Activity for Mark Baker
| Type | On... | Excerpt | Status | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Answer | — |
A: Are About pages copyright? Yes, those pages are copyright. Copyright is automatic. Everything written is copyrighted from the moment it is written unless it has passed into the public domain or has been explicitly placed into the public domain by the copyright holder. So, it is not okay to copy anything from anywhere ever unl... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Internal and telepathic dialog There are no conventions for representing telepathic dialogue. This means you get to pick how you are going to do it. It also means that you have to clearly and explicitly establish your convention for the reader. A typographic change is certainly one way, but you will have to be very careful to make... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Finding a thematic setting I don't think it is reasonable to call a setting thematic in itself. It should also be said that a theme is not a message. A theme is what you deal with in a story or an essay, not what conclusions you reach about it. You can have two different works on the same theme that reach very different conclu... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Could I be overdoing it on my first story? Different writers work in different ways (you are going to hear the terms "plotter" and "pantsers" from multiple people -- plotters being those who plan first and pansters being those who just sit down and write). However, you should be aware that there is an entirely separate activity/hobby/avocati... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Are the following examples violations of first-person limited? First person limited is not a rule and therefore cannot be violated. It is an analytical category that can be used after the fact to describe what an author has done. The author's responsibility it to tell a compelling story, not to confine that story within an analytical category. If the story is go... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Does a technical writer need a technical background? Technical writing is a three legged stool. To do it well and efficiently, you need three things: - Sufficient knowledge of the user's task to figure out what they need to know and how to communicate it to them. - Sufficient knowledge of the technology to figure out how it works and what you need to... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Is it good to add 'I believe' at the beginning of the sentence? It is not necessary to qualify every statement you make. You are the one making the statement. It goes without saying that you believe the statement you are making. However, there are specific times when it is appropriate to add "I believe". - You are contrasting your belief with someone else's bel... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: What are the acts of a story? A play has certain practical requirements that are met by dividing it into acts: - It provides an opportunity to change the set or to redress the existing set. - It allows you to suggest a change of time or place to the audience. - It gives the audience a chance to pee and visit the snack bar. Part... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: How to protect my idea/design to re-publish a public domain book? No. There is no protection for literary ideas, only specific recorded works of literature. If the work is in the public domain it is in the public domain and your idea to publish it with illustrations is not something you can protect or prevent other people from doing. Multiple publishers publish wel... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: How can I have a war with no "good" or "evil" side? At a political level, many conflicts are simply contests for resources. For each side it is good that their wives and children should have enough to eat. Since there is not enough food available to feed both tribes, each feels justified in fighting to feed their families. In the age of extraordinary ... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Is active or passive voice more common in scientific writing? Discussions of the passive voice often cause more confusion than they avoid. It is always easier to see your way clear in these cases if you think in terms of naming or hiding the agent. In other words: > Tom kicked the dog. Here the agent is named. We know who did the kicking. > The dog was kicke... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Is it eccentric to address the reader in non-fiction writing? No, it is not eccentric at all. As I am sure you can tell from reading your two examples, the first is livelier and much easier to read -- and that is 95% of the argument in any question of style. But the use of the second person in any work that is discussing things that the reader might do has beco... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Is it better to self-publish or get a real publisher for a 100page humor/comedy ebook? There are four basic reasons to self publish: 1. The work is not good enough for a commercial publisher to accept. 2. You are not willing to put in the work to get it professionally published. 3. You are confident in your ability to market the book yourself and believe you will make more money pub... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Should I bother allowing images (headshots) for pen names? I would not assume that the reason for using a pen name is the desire for anonymity. Sometimes it is about marketing. If your name is Rock Hardplace and you write sweet romances, you probably want to use a pen name. Sometimes it is about disambiguation. If your name is Jonathan Kieth Rowling, you p... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Finding beta-readers for science | religion non-fiction Personally I would not favor looking for anonymous online beta readers for a project like this. Any project on the relationship of science and religion is going to attract cranks on both sides of the spectrum and the opinion of cranks is of no value. There are really three types of beta readers wort... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Where to put statistical signifance test results This is not an opinion based on academic practice, but on general writing principles: If you think that the typical reader is going to want to read the table when they get to it, include it inline since it creates an inconvenience to the reader to have to go look for it in the appendix. If you think... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Isn't word-choice important? There are occasions where word choice is very important. These usually come where you are trying to express a new idea or make a distinction that people do not usually make. Each word takes the reader's mind down a certain well worn path and if you want to get them off that path you may have to choos... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Is writing in fragments bad practice? In Story, Robert McKee warns very strongly about the dangers of writing in scenes. His point is that what makes a story is its overall arc. Given a set of characters you have invented, each with a particular motivation and a set of values that shape how they pursue their goals, it is easy to put almo... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Creating a fictional place within an actual city? All the world's a stage and all the men and women merely players. So sayeth the Bard, and he should know. No story is set in a real place. It is set on a stage created by the author, a stage designed carefully for the convenience of the author's plot. It may share names and physical features with so... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Should I use colons and semicolons to summarize information? > To quickly summarize: MIT is located in Massachusetts; FIU is in Florida. A colon is used to introduce an explanation or summary, so "To quickly summarize" is followed by a colon. A semicolon is used between two related independent clauses. "MIT is located in Massachusetts" and "FIU is in Florida... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Can a source be cited just to substantiate a claim, without specifically mentioning the author or the content? Using footnotes to substantiate claims of fact by reference to published sources is a common and accepted practice. However, it is more common in academic work, or in popular works that pretend to academic rigor. In popular work it is not common to footnote every claim of fact, but if you say somethi... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: What constitutes misleading the reader "Don't confuse the reader" is not a rule, but it is an action with consequences. You can decide to break a rule, but you cannot decide to exempt yourself from consequences. The consequence of confusing the reader is a confused reader. The probable consequence of a confused reader is an abandoned book... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Can I have two prologues How would this be different from having chapter one by about their birth, chapter two be about them at 10, and chapter 3 start the main adventure? This is a perfectly normal progression for many novels. A prolog, generally, is not simply an incident earlier in the career of the MC, it is in a differ... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Is it bad/distracting to mix dialogue and action too much? Since it is my answer you are referring to, I will take a stab at this. First, I would generally avoid saying that something is "bad" in writing. It is more useful to think in terms of everything having an effect. A given technique has a given effect. If it is the effect you want, it is a good techn... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Ways to reduce the -ing verbs in dialogue and action tags? I'm not entirely sure for your question whether you are trying to avoid the verb or avoid the entire clause. If you insert the action clause in the sentence, the ing verb is the right way to do it and anything else is going to sound forced and ugly. However, regardless of the ing verb issue, mixing ... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: How to make a character's personality trully distinguishable/memorable? In a nutshell, the answer is, humanity. A more human character is more memorable. The great authors are those who seem to have the greatest insight into what it means to be human. I don't think that comes from anything one could reasonably describe as technique, it is more a matter of careful observa... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Recaps: Yes, No, and How To? I can only speak to personal taste, but in the interest of generalization, I will try to justify my personal taste in this. I think serials should consist of stand alone novels that can be read independently. This is for four reasons. 1. Many of the serials I have read -- Sharpe, Aubrey/Maturin, Hor... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: When it comes to creating cadence, should I depend on my ear or are there principles I can follow? Prose cadence has mostly to do with making the emphasis in a sentence fall on the most important words: > But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate—we can not consecrate—we can not hallow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Do I have any control over the grammar of my novel? 1. English grammar is anything but black and white. Everything is debatable, even the definition of "word". 2. Punctuation is not grammar. This is a punctuation question, not a grammar question. 3. Your publisher probably has a preferred style guide that they want their authors to use. 4. Everythi... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Will Publishers Accept Alternate Planetology? Publishers will accept anything that they think people will buy. That is all ye know on earth and all ye need to know. (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: How does copyright generally work? Copyright is what it says it is, the right to make copies of a written work. Copyright covers a finished form of expression -- book, movie, etc. It does not cover an idea. There is no protection for ideas. Copyright is automatic. As soon as you write down an original work, you own the copyright on t... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Is there a hack to bring out your "true" voice? It should sound very far away from your internal voice. Your internal voice is the voice you use to talk to yourself and it has all kinds of advantages that your public voice cannot share, since you know yourself better, and have a complete stock of shared experiences with yourself, that no member of... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Text formatting Any decent text editor will have a function to unwrap lines. For example, you can download Notepad++ and install the TextFX plugin. Then highlight the text and choose TextFX \> TextFX Edit \> Unwrap text. (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: What are ways to make the protagonist's relationships with other people seem realistic? This is a pretty broad question and therefore this is a pretty broad answer. It all comes down to what is called the "telling detail". The word "telling" emphasises two things here. First it means "important", a detail that matters. Second it means a detail that gives information. A warrior walks in... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: What rights are needed to sell books on your website? IANAL, but when it comes to rights, it is generally the the right to make copies that is protected. If you own an existing copy of a book you can sell it just like you can sell a chair or a piano. However, the Supap Kirtsaeng case makes things a little more interesting. Publishers often sell books m... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: 'Filling' up a school setting without making a bunch of new characters? If a character knows the people in a crowded scene, they think of them by name, which indicates to the reader that they are in familiar surroundings. If they don't know the people in a scene, then they will tend to notice some prominent feature or action they are performing. If you don't name the in... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Do new writers stand a chance at a career without ambitions to write series? I think you are looking in the wrong part of the bookstore. Certainly that is not true in general fiction (by far the largest part of the fiction marketplace). There are plenty of best selling authors who do not write series. John Grisham is a good example, or Michael Crichton. It also depends on ho... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Is there a method to estimating the length of a work before writing it? I suspect not. Certainly I have never found any proportionality between a line of an outline and so many lines of finished text. A concept or event that you sum up in one line could take ten lines or a thousand lines to fully describe in exposition. Sometimes what seems like one chapter in an outline... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Making a blog for my book? The best place to get critiques is in a critique group or a writing class. In these settings you will get feedback from other writers, or from a writing teacher. These are people who are (to one extent or another) studying and practicing the craft of writing. They care about why things work and don't... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: How do I know what language is period-appropriate? Let's start with two basic observations: - All dialogue is artifice. People in Jane Austen's day did not speak like characters in a Jane Austen novel. Dialogue is not speech. Genuine transcribed speech is painful to read, almost inarticulate at times. Speech is a multimedia phenomenon. Dialogue has ... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: When can You Pause the Story and Speak Directly to the Reader? I think your premise is a little flawed here. The convention of the novel since its inception is that the narrative is addressed by the narrator to the reader, and that the narrator is free to relate events or to comment on them as they see fit. There is no fourth wall in the novel; there are no wall... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Using ellipses in a novel Editors care if you have a good story to tell and can tell is reasonably well. No manuscript was ever or will ever be rejected on the basis of spaces around an ellipsis. Four spelling errors on the first page, maybe. Spacing around an ellipsis, never. All that will get taken care of in copyediting an... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Why is getting a job in journalism so difficult without a degree? I very much doubt that there was any such thing as a degree in journalism in George Orwell's time. There has been a huge proliferation of degrees over the last half century or so, responding, I guess, to the demand of the upwardly mobile middle class to send all their children to university. Since th... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: How to find and keep readers and commenters for a diary like blog about mental health issues? Most of the marketing for content is by word of mouth. You build an audience by writing good content that people want to read. Slowly, the natural audience for that content will find it and will spread the word, slowly building an audience for you. You will notice that advertizing of books is rare, ... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: How can a book get a Kirkus Star, yet have no sales? A good review means the reviewer liked it. It does not mean anybody else did. Something can be intensely liked by a small group of people and ignored by everyone else. It can be a very fine example of a kind of literature that appeals to very few people. The my-childhood-was-wacky-because-my-parents-... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Satirical writing: how much can you say about famous athletes? This is essentially a question of libel. Is what you say about these athletes libelous or not. The laws governing libel different from one country to another, so it is impossible to give a definitive answer as to whether what you propose is libelous or not. Also, libel is not in the general concept, ... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: Can my character's name match someone in real life? How many Harry Potters do you think there are in the phone book? Or James Kirks? Literature would be full of some truly strange and wonderful names if no character could have a name borne by any real person. (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: What makes a poem a poem? Well, it's a very old question, and one that is not likely to get a definitive answer. It is perhaps worth making a distinction between poetry and verse. Verse is a literary form that is characterized by the use of rhythm to achieve literary effects, the most foundational of which is simply to make i... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: When do I successfully kill off an important secondary main character... in a series of five books? If you can't adequately develop sympathy for a character over the course of an entire book, then there is little hope of your readers ever reaching the end of that book. Of course you should be able to get your readers attached to Cancer by the end of book one, indeed, but you need to get them attac... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |
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A: How to interleave a story with context and introspection? In principle it works. Great magazine writers do it all the time. The thing is, at every turn of a story, you have to make the reader care. Detail for the sake of detail is just a distraction. If you include a detail it has to be what we call in the trade a "telling detail" it has to point to somethi... (more) |
— | over 7 years ago |