/lit/ - Literature

Is this the thread where you can get some critique?

Reposting this so that posters here can pitch their works.

>>20746080
James Krake's Ship of Fuls should be in the running. Never heard a bad thing said about it. Because it comes out this monday.

>>20746080

>>20746119
>posting the incomplete one

>>20746076
Not sure. We have to wait for pige to answer

>>20746140
Gardner can't handle that he's been removed on account of never having posted in /wg/ prior to shilling.

>>20746159
New friend detected. The OG /wg/ threads were filled with Gardner posting his progress.

>>20746159
What are you even talking about? CotC is in your picture, top right.

You skipped Faceless and the wine bottle one. Fix your shit son.

Egregore has a new cover too, doesn't it?

>>20746140
You’re right. It’s missing the 10 other F Gardner books.

>>20746168
>>20746171
See what I mean.

All together now.

Get lost Gardner.

>>20746076
You could.
Post what you have I will read it and see if I can impart any advice.

>>20746076
Post it. It's not like it's going anywhere.

You guys can just report the gardnerspammer so he won't shit up the thread

Here's a pretty cool concept:
A character is immune to military weapons and whatnot, but they only recently got this durability. They need to overcome their instincts and realize that no, bullets can't hurt them. It'll make them more effective.

>>20746168
There's not a single thread between july and september 2020 of /wg/, the first couple months of it existing, where that story is mentioned. You're not fooling anyone.

>>20746248
This, get lost Gardner!

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1EvEBLhm43ZERYAHkPW-1wTI7BIC2ovhEQIGJNzYl1Bw/edit

wreck me daddy
do u get cyberpunk vibes?

>>20746282
>do u get cyberpunk vibes?
Why should anyone read your writing when you disrespect the English language like this?

>>20746119
Why is every book on there so grim dark and edgy save the Emily project which is probably sexy about a killer woman.

>>20746282
>not allowing comments
I mean, I get why you wouldn't let 4channers vandalize your document, but you're not going to get good critique without it.

>>20746282
It's not good.
>Character is introduced by complaining
>Adverb abuse
>Uninteresting scene
>Description of the guy is told, not shown
>No plot
>No interesting worldbuilding
>Prose is rudimentary

>>20746076
You can never get critique if you're too pussy to post your writing :)

>>20746313
>do u get cyberpunk vibes?
>It's not good.
No shit?

>>20746313
thanks will work on it

>>20746282
moxy seems like a bitch

>>20746338
yes she is supposed to come across as a bitch

>>20746282
>anonymous liger
cute
I thought it was alright but I didn't get cyberpunk vibes. It just felt like stoners in a club although the one thing that stood out to me was it being called a "spark". I'm guessing this isn't what people normally call vapes and this is some scifi thing? I don't know how chap 1 is but this section reads off pretty normal, albeit colorful. That can be a good thing and people do say speculative fiction shouldn't jump into the scifi too fast but sometimes I feel like that advice is bullshit because Brave New World did the exact opposite.
I was a bit confused about the rainbow fumes, is that because of the strobe lights? It wouldn't hurt to describe a little more of the color in the room first if it makes that much of an affect on everything, wouldn't everything have a lot of color to it?
Also use emdashes ( — ) instead of hyphens if you are using that for the change in emphasis. Personally I would write this if you wanted to emphasize anything:
>—inhale...exhale—slow and measured.

>>20746298
how to enable comments?

>>20746344
how do you write emdashes. i can't find it on keyboard lol yeah the fumes are rainbow themselves not the strobe lights. i'll try to be clearer. thanks!

>>20746292
fk off faggit kek get off yer horsy ;)

>>20746365
depends on your computer
try holding Alt then press 0 1 5 1 for an emdash, and endash is 0 1 5 0. If it doesn't work look up a guide for your operating system.

>>20746349
Its under gdocs share settings (viewer -> comment) but I already read it and don't feel like goong back in to comment

>>20746171
>>20746181
Done.

>>20746386
Lol Gardner has literally written half of the /lit/ canon.

