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Yes, there is an objectively better place to start, and that is with character. This is not to say that it is the only place to start. As long as you put all the bits together in the end, it doesn'...
Here, I wrote this into an answer because what I want to show cannot be written as a comment. When I first read your post, it had not yet been formatted by Galastel. That's what I was referring to...
If the narrator is describing what a person said and thought, then the narrator can use their name. Typically direct thoughts of a character are in italics, while tags and words from the narrator a...
If you're writing for an American audience, with an American publisher, then use an American dialect for your narration. But... your character is living in England. Whether she's British or an im...
I completely agree that Tolkien’s racial hierarchies haven’t aged well. “That’s just Elf propaganda, and actually the Orcs are the exact opposite!” has become a cliché in and of itself. Here are ...
First of all, learn about the fantasy species you want to write about You want to populate your world with the traditional fantasy species, but your own perception of them appears to be based on o...
Use English English except where doing so would cause confusion, in which case use neutral words. If you can't do that, maybe clarify with extra information, (e.g. for "Year 8", you could also add ...
Humans don't all look the same, dress the same, speak the same language. Why should $FANTASYRACE? So you have Legolas elves. You should also have Rhea Perlman elves. You should have Lupita Nyong'...
An alternative could be to not discuss the skin color etc of the fantasy races but make the humans in the story dark-skinned. I think that Daughter of the Empire by Janny Wurts and Raymond E. Feist...
Grab a friend or family member and print out the scene so you each have it on paper. Ask the other person to read it out loud, acting it out to some degree. Was there a pause in your head that yo...
Starting from a blank page is always hard, so don’t beat yourself up. But there are tools that will help you get started: The first I would recommend is Scapple by Literature and Latte. Scapple ...
You start by starting. There is no other way. As to how to organize it, I like JK Rowling's approach. She broke her series down into 7 books (1 for each year at the magic school). She mappe...
Something that has helped me is to have a list of the chapters of the novel with a short summary of each one. Don't worry if there are gray spots on it, in fact that is good as it allows the story ...
It's an entirely Western thing to not have illustrations in novels. The general consensus I found in other boards is that, "Illustrations lack maturity, thus they are only in children's to YA books...
You could have scenes with a family next door or in the next apartment/flat that just moved in from the USA or Canada. Possibly the protagonist could often have to stop and mentally translate thei...
You have two choices here. If the object is truly inanimate and there are no surprises, then you are writing a history of the object. If the object is anthropomorphized (think Disney talking teac...
Short answer: You cannot. Human fundamentals never change. If you desire to narrate a story where against all odds certain Things about humanity have changed - dramatically - you ought to recogniz...
You'd need to highlight the challenges you think most typify the autistic experience. I'm an aspy my main personal challenge is reading body language, I have other issues but that's the one that ha...
You can do it. But the expectation has to be set that this is possible, and it should be written like a tragedy. The market for such a book may be small, but it isn't nonexistent. Check out the gr...
It is perfectly fine for your story to end with the "bad guy" winning. Consider for example George Orwell's 1984: He loved Big Brother Complete and utter defeat. 1984 is one of last century's...
Consider giving a pyrrhic victory to the good guys in the end as an alternative. A Pyrrhic victory is a victory that inflicts such a devastating toll on the victor that it is tantamount to defe...
I think Amadeus hit on the core of the issue with doing this - "good" ultimately triumphing over "evil" is by far the more popular archetype, and for very good reasons. Setting aside the idea of "...
Your girlfriend is correct that the bad guy winning at the end limits your audience, and will anger some readers. But it's important that you write your own book, not the book you think you should ...
Yes. A sterling example is the "Parker" series of books by Donald Westlake, written under the pen name Ricard Stark. Parker is a "bad guy" but the protagonist of the series, and always wins in the...
Yes, provided that it were not inevitable from the outset Suspense and uncertainty are vital ingredients to many a great novel. When it comes to making a good narrative, the outcome itself is less...
