throat ...
"it just feels like a chore to read these sections" For me, I typically find it a chore to read long stretches of lengthy description. The key for writing a chapter like you mentioned is dial...
Prison drama can be interesting and fascinating, actually. You can read books about real prison experiences for inspiration - I would recommend Inside: Life Behind Bars in America if you need a sta...
Probably the reason most of the prison cell sections you read were boring is because there was no conflict. Stories are mostly about Person A wanting to do something, and Person B (or Thing A, or s...
I prefer the first example. Example 2 sounds a bit wordy and the breaks in the writing (the parenthesis) make it sound choppier. I don't think you need the parenthesis around Chuck's name. Just ...
I think what you are missing is that all writing tells a story. Just because there is no love story or car chase, that does not mean your technical writing is not telling a story. You are just tell...
I agree with @mbakeranalecta that the purpose of tecnical writing is not to entertain but to inform. I recall a textboook on software development that I had in college where the text was regularly...