(excerpt from a story i was frequently posting in here a month back)
Ostra grabbed another stone and threw the first. There was a sharp cry of pain, a very human-sounding cry.
A boy appeared rubbing his head.
“Zotu!”
The boy blinked, stared for a time, and started to cry. He splashed over to Ostra and hugged him. “Gone… they are all gone.”
“Who is gone?”
With puffy eyes Zotu looked at Ostra.
“Everyone in the whole world.”
Ostra felt a chill. He looked over at Tsiqui who had pursed lips.
“That must have been quite challenging being all alone.”
Zotu looked at Tsiqui and recoiled.
“Who are you?”
“I’m Tsiqui, Ostra and I have been together since the sky fell.”
Zotu looked at Ostra and then Tsiqui studying them.
His eyes were large and he fidgeted. “So dark and cold….”
“Zotu… how did you manage to stay alive?”
Zotu’s eyes flitted upward. “I-i was in my house… There was a light then a loud bang!”
He clapped and shook his head. “It was much bigger. I don’t remember. But then it was dark and cold….”
His eyes drew away from Ostra and to the sky. “A man came and it wasn’t cold no more.”
As Zotu told his story they climbed out of the spring and got dressed. They had to go around the pool to find Zotu’s clothes which were barely more than rags. Ostra looked at Tsiqui and saw she was perplexed too.
“Where did you meet this man?”
Zotu shrugged and said he couldn’t remember.
Zotu led them over to a pile of boulders jutting out of the snow. Ostra sucked in his breath when he realized the stones were decorated. These had been part of the village. There was a break in the stone where a tunnel had been burrowed.
Zotu pointed a small finger at the hole. “I came from there.” Ostra blinked. The hole was only about the size of his fist. He thought about what he encountered last night and sucked in a breath. “It’s not the craziest thing I’ve seen or heard…”
Tsiqui walked around the rubble and let out a short shriek. Ostra nearly tripped over himself trying to get to her. Zotu stood there with tight lips and eyes that stared at the sky.
Ostra flinched when he saw the mangled corpse. He had been expecting this but seeing it made him pale. A gnarled frozen finger pointed at him. His eyes flickered over to the exposed skull which still had flesh clinging to it. The face had been scavanged by some rodent and the skull smiled through decay. The rest of the body had been crushed by the stone.
Zotu did not follow them around but they could see him looking up.
“It was so dark… so cold.”
Ostra gingerly touched his lips and uttered a prayer, but stopped when he noticed a bracelet hanging from the decomposing arm. It was red and blue. Ostra nearly fell to his knees but instead walked over to Tsiqui. He wanted to tell her to take Zotu back to the spring's warm waters, so he could search the area for more bodies. He was not strong enough and just stood there biting his lip.

>>20746409
Gardner has literally written every post expressing interest in his books, and most of the reviews on his goodreads account

>>20746409
Give me some time, I'll overtake him.

When will gardner stop shilling in this thread?

>>20746375
sweet changed it. thanks for your time anyway

>>20746419
Explain all the YouTube videos then.

>>20746424
The other books were added to. Not just Gardner’s.

>>20746386
>none of these books are any good

>>20746484
Stop seething Gardner, it’s literally just you that sucks. Everyone else on that list has at least enough skill to write something fun, stop being a spoiled brat and practice some more if you want respect

>>20746493
>implying Gardner cares about the “respect” of some jealous loser.

Lol. Lmao even.

Thoughts on this

They ignored her.

“Did you see the second question? What the fuck? He spent two minutes talking about it in class a month ago! That was five points!” Said a girl in a jokingly exasperated tone, clinging to the guy who sat next to her in class. Guess they were dating now.

They were talking outside the entrance to the university. Close to them another group discussed a controversial question, making bets on who got it right.

She tried to butt in again, waiting for her turn in the conversation. “What second question? The tests weren’t all the same.” The teacher liked to mix the questions.

The girl and the little group looked at her. “The diffusion one, I think.” Thomas said. He was a chubby guy, sat in front of her in class and was one of the only pleasant people on this trash heap. He also vanished after every class. Too much work, he always said.

“Dunno.” The girl responded, disinterested, and went on to talk about other things.

They didn’t really aim to be mean, she guessed.

No, they weren’t being mean. She was just the girl that sat nearby, the one that wasn’t really quiet but never really said anything important. The one line responses were still infuriating.

When the semester started she said to herself that she would put in some effort and try to get to know her colleagues and make some friends. She failed. The time for making friends was over, the semester was already ending.

Making friends wasn’t my only failure. She thought when she recalled the test. She wasn’t going to pass. Spending your days sleeping and browsing the internet was bad for your grades.

She adjusted her backpack, putting the second strap on her shoulder and removing her hoodie from under it.

I’m out.

She remembered something when she saw one of her classmates shouting about the bets they were making, then made her way to them.

“Alex.” The blond man didn’t hear her, paying attention to the group.

She tried to zip up her cheap hoodie jacket, finally managing to lock the zipper in place, but the fake fur made it difficult to close.

“Hey!” She half shouted at him, getting him to pay attention.

“I heard something about drinks tonight? What’s everyone doing?”

He spent a second thinking. “I didn’t hear anything,” Alex said. “And I have some things to do.”

She nodded and left.

>>20746248
For some reason, people don't report the spammer, they would rather respond to him, I just say report him, it would clean /wg/.

>>20746537
is this annoying to read?

>>20746535
And this

>>20746459
Don't care. Stop shilling gardner.

>>20746544
Mentioning Gardner isn’t a spam. He’s the biggest writer from these generals. So, the most relevant thing you could post about other than your own writing. Which btw should really be the focus of these generals again. Not solely self promotion.

>>20746535
>>20746560
Fuck off.

>>20746564
Fuck off gardner.

