Activity for Mark Baker‭

Type	On...	Excerpt	Status	Date
Answer	—	A: Is it permissible to use subconclusions for argumentative paragraphs if they contain multiple arguments in support of the main point? It is certainly permissible because outside of specific educational programs, there are no prohibitions on paragraph structure that would make it impermissible. That topic-sentence etc. model is simply a particular systems of training wheels and there are innumerable good paragraphs that don't fit th... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How can I write about historical realities that readers mistakenly believe are unrealistic? I feel for you. I write about the Anglo-Saxon period in England and I am careful to portray my characters living and working in huts and wooden halls and guarding their villages with wooden palisades. No matter. My readers conjure up castles out of thin air. Of course, this is how fiction works -- h... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How do Red Herrings work? Stories run on anticipation. A reader keeps reading because the anticipate that certain things are going to happen, and that we are making progress towards those things happening. By and large, the reader reads on because they anticipate the enjoyment of watching those thing happen, and thus enjoy th... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: What are alternatives to "is that" as in "[something] is that [something]"? The alternative is to stop listening to people who say silly things like that. There is, unfortunately, a sub-culture of writers who obsess over the minutia of prose without having any actually stylistic skill. This means that come up with a collection of vacuous rules, and one of the most vacuous o... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Archetype or Stereotype? An archetype is a role. A stereotype is a bundle of characteristics. Thus the wizard (wise man, not necessarily magical) is an archetype character because he plays a specific role in the hero's journey (providing information, gifts, admonishment, or encouragement). A common set of characteristics c... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How much value do publishers and editors place on informative/educational content in fiction stories? It depends on the genre. The purpose of a story is to give pleasure to the reader. Learning things is certainly one of life's pleasures. In historical fiction, for instance, readers often take the story as a kind of history text and expect to learn things about the period. In age of sail novels, a la... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How many characters are too many? The number of characters in a novel is probably not a number you can fix. The number of characters in a scene, and in an arc, however, can be significant. Essentially, each character in a scene should create tension in the scene or arc, should shape the way the scene or arc unfolds. The basic test h... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How to construct a technical tutorial when the user can't verify the results after each step? There is not really much you can do in a situation like this other than to clearly alert the reader to the situation up front. If there is no way to verify the next five actions until you have completed all of them, put a warning in big shiny letters saying: > WARNING: The next five steps must all b... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How much agency should main characters have in the plot? At the heart of every story is a choice about values. The protagonist is brought to a point where they must choose between two things they value. This requires the ability to actually make the choice and accept the consequences. That much agency at least is required. On the other hand, there must be... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Are there any rules to follow about the narrator mixing past and present tense in writing? Stories are not written all in one tense. Even sentences are not written all in one tense: > I think I will go to Paris tomorrow, the place where I was born. The only thing that the concept of tense applies to is individual verbs. One of the uses of the present tense is to express general qualitie... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How do you show character reactions without making them do something physically that is unrealistic? Lamentably, a great many authors today are mentally acting out scenes in their heads because they are subconsciously directing a movie rather than writing a novel. Both the screen and the page are limited media. They do some things well and some things badly. Showing facial expressions and body lang... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: What could be done to generate and maintain reader interest in plots without a lot of conflict / tension? All stories are moral. That is, all stories are about a choice between values -- a choice that the protagonist does not want to make but is eventually forced to make. Saying that stories are moral does not mean that they make judgements about which choice is correct (though the readers often will). I... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Eliminating the Dash in Prose Writing The em dash does not mean pause. There is no piece of punctuation that means pause. The em dash is a more emphatic substitute for the comma, colon, or parentheses and can be used to indicate omitted words. If you need to indicate that someone pauses in speech, say "John paused". Be particularly awar... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Why do most literature magazines take so long (several weeks or months) to respond to submissions despite having only a few hundred subs per month? In addition to what GGx and robertcday have mentioned, it is because the submissions you are talking about, the over the transom submissions, are their lowest priority. Publishing houses, agencies, and magazines would much rather deal with people they know, people referred by people they know, people... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Describing an important emotional turmoil in the character's life I've never been through There is a very simple rule here: don't describe emotions; create them. You are creating an experience for the reader. If you describe emotions, you are creating a clinical experience, one that is detached from what is happening. But if people want a clinical experience, they usually turn to non-fict... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Can I assume readers will root for my protagonist in a man vs. beast story? For us to be interested in your protagonist, there must be more at stake than mere survival. Survival is merely a technical problem. The physical action of an escape story is usually used to explore a deeper escape story, one that is more psychological, more moral, in nature than physical. In facing ... