Posts by DPT
For the agents--You will only need a perfect query letter and opening pages. If you find an agent that requests the full manuscript, you can explain your situation. If they find your story compelli...
My advice is to be certain these characters show up again, either as characters or as something else --like an idea, a value, a representation of those characters. I always fall back to Luke in St...
I think it is often cloaked. Bambi is an animal. Hobbits don't actually exist. Look at Narnia--real kids and heavy themes, but they're in a wardrobe so it's all imaginary. Even the memory of Narnia...
My answer is that you should read widely and then write and cite, because you want the foundation you're building upon to be rock solid. The risk of writing first and inserting later (which is a co...
Caveat: I have not read the book but I've thought about wants and needs in the past, and I typically see wants as external (e.g. money) and needs as internal (e.g. love). You said: In my char...
Without reading the other answers, my answer is that your premise is fine as long as you set the contract with the reader. The reader is fine with your premise if you do not promise a science-base...
Simple--Metrics. Count the number of named characters and the number of acts/chapters they are in. Named characters should appear in at least two chapters, to reward the reader for learning them,...
A complaint from readers if description is not sufficient goes something like: "It felt like floating heads were talking in a white room." Readers wish to feel grounded. You don't necessarily nee...
Answer: There are many tricks. But beware of symptomology. We are told that phrases like the examples below are 'showing,' but they are not the mark of good published authors. They are symptomolog...
Question: What's the best way to channel, handle, or survive this part of the writing process? Answer: Keep a notebook handy. Always. And, set aside time to spend with that character. But addit...
+1 to both suggestions. In addition: Play with an alternating viewpoint. There can be rich potential in viewing the same scene or battle from two different perspectives. Have the MC develop a r...
It will really depend on the story itself, the tone of it, how you present the story. The Lord of the Rings, for example, has a 'diverse' fantasy cast and no religion. It depends on the contract ...
I have learned over the past fifteen months of writing fiction that every scene needs to have tension and advance the plot. This is good. But, I find that as I read my novel (again and again) to ...
We are good at pattern recognition and if you keep the bizarre names to a minimum you should be OK. Long is fine, so long as they can be scanned and not confused with one another. I rather like T...
I think Standback has a great perspective here. Answer: Symptoms of crying are one thing. But you can do other things with this emotion, and you should. You can go into the character's thought p...
I think the nude scene in Titanic is 'tasteful' because of the motivations of the two characters. Sure, they are attracted to each other, but Rose at her heart is rebelling against her mother and h...
I'd suggest grouping them into manageable sizes, making some sort of joke out of it, and making mnemonics with their names. Here is a very bad example. It's only to make the point. Finding good n...
It sounds as though this is your first novel. Congratulations! You have accomplished something very few people ever do. To answer your question, consider these points. What is the arc of your st...
You go through piece by piece because you will want to assess each instance. Sorry. That's my answer. Someone may have an easier answer, but easy does not mean better. Look at each instance. Just d...
Ditto to the other answers. I break it down into specific goals. Each pass requires about a week. Check commas and other grammatical issues. Fix instances of passive voice. Make character voices c...
It depends. Are you in an omniscient perspective? Are you in a limited perspective? If limited, you'd only describe those attributes that the point-of-view character notices. So, if the point of v...
Yes, your instincts are correct. You are outlining your characters, which you need to know for yourself as the author, but you are putting that down on paper within the story - and - we do not need...
Don't toss out any literary device you have. Yes, this can work, and work well. In TV it's called the "How we got here" trope. Some examples are The Emperor's New Groove, Fight Club, Inception, an...
This may be opinion based. My advice is to at least finish it - and here's why. If you allow yourself to not finish, you are setting a precedent for yourself. You are patterning to you that you don...
The advice is simple. Nail your butt to the couch and type. It won't always be fun, and your first draft will be very bad. If your expectation is to finish a beautiful story painlessly with a bli...
