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I think "striving for originality" is a key reason, but to that end it's fair to say that 99% of fantasy novels aren't set in this world (earth and it's various countries) they're set in their own ...
I will agree with Galastel, and add the following. If I were a plotter and intentionally writing a trilogy, I would provide some treatment (say 3 or 4 thousand words) of what is in the second book...
What I learned is that the writing process is something very subjective and what can work for me could not work for you and viceversa. However, the most important thing (especially if you are a be...
Overly descriptive scenes leave me wanting less; I don't read many newer novels because they spend way too many pages describing things instead of developing and telling an intriguing plot w...
There is a pervasive misunderstanding today about how language works. It is, in its operation, heavily symbolic and analogical. Can a fever rage? Of course it can. Language is naturally analogical,...
I take the "show don't tell" maxim to deal primarily with how my characters feel, or the content of their personality, and to mean "write about effects and manifestations, do not just state such th...
No. Simple answer. If it makes sense to the reader and people want to read on, do what you want with the plot. Twists can add a great deal to a novel. If you can keep thinking of them and the reade...
Goosebumps would probably be your closest bet to what you are looking for. It is children/teen series that does a PG horror/thriller story. I use to read them a ton growing up and I hate horror o...
To decide how many points of view (POVs) you can handle, you need to take into account the demands a new POV makes on you. Each POV needs character and voice. When you have more than one or two PO...
Point of view is nothing more than it says it is. The place where the story is viewed from. In movie terms, it is the position of the camera. To have a single POV is equivalent to shooting an entir...
The sad truth is that today, resumes are read by machines. Machines don't care about aesthetics. In fact, machines can be confused by the characters you insert to achieve aesthetic effect. If human...
All caps has come to mean shouting. You can have a voice which is harsh but not loud. So no, I wouldn't use all caps to mean something which is difficult to listen to. Describe it as "harsh" and le...
There are many ways to handle that. Almost too many, to be honest. I can't tell you which to pick, or if the way you are currently doing it is right or wrong. It all depends on your skill as a wri...
You can just have the humans call each other He, She, Person, People. The other species' then have their own variations of those words. I assume, in your work, that the two species eventually meet...
Different methods have been suggested for copyediting, that is, for finding spelling and grammar mistakes (such as printing text instead of copyediting at a screen, using a different font, reading ...
I agree with @S.Mitchell about chance being a major part of authorship in writing. It's good things can happen by chance. If it didn't happen at all, then what kind of writing would that be? To m...
Most of the time, it's important that the outcome — good or bad — follow from the main character's actions. If the outcome is determined by chance or randomness or coincidence, it's less likely to ...
There's nothing inherently wrong with chance occurrences, in my opinion. Coincidences happen frequently in real life, after all. Regardless, what happens by chance shouldn't necessarily be dict...
At extremes: yes, relying on "chance" as a plot device can be very unsatisfying. The reader knows that "chance" isn't really a matter of luck; instead, it's the author manipulating events. The re...
Life is full of chance occurrences. In many ways, though, our appetite for story is based on our appetite for a more logical, predictable world than we actually live in. We want stories to have the...
Daniel's answer is good, but I have an additional "yardstick" which may be helpful: Part of art, of any art form, is inviting the audience to contribute. It's even been said this is what makes it...
Readers of popular fiction (usually) want a clear protagonist, a clear goal, and a clear path of the protagonist to that goal. Readers also want the protagonist to struggle for his goal, so that wh...
I think that the answer depends on whether this is a, or the, main character in the story. The main character or main plot-driving character is the protagonist. Someone who opposes their goals is ...
Sticking to the technical grammar definition, a conjunction is a word that connects two phrases within the same sentence. If you start a sentence with a conjunction, one of the phrases is in a diff...
From the Chicago Manual of Style: There is a widespread belief—one with no historical or grammatical foundation—that it is an error to begin a sentence with a conjunction such as 'and', 'but', ...