>>20746535
There is no good media because all the good writers left back during the recession and the occupy era. Good writers were replaced with diversity hires and women. Reality television and cgi made writing even more poor. So you are left with agenda driven shit that falls into post nuclear family trash concepts. Also they have an invested interest in keeping everyone bitter. Look at kpop versus western pop. Kpop is mostly happy, upbeat, and romantic, western pop is nasty and bitter.

>>20746566
This is the spammer. The guy who shits on everybody here.

>>20746560
Based Lucas as always

>They ignored her.
(Who)?

>“Did you see the second question? What the fuck? He spent two minutes talking about it in class a month ago! That was five points!” Said a girl
>in a jokingly exasperated tone, clinging to the guy who sat next to her in class.
You don't need this sentence at all
>Guess they were dating now.
Why is this important? If not, delete it.

And the rest of it is more or less the same. There's a lot of pointless sentences that set up nothing in the scene besides a bunch of sluts talking about a test. Other than that none of it matters.

>I'm out.
Exactly. Also who's who?

>>20746588
>who
the main character
>no need
it's fluff

the i'm out is in italic
I'm trying to go for some realism, what do you think?

>>20746537
i can't tell who is who. who's they? who's she?
also the teacher liked to mix the questions is unnecessary, we get it.

>>20746282
it's actually alright. it's fun enough.

>>20746119
What kind of story is missing from this list? I will write it.

>>20746417
Any thoughts? I know it lacks context but is it suspenseful?

>>20746417
Work a bit on the formating if it looks like that in the original document. Also too much telling, but maybe it's just this part. It's readable so that's the most important thing done.

>>20746692
A good Gardner novel.

>>20746424
Hopefully he'll get hit by a van like Stephen King but die instead.

>>20746790
The formatting came from copying it here thanks for the read

>>20746564
This. How on earth is it spam? F Gardner was the first ever anon from /wg/ to finish his books. He’s more so an inspiration for me than anything.

>>20746692
A true Western.

>>20746812
That would honestly be Ouroboros. Which somehow is never spammed. CotC seems to be the only one that gets memed.

Climate change will cause environmental problems that will escalate to supply chain issues and food shortages around the world as well as making certain areas of Earth near uninhabitable for extremely long periods of time.
This incoming ‘filter’ is a global environmental disaster that will be weathered by enormous amounts of funds, dedicated to keeping a small group of elite alive.

The reality is that little can be done in regards to stopping this, the ‘Event Horizon’ has been crossed long ago with the growing population of Earth and we are experiencing environmental effects not predicted for 50 years. The disasters that the scientists told us were coming tomorrow, are here today.

Overpopulation and Resource Overcompetition

Humanity is now facing the reality of a finite Earth. A path that leads to the eventual downfall of humans on this earth, a path that has ignored the dignity and suffering of so many sentient beings, fuelled by the opportunistic growths of a capitalistic system.
A systematic change brought about by the downfall and consequences of society will be the catalyst for change that brings forth the next world order. But the reality is that wealth and systematic greed has brought about irrevocable mistakes and flaws of the enduring, corrupted past.

A dysgenic evolutionary by-product of a world that caters to the most wealthy individual, society or nation, has created generations that have inherited all the overlooked flaws of genetic and cultural shortcomings, we are literally saving the most unworthy.

Outdated Religious doctrines

There are less believers now than there have ever been in history, it just doesn’t mean as much to the common person as it did, even 50 years ago. Religion never accounted for technology, it never made the assumption that there would be gender movements, there’s little relevant philosophy that isn’t ambiguous and confusing and science is almost completely out of the question.

There’s no wonder why religion has been on the decline in the last 50 years and unfortunately, aside from the field of self-help development, which is in its infancy and not nearly complete in its doctrines, nothing has been offered to be a suitable replacement to religion in this modern age.

God is effectively a forgotten entity, the great plan is subdued for individual happiness, collective spiritualism is often tainted by sexual, violent or greedy behaviour.
Honour, righteousness and dignity are far gone conceptions in this day and age, without God serving as a greater force of fear to instil piety and discipline. But without greater insight to serve the psychological needs of the masses, depravity has seeded itself throughout the modern generations.

>>20746857
Climate change is a fucking bureaucratic meme pushed by the ipcc kys retard. If the temperature increases another degree we will be in the climate optimum the era where humans invented agriculture

>>20746833
>That would honestly be Ouroboros
Honestly it would not be anything Gardner has ever written or ever will.

>>20746827
You're not from /wg/ and no amount of astroturfing or shilling will ever change that.

>>20746875
can you source your claim?
>i still think it's real

>>20746887
I am not the meme author, mate. See>>20746168
If you don’t know this then you need to lurk more. What have you written? You don’t speak for all of us. And Gardner and many other writers here (including myself) have actively participated. You are the one treat needs to prove yourself if anything. Go be a crab in a bucket in another thread if you don’t want to be part of /wg./ These threads are supposed to be about writing.

>>20746910
*who needs

I’m done feeding the troll now.