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Mentioning quickly repeated events in first person? > I knocked several times but no one answered. No more than that. Any emotional response to knocking and getting no answer has to be set up in advance. Show us that a reply was expected. Show us that much depends on the reply. Show us that the lack of a reply is a sign of great peril. Then just say,... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How to describe something, that would normally be shown by facial expressions? Watch much less TV and read far more books. TV/Movie storytelling is different from book storytelling. If you are thinking in terms of facial expressions, your storytelling apparatus is running in video mode, not prose mode. Both prose and video are limited media. Prose has limited access to visual ... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Writing Unequal Societies (Without Supporting Inequality) While there are injustices in every society, and the rich and strong oppress the poor and weak in every society (including our own), current ideas about what is biased or unfair treatment can't be projected back on past societies. Modern society is highly anomalous in its individualism and in the cen... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Avoiding Slang whilst Writing Neither your individuality or your creativity is precious, no matter what they told you in kindergarten. Your story may or may not be precious, depending on whether it is any good or not. Creating a good story is not about expressing yourself (no matter what they told you in kindergarten), it is abou... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Avoiding Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy At the heart of every story there is a moral choice -- a choice about values. The hero will be brought by some means to a point where they must choose between two things that they love. They may choose well or ill. The consequences may be for good (comedy) or ill (tragedy), but there must be a choice... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: What is the structure and important points to cover in a first chapter? In classic story theory, a story begins in the normal world, the world from which the hero will be forced to depart and to which they will attempt to return, often transformed. This does not mean a physical journey, necessarily. A coming of age tale requires the hero to leave the normal world of chil... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Can I assign actions to broad concepts? Our speech and writing is full of anthropomorphic language. We ascribe actions to inanimate objects and abstractions all the time. It is almost impossible to communicate effectively without doing this. Unfortunately, there are people who think of language as a machine (rather like the way a programm... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Why do heroes need to have a physical mark? The idea of the anointed one is as old as recorded history and recorded literature. But we should remember that this idea exists in the context of societies in which everyone has a specific role to play. The rejection of this notion that everyone has a place and a role and a responsibility in the co... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How do experienced writers introduce the topic sentence halfway or near the end of the paragraph? Personally, I would regard this more as a critique of the notion of a topic sentence than as and evidence of skilled writing. The theory of the topic sentence is part of a theory of paragraph design that really doesn't hold much water when you look at the practice of real writers. So maybe the fact t... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How do I make "foreshadowing" more relevant in the early going? You can do almost anything if you make it a story. Want to foreshadow something that will happen in chapter 5. That's fine, as long as you do it in the context of a story in chapter 1. A novel is a long story made up of many smaller stories. Each turn, each event, each incident, is a story in its own... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How much can the supporting sentences deviate from the topic sentence before introducing a second paragraph becomes a better option? The paragraph is a very ill-defined unit of composition, and the rules of paragraph writing that they teach in schools (which is a kind of mini-essay format) has not a lot to do with how actual working writers write today. For certain, the paragraph has been getting shorter. In the 19th century you ... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How acceptable is "alternate history" in writing (nowadays)? You were right about your own taste. You may have been right about the taste of many other people as well. But as a general principle, you were wrong. Fiction is fiction. Fiction is all the stuff that didn't happen but should have. There is no part of life, experience, or history that is not ripe fo... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How can I convey an absolute truth from the author to the reader without a mentor character? If you want to say something to the reader, just say it. You are writing a novel, not a movie. You are narrating the whole thing and everything in it is said by you to the reader. In LOTR, Tolkien outright tells us all sorts of things. There are other things that we learn only when they are spoken b... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How to plan a short story for a given word count? A story is how long it is. The short story is a spare medium to begin with. You can't make a decently written story of X words X-500 words without taking something away from the story itself. I think a perennial short story writer develops a sense of what constitutes a 2500 word story. It is a 2500 ... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Do you have to write in the tone of ordinary speech? You should never write in the tone of ordinary speech. Ordinary speech is unreadable. It is repetitive, broken, trivial, and largely mindless. Dialogue is not speech. Dialogue should be crisp, relevant, coherent, readable, and should move the story along. As such, dialogue is always to a greater or ... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Does the degree of immersion in the character alter the extremity of plot points used? The most powerful magnifier of emotion is anticipation. Dread multiplies horror. All horror films play on this basic emotional truth. If you want to produce the most profound emotional impact on the reader, you must build their anticipation. Full immersion is not necessarily the best way to do this.... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Why is young adult romance now being written primarily in the first person? I doubt it is specific to romance. It seems to be everywhere. I keep finding books that have no reason to be in first person (and in some cases every reason not to be) which are in first person nonetheless. In part it may just be a fad. It's a bit like the way people wore blue jeans when I was growi... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Describing something that doesn't exist It looks like a fish bowl had a baby with a bike helmet. Images, not adjectives, are what you need to describe something that does not look like anything conventional. You won't get close to the details -- words are not good at imparting physical details, they are good at recalling images that the re... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Do I have to show my characters making up after an argument, or can it be implied when we see them on good terms again? It depends. In these matters, it always depends. It it advances or enriches the story, leave it in; if not, leave it out. There is no general rule that says such and such a thing always advances the story or such and such a thing never advances the story. It is always about the role it plays in the c... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Tools for organising anthologies In a month or two I will have a book out on how to do things like this (Structured Writing: Rhetoric and Process, from XML Press). The big question is, what are you going to use to do the selections based on the metadata and publish to the various output formats? Are you willing/able to write any co... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Slow buildup vs sudden introduction It all depends on the moral structure of the story. At the heart of every story is a choice about values. (With great power comes great responsibility, etc.) The more conventional structure would be to build up to by focussing on the choice that the hero has to make in order to fully realize their p... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: What is the most fundamental advice when it comes to writing? If you want to be a writer -- that is, someone who writes for a living -- as opposed specifically to being a novelist, then the money is in business writing: technical writing, science writing, marketing writing, medical writing, etc, etc. These are all reliable and lucrative careers that allow you ... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: No time to deal with emotional trauma Two thoughts. 1. Literature is not about the character's emotions. It is about the reader's emotions. In real life, every single TV cop and mystery series detective would be invalided out with PTSD by the traumas they endure. Most fictional heros are far more emotionally resilient that real people (... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Alternative for the Hero's journey (since it is about Ego) It strikes me looking at this that what the difference between true self and false self here can be summed up as contentment vs discontent. I would like to think that contentment was the true self and discontent a false self, but I think that is bollocks. Man is born to trouble and the sparks fly up... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Describe illustrated characters? I think there is a huge difference between an illustrated novel and a graphic novel. An illustrated novel is a novel that can stand on its own but to which the publisher of a particular edition has chosen to add pictures. There are various editions of Lord of the Rings, for instance, both illustrated... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Referencing a blog post in text? When it comes to citations, there is no universally correct method. There are various style guides that specify different ways of doing citations. Publications often specify that the articles or books that they publish must use a certain citation format. Certain academic disciplines may adopt a parti... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How to manage getting depressed by what my main character goes through? I'm not sure that you do get through this. A story is an experience. To write the story, you have to live the experience, emotionally at least. When a story does not ring true, I think that is usually because the writer chickened out of really putting themselves through the emotions, of fully immersi... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Should I describe a person or a room first? Setting is character. Where you meet someone tells you something about them. It may tell you a lot or it may tell you a little. It may tell you the most significant thing you need to know about them or it may tell you trivial things about them. It is either the space they designed or the space they ... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How to improve a "dry" scientific review article? Dry is not a precise or technical term in writing. It is more of an I-don't-know-what-it-is-but-I-know-I-don't-like-it term. There are a lot of those in writing because in the end it is the total effect of the writing that matters and either the total effect is pleasing or it is not. However, most w... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: What are the limits to description in story writing? How do I know if I have crossed them? The central issue here is not the extent of description, it is focus. Good prose allows the reader to focus on one thing at a time. When it is time to describe, it describes. When it is time to deal with action, it deals with the action. If a description of the setting is necessary to understand the ... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How common *are* happy endings? An ending does not have to be happy; it has to be satisfactory. That is, it has to affirm something that the reader believes, or wants to believe, about the world. That can be something sad. It is often something sad. Sad stuff happens and we have to deal with it. It is often preferable for people to... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: A question about Past Participle vs Simple Past in a novel Lauren's analysis is excellent. But there is one thing to add. Language is not a machine. It does not work by machine rules. It works by context and suggestion. > Her father had given it to her... This sentence establishes the context of what follows it. The use of had here is essential because it ... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: How do you handle editors who materially change your writing after publication? Editors edit. Often for the better. Sometimes for the worse. When an editor edits something in a way that changes the original meaning it is a sign that, however clear the statement was to you, you did not get it across successfully to at least one person -- the editor. I'm going through the edit p... (more)	—	over 6 years ago
Answer	—	A: Can I use LaTeX in a fictional code-weaving? ReStructuredText is a lightweight markup language with built in support for LaTeX math expressions: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/25793190/latex-in-rst-processed-with-pandoc (more)	—	over 6 years ago

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