Posts by System
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 ...
Mark Baker's response more-or-less says it all. Let me rephrase some of it: A book always has just one POV, namely that of the author, who is not necessarily a character. Then, the author may pret...
All bestselling fiction has a strong concept. The concept is the red thread that leads the reader through the story. It is the reference point against which the actions of the characters become mea...
The "darkest hour" does not fall at the end, as Daniel Cann claims, nor is it the second turning point, as FraEnrico asserts. The "darkest hour" is usually called the crisis. The crisis comes af...
Your question is too broad. I'll narrow it down for my answer. Procedure In the case of coauthored biographies, the coauthor typically interviews the primary author (and other persons), assembles...
"Text wall" is a term that describes user-generated content in internet forums or on social media sites that take longer to read than the average eight second attention span of internet users. The...
The question needs to be rephrased. Of course it is possible to write a story without any world-building. Here are some examples: War and Peace. Pride and Prejudice. The Autobiography of Malcolm X....
Some of the current answers are part of the problem that you have: they provide a cognitive approach. When your writing lacks "color" it lacks emotion. You cannot analyse other texts and conscious...
2. The one fundamental rule in scientific writing is clarity. Analogies, metaphors, and other figures of speech are never clear in their meaning but open to interpretation. When I say, for exampl...
I really think people are much too obsessed with not telling. Many of the novels I enjoy most, tell. Lots. If you have, for example, a group of characters recovering from a fight, just friggin' sa...
I won't repeat my answer to this related question here, but instead briefly remind you that writing about an alien world is exactly like writing about the real world. You are stuck on the idea that...
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...
Even when no-one steals my ideas, I don't want the bones of my book exhibited on the internet for all my readers and critics to pick over. I only post ideas and excerpts in closed forums with a sm...
There is no postmodern canon that you have to work through to be able to participate in postmodern intellectual and artistic discourse. If you want to create postmodern art (which is always at the ...
I studied literature at university. We spent a lot of time extracting meaning from texts, and some time on understanding the process of writers. From what I learned there, I can assure you that the...
As I see it, there are three possible uses for such a scene. You show the skill of your protagonist because you need your reader to know it later. Just saying that your knight is skilled is not s...
Can men fall in love with characters in novels? Of course they can. Men and women fall in love with fictional characters of all kind. Think of the teen girl pining after a boy group, or the teen b...
I agree with Standback, but his answer is not generally true. In this time and age, most readers of Fantasy and Science Fiction have seen so many Science Fiction and Fantasy movies that their mind...
Many authors avoid reading – or reading anything even remotely related to what they write – while they are writing, to avoid being influenced by the ideas and style of other writers. My recommendat...
I'm going to answer this from a different point of view. What you ask for, and what many inexperienced artists crave, is a secret or formula they can follow to create outstanding art. They read ho...
When I sit down and put words on paper or type into my computer, that aspect of creating a text (like a novel or software manual) is called "writing": I store the content of my text in letters. Bu...
For my editing markup I prefer a style that does not overlap and interfere with what might be part of the text I am editing. Since square brackets indicate comments or amendments in quotes in some...
When a phrase from a novel or movie becomes so widespread that it can be considered a common figure of speech, using it is no longer plagiarism. No-one in their right mind would accuse you of plag...
There are lists with YA bestsellers. What they don't tell me is which books are bought by girls, and which by boys. Are there any resources showing (YA) bestsellers by reader's gender?