>>20746890
I'm not playing this game with you. Climate gate proved scientists were colluding to fake data to make the slight increase in temps over the last hundred years seem far more drastic by hiding the decline in temperature from 1940 to 1970

Go read state of fear by Michael Crichton

>>20746073
miniMAG

still looking for submissions

minimagsubmissions@gmail.com

Used to feel bad about spamming the thread, but hey- atleast this ain't a Gardner post

>>20746417
i want to be like "establish this... establish that.... establish if these are even humans...." but it's entirely possible you did that previously in the story so idk

>>20746537
>>20746638
everything this guy said

you did good at making her pitiful

I do find myself wondering why she's so pitiful though? Like most university guys would give attention to any girl with a pulse

>>20746910
You're defending him to the point of just flat out lying. If you're not Gardner that's even more pathetic.

>>20746910
He’s half right. F Gardner doesn’t participate on /wg/ ANYMORE. But he used to. Then he bowed out. The amount of seething when he finally published the writings he posted here was unreal.

>>20745899
That wasn't me.
I was working when >>20745503 was posted.
Do you even have a job?
>>20746294
"The Mystery Of The Real Live Dead Person" isn't dark or edgy; it's a ludicrous mystery.

>>20746921
Also the "record temperatures" if even true are due to urbanization such as buildings and asphalt trapping heat. Humans and plants thrive in warmer temperatures with higher co2 levels

>>20746942
We have been through this before. Where anons have posted the archived threads from two years ago. I’m not going to take the bait from you anymore. Either post your writing or shut up.

>>20746946
Post links to the archives with his WIP or shut the fuck up forever.

>>20746951
see
>>20746959

>>20746959
No. I told you the exact dates they’re from. Just Google whenever Call of the Crocodile was published. I’m not going to spoon feed you. Your post is off topic.

>>20745058
None. Make $1500 from book sales a month gross and about over $600 a month from online writing. Will quit full time job when income hits 10k a month

>>20746969
He can bitch all he wants. F Gardner’s solidified into the /lit/ canon.

>>20746972
What type of books do you sell and what do you write about online?

>>20746969
No. Post the links or shut the fuck forever. That's the ultimatum Gardner.

>>20746921
i typed out a bunch but realised i shouldnt respond to you. at least i dont have to worry about you outcompeting me in the new world order

>>20746857
does anyone else have anyhting to add? how does it read? is it interesting? hooky?

>>20746939
minimag.space

new issue tomorrow

>>20746951
>post your writing
OK.

>>20740107
For FFA: A lie is taken seriously, with far worse consequences than the truth
Suggested title: The Truth Shall Set You Free
New prompt: Young child suddenly becomes elderly

Raymond paced back and forth nervously. He had to turn frequently; the cell holding him measured only six feet on each side. The bed, sink, and toilet took up half the available floor space; it left little room for anything else. He glumly noted the absence of any vent to the outside; most cells had at least a barred opening. The stale air felt cloying; they had buried him deeply in this labyrinthine building. Would he ever see daylight again? Given what he had done, probably not.
He almost couldn't believe his luck; he had learned the dictator was going to be driven down a specific street within a narrow window of time. He owned an unregistered rifle, handed down from his grandfather to his father, and now was his. Ammunition had been scrounged from many sources, including corrupt policemen. He had the chance to fire his shot from an open window in a tall building, the method and materials to wipe his fingerprints, and the perfect hiding spot for his rifle. The authorities swept the building after the incident, arresting everyone inside, but he was confident they would never find his weapon. And with so many other people to sort through, he was confident he could remain unnoticed.
He angrily kicked the bars of his cell. It was so unfair! The dictator was widely hated; he had ruled with an iron fist since day one. He made people disappear on a whim. Raymond was positive most citizens felt the way he did. He believed he should be hailed as a hero, not suffocated in this stagnant hole.
He closed his eyes and issued a haughty prayer; if there is a God, He will have to beg my forgiveness.

>>20746992
His hair stood on end as heavy footsteps approached. A burly pair of cops suddenly obstructed his view; one unlocked the cell as the other muttered furiously, glaring at Raymond. As soon as the door opened, the cop grabbed Raymond and yanked him out of the cell, pushing him roughly down the hallway. "Hey!" he complained. "Ease up!"
"Not a chance," came the curt reply. "*You* know what you did. You deserve to be treated this way."
"You should be careful," Raymond crowed. "You don't want to hurt your fists on my account."
He felt the back of his shirt tighten up right before he found himself flung into the unforgiving concrete wall. A shock of pain overwhelmed him, and he crumpled to the floor. "My fists will be just fine," he heard the cop gloat. In an instant, he was pulled to his feet and the forced march continued.
After what seemed like a long journey, Raymond entered a small courtroom. There were tables for opposing counsel, but no space for a jury, and only enough seats for a handful of witnesses. He felt a chill overwhelm him; he had heard of courts like these. They were known for dispensing swift and brutal justice. The door slammed behind him; he was alone in here except for the judge and one of the cops.
"Raymond Izquieda," the judge intoned, "you stand accused of assassinating the President."
"I demand a lawyer!" he bellowed. He felt himself shoved from behind, and collided painfully with the floor. Righteous indignation gave him the strength to stand up quickly. "Did you see that?!" he fumed.
"Indeed I did," the judge scolded, waving his gavel menacingly. "Keep this up and I'll strike you myself." Raymond swallowed hard as his shoulders slumped.
"The standard punishment is to be tortured to death," the judge warned. "But we can reduce that to painless execution if you confess. Maybe even life imprisonment. But it all depends on your cooperation."
"You have nothing on me," Raymond growled. "I'm innocent." He remained calm; he was highly confident they could never prove it. After all, he had done a *really* good job of covering his tracks. He just had to hold out against this abusive interrogation.
The door opened; all turned to look. It was one of the many bureaucrats that worked in the building. "Your honor?" he interrupted. "We found the guy. He gave us a full confession, and produced the weapon."
Raymond felt his blood chill. What was going on? He stared hotly at the interloper as the other two glared silently. No one spoke for a moment.

>>20746995
The judge and cop brightened visibly, and broke out into a laugh. "I can't wait to meet him!" the judge chimed.
"Me either!" the cop trilled. He turned to Raymond. "We can stop this now. Come with me."
They started to leave the courtroom; Raymond's face was pure confusion. "So that's it?"
"Well, sure," the judge explained. "Everyone hated the President. We're just as glad he's dead as everyone else!"
"Yeah!" the cop gushed. "The assassin is likely to become our new national hero! Maybe even President!"
Raymond stopped walking and stared incredulously. "But *I'm* the assassin!"
The judge beheld him dubiously. "You are?"
"Yes!" Raymond asserted.
The cop pointed uncertainly at the bureaucrat. "But we just got a confession."
"He's lying!" Raymond maintained.
The judge looked thoughtful. "You're sure about this?"
"Yes!" Raymond declared.
The cop and judge exchanged uneasy glances, then shook their heads sadly. "I'm sorry, sir," the judge related, "but you just lied to us, three times. Perjury is a felony; you're looking at a thirty-year sentence."
"He also said he was innocent," the cop pointed out.
"Indeed," the judge concurred. "Forty year sentence, minimum."
"We were going to apologize to you and let you go," the cop sympathized, "but now we have to take you back to jail to await another trial." He looked Raymond squarely in the eye. "Perjury is a *very* serious crime."
Raymond began shaking in terror. "This *can't* be happening!" he whined.
The judge and bureaucrat walked away as the cop led Raymond back to his cell. "I'm sorry, sir," the judge revealed, "but you should have told the truth when you had the chance."

>>20746976
Ecology books, ecology online.

QRD on the guy who hates gardner? He’s been shitting up the past few threads like this.

>>20746978
Holy shit no one cares dude. Jannies please range ban this colossal faggot.

>>20747014
Any hatred of Gardner is legitimate.
He's the seething schizo samefagging pseud that's been shitting on everyone's writing for a very long time now.
He also shill-spams his books constantly.
His writing is not particularly worse than most of the stuff that gets posted here, so he doesn't really stand out in that regard.
The hate directed toward him is for his behavior, not his writing.

>>20747023
You know that's not going to get any attention.
Why not report his posts?
You MUST have a legitimate reason you could cite...right?

>>20747036
Ok this is all BS. I’ve talked to Gardner on discord and he’s always encouraging others.

>>20747040
Ruining the past several threads sounds like a pretty good reason. He’s not even discussing writing and just spamming about how much he hates Gardner.

>>20747023
POST. THE. LINKS. GARDNER.

>>20746386
Woah I didn’t realize F Gardner had written so many books. I thought it was just a couple. Can someone post some brief descriptions of the other works listed here?

>>20747089
I'm sure you will Frank.

>>20747090
Kek. I was referring to the other works.

>>20746575
>spams the thread
>called out
>n-no you're the spammer!
Kill yourself.

>>20747050
>Ok this is all BS
So Gardner doesn't shill-spam his books constantly?
You know he does.
And his writing IS worse than most of the stuff that gets posted here?
Thank you for clarifying that.

>>20747103
I actually don’t think he does. Croc is the only book ever mentioned. So it’s just a tired old meme at this point.

>>20747115
I’ve tried explaining this. If it was somehow all Gardner he’d be spamming his new books. He’s written 10 books since Call of the Crocodile. But the idea of it all being Gardner has become a meme too.

>>20747115
>>20747122
Get lost Gardner.

>>20746828
give me 2 or 5 years to finish my entire story and then I'll get to work on my western fantasy about a sheriff who is made of copper.
But on a more serious note, what are some good western novels, films, and shows. It's a genre that I do enjoy and I'm open to see more movies.

What is the best place to publish short stories and at least get some people read and commenting on it? I feel like self-publishing and traditional publishing is not what I'm looking for. More like /lit/ fanzine, forgot what it was called.

>>20746073
easy on the nose there pige

>>20747127
Ok Gardner.

Fuck the Gardner cum gargling poster.

The entire thread has to grind to a screeching hold because you have nothing better to do than spam the shit out of it day after day.

Just don't post about him, this is a Writing General, we don't need to hear about a single self published loser EVERY FUCKING THREAD and whether he took children's karate or if shitty book 3 is better than shifty book 4

>>20747148
Fuck you Gardner.

>>20747131
>give me 2 or 5 years to finish my entire story and then I'll get to work on my western fantasy
This feel, I know it well. For me it's give me 2 or 3 years to write a historic fiction because I'm well underway to releasing two novels next year and immediately start working on an epic. I don't want to take only one year to do it because there's like three if not four different ancient civilizations involved, it's gonna be a complicated project.

>>20747132
minimag.space if it's <2500 words

&amp is really good too

>>20747148

>>20747168
>&amp is really good too
That implies both are good. They aren't.

>>20747148
The screeching halt is because of you. The anti Gardner spammer. We can discuss any of the /wg/ authors we want. But cutout the drama and also post your own writing.

>>20747168
Thank you.
>>20747172
I don't really care if they are not great, I just want people my stories.

>>20747183
Sounds like you're a perfect match for each other.

I'd like some feedback on a first person POV passage. Character is a plague riddled schizo crusader:


I walk between the death trees towards the life-tree. It sits nestled in a burnt out husk; it makes sense to me. Life is a product of death. Even the herbivore eats grass to survive. Trees eat light, so it’s rather little wonder that this land lies so dark. What do the death trees eat I wonder? People. They eat people; those people nailed to their boughs. They scream and squirm and thrash and fight. Their war, long ended. Their pain is like mine, eternal. I often ruminate on the pain that I feel, its status as a divine gift. Why should I be alone in it? I am an altruist at heart. All should share in this warm glow that crawls inside my lungs. Sometimes it talks to me, I am never alone. How blessed I am, to never endure the torture of solitude. I want to fuck something and then kill it. Fill it with my life seed and quell it with my death seed.
It squirms inside my veins, the seed of death. It sustains me, it fulfils me. I am not worthy of joy so I am happy in pain. It’s good. It’s right. It’s my apology to myself. I look to Titus and see my mask mirrored in his, yet his mask scowls in rage where mine is twisted in a grin. The tears carved into the cheeks of this face of mine betray the truth all know, that a smile is a shield against the dark without, and the dark within. In truth I do not smile, nor laugh with mirth, but rather I laugh because I am tired. I am, oh so tired. Yah-Xa-Xel, accursed be his name, has cursed me with life in greater abundance than our lord ULD. AIN. SELAR. Can bless me with death.

>>20746692
I am writing the token religious story. I hope /wg/ catches feels from it, even if they aren't religious.

>>20747191
Great.

>900 words tonight
>great phonaesthetics
>progressed to the beginning of new major plot points
>one step closer to finishing the book
>mfw realizing even if I have to polish this book for a year afterwards that I'm gmi

>>20747232
Good for you fren, we're all gonna make it

Finally hit 100 unique followers on RR. Neat

>>20745503
>>20745899
>>20747115
>>20747122
Why would someone who isn't Gardner seethe about a reviewer giving his book 1 star, while giving another /wg/ writer's book 4 stars?
Literally no one in the world would seethe about that...except Gardner.
Do you think any of us are fooled?
You're like a toddler who covers his eyes & thinks he's invisible.

>>20746999
You write okay but the entire plot is so retarded that i had to laugh

>>20747317
I look forward to your contribution to FFA.

>>20747131
>novels
Pic related
>films
Dollars trilogy (ESPECIALLY For a Few Dollars More), Once Upon a Time in the West, Stagecoach, American Tail: Fieval Goes West
>shows
Bonanza, Gunsmoke, Lonesome Dove (also a book)

>>20747317
seethe

>>20747337
Not that anon but thank you. I needed a list to consume so I can write a series of western style novellas about a lone stramger ruining leftist "utopia" enclaves during the apocalypse

>>20747314
What are you even talking about?

>>20747337
thank you, I am that anon.

>>20747368
I thought you got banned Gardner? Just a warning maybe?

>>20747337
O Pioneers! isn't a fucking western.

>>20747362
>>20747395
I can't stress enough how great For a Few Dollars More is, especially the villain. El Indio is so well written. So is the Man With No Name and the Colonel, but Indio stands out a lot. Plus it has the most kino soundtrack imaginable and insane cinematography. It impressed me so much that I started working on a Western short story only to realize I just wanted to rewatch For a Few Dollars More.

Looks like my book's going out into the world soon. A good handful of the locals who know about it are excited, so I'm hoping to do some freemium local advertising around the release. I'm excited desu.

can someone tell me how awesome my writing is?
like on a scale from 9 to 10.

>Slayer narrowly dodges The Hellhound’s fiery
>assault. The beast had missed. The Hellhound inhales
>deeply. It was going to try again. Killer jumps at
>The Hellhound, but is engulfed in the fiery blaze of
>its breath. Killer yelps, rolling around on the
>ground.
>Ripping off his shirt, Otto rushes over toward Killer.
>He places his shirt on Killer, trying to put out the
>fire. “Wew…that was a close one…” Otto says.
>It seemed his idea had worked. The boy had reacted
>quickly, and used his shirt to put out the fire.
>Killer was safe.
>“That was fast thinking” The Skeleton compliments.
>“Yeah…thanks” Otto says. He felt a bit chilly now that he was
>shirtless. But that was the least of the boy’s concern. He
>couldn’t just put his shirt back on, now that it was burnt from the
>flames. Otto was just going to have to go on without a shirt.

>>20747283
Once you hit like 5-10k you can feel something behind you.

>>20747338
lol why would the justice system waste their precious court resources just to troll a guy? entire premise is whack and you just can't admit it

>>20747431
I am sadly aware that 100 aint shit. I think I am going to have to start over soon, but it's still a leg up for next time

>>20747444
The highest priority of the cops and judge was to get the assassin to confess, so that they could congratulate and reward him.
Reducing the punishment from torture to life imprisonment was one way they tried to motivate a confession.
At the same time, they were afraid to admit their anti-dictator sympathies openly.
But they still take the rest of the law seriously, and enforce it harshly.
I was going for a Kafkaesque feeling.
And no one turned out to be a tulpa.

>>20747485
Don’t restart, keep building. Im 12k now.

>>20747487
I've already posted like 70 chapters anon

What's a good way to introduce the myriad conflicting religious and philosophical beliefs that have developed in my lost space civilization in the past three thousand years since the breakaway with our own, without falling into "as you know" territory or having the protagonist interview every character about their beliefs like in Morrowind? In real life the only people I know who freely divulge their political opinions are relatives at Thanksgiving and bus people, so am I going to have to establish space-Thanksgiving and space bus people?

>>20747502
>70 chapters
you need to start over and it has nothing to do with followers on rr

>>20747516
I genuinely don't follow what you're getting at

>>20747509
I assume your protag is a stranger-that-came-to-town type.
Have him try to engage people in (to him) perfectly normal conversations, only to unwittingly run into one taboo after another, with the commensurate strong reactions from the locals.
Or he sees innocent-seeming situations that suddenly devolve (in his estimation) into unfathomable savagery, which the locals treat as perfectly normal.

>>20747509
well now I want to read some space thanksgiving and bus people

so yes

go do that

/wg/ do you have any anti-inspirations? (Other than Gardner)
By which I mean a creator/writer who made made big bumbling mistakes and that you've learned from secondhand?
Hussie comes to mind for me.
Normal edgy internet dude bent over backwards for the sjw portion of his fan base and as those types always do they spit in his face and nothing was ever good enough.
He scammed people out of a million dollars for a game incomplete a decade later.
What remained of Homestuck's fans hated his cronies so badly that Homestuck 2 got canceled (or "indefinite hiatus") after bitter reception to the "epilogues".
Said cronies retconned characters to being fat, trans, and would actively pick fights with the fans who were mostly left leaning anyway.
Psycolonials is so bad that it's ignored completely and the quality of writing in it makes me think that Hussie really is suffering CTE level brain damage from all the kool-aid.

>>20747531
Fitzgerald's first book is a disjointed mess; Gatsby is one of the best constructed novels of all time

>>20747531
Chris Metzen. Man made a fun, light hearted and soulful generic D&D fantasy world, got mega rich, drank, handed it off to marvelniggers and went on to make a tabletop RPG that's planescape for retards

>>20747486
why would the fake confessor even confess in this scenario? what does he have to gain unless he's a schizo? bro just admit it's whack

>>20747531
My biggest anti-inspiration is bad TV/movies.
MST3K and RiffTrax, obviously, but also stuff that's supposed to be good.
Sometimes I come to the end of a bad episode/movie, and am so incensed by the lack of quality that I feel inspired to create.
After all, if those idiots can make a living doing this, why can't I?

>>20747544
As I explained clearly, the fake confessor was intimidated by the offer of mercy, i.e. reduced punishment.
Even the American justice system, as much as it likes to fellate itself, is filled with stories of people confessing to crimes they didn't commit because of abusive prosecutors and the threat of being bankrupted by legal fees.

>>20747531
The anti Gardner shitposter

>>20747557
Shut up Gardner.

Well this thread is shit. Check out my discord server if you want to discuss writing occasionally.

https://discord.gg/yJw4Fg3j

>>20747551
Same with every season past 1 of Westworld
Writers got so mad about leddit doing what internet sleuths do and guessing the twists of the first season that they made every season afterwards terrible so no one could figure it out kek
Danganronpa V3 has also provided a lot of inspiration for me because of how terrible the ending is
Funny how nothing Kodaka has made since then has been notable at all
Worlds End Club was the worst game I've seen in a decade
I wouldn't believe anyone saying that the creators of Dangan and Zero Escape could make something that terrible if I didn't already know

>>20747554
lol reduced punishment of an execution/life sentence?

>>20747566
>F Gardner has invited you
Come on man just fucking stop

>>20747575
F Gardner was in the server but he left after I told him to stop shilling :/

>>20747410
nice anon
I can only hope my town will notice too, there's a local publisher here but I'm not sure how they will respond

>>20747580
Sure

>>20747573
You need me to explain that most people prefer to live rather than die?

>>20747610
>"But we can reduce that to painless execution if you confess.
do u read ur own writing?

>>20747599
He kept tagging everyone.

>people larping as knowing Gardner

>>20747626
What a fuckin chad.

>>20747626
Gardner is pretty based actually

>>20747626
I don't care if that's really him or not, the fact that Gardner has terrible grammar AND refuses to hire an editor (yet alone do any editing himself) really speaks to his hubris and he needs to be taken down about a dozen pegs
Hopefully getting banned on GR chipped his ego
I can't imagine putting out a book with as many mistakes as him and pretending like it's a finished product not to mention the redundancy issues
Honestly /wg/ should be embarrassed that Gardner wants to pretend he represents us
Not that the bar is high but no way is Gardner making a living from this
I'll believe it when and if he ever posts proof of the income made from his books
He's a NEET living from mommy and daddy and he spends all his allowance on 4chan ads instead if paying someone to make his shit readable
Sad and pathetic

>>20746073
>Writing General pige 07/27/22(Wed)14:12:54 No.20746073
>/wg/ - Writing General

>>20747637
>>20747649
Give it up Gardner.

>>20747687
/qa/ lost, chud.

What's the point of this general if it gets derailed every thread?

>>20747737
You're free to post anon. Gardner is not.

>>20747740
Gardner is free to post. You do not speak for us.

>>20747759
T.Gardner
>>20747740
This anon speaks for me

>>20747759
Obviously. There have been non stop Gardnerpostings for two years. I don’t know if he really posts here himself. But the idea of that going away is like the “Start with the Greeks” posters suddenly stopping. Like it or not Call of the Crocodile and Gardnerposting is here forever.

>>20747767
/thread

Now talk about your fucking writing you faggots.

>>20747767
Then I guess there is no point in the threads after all.

>>20747772
Not if you guys constantly bitch and moan about fucking Gardner. Call of the Crocodile is the most famous book to spawn out of 4chan. It doesn’t matter if you love or hate that book. Of course it’s going to come up in conversations and so will Gardner.

>>20746248
This would be honest to God solve the spamming issue.

>>20747781
Easier to report the anti Gardner spammer. Other Gardnerposters will invariably show up in other threads.That way they at least won’t argue like this and we can just talk about writing.

There are only 36 posters here
You can't tell me that Call of the Crocodile is so famous that it is an inevitability with such a small handful of people
It's infamous maybe but still not to this extent

>>20747790
Fuck off.

>>20747772

it's like trap threads on /gif/ there's always going to be someone posting about you being a fag. you just gotta keep fapping

that's what gardner is to /wg/

>>20747805
>that's what gardner is to /wg/
Killing /wg/?

>>20747778
Bitching and moaning will continue until Gardnerposting does not.

>>20746073
What is that pig?

Any help would be appreciated. Should I describe Number 4 begging or is it a waste of time?

>>20747820
That's F Gardner

>>20747816
What makes you think it will ever stop?

>>20747827
This. It has been years. Call of the Crocodile is from 2020

Caught some quick errors, but should i describe the begging scene or would it be pointless filler?

>>20747834
Bleh now I catch more mistakes after I posted it. I read through it once already.

>>20747823
number 4 is pretty cringe. also, i would cut leather for skin/bups/"it stunk,.."

>>20746073
Welp. Here it goes.
>>20747823
>the and other sounds
What? Did you edit something out or is this supposed to be a weird thought disorder styled writing?
>say happily
Shouldn't there be a comma there if you're using "say" as the expression?
>Let's mama
huh? Is she ESL?
The last line of dialogue is kinda info dumpy and it pulled me out of the story. Try to talk more naturally.

>>20747847
why does this exist?

>>20747509
Depends, you could have your character break up a fight between 2 zealots with both of them throwing insults which are really them describing their religions.
You could have these same people handing out pamphlets and try to recruit him with a few short but descriptive lines.
Maybe have it so only some areas are allowed to do these things without a permit and the character walks to work through that street.
Just a few off the top of my head suggestions.

>>20747845
the first line is a hard catch.

bAp
bEep
bIp
bOp
bUps

All vowels as sounds. Hence the repetition.

>>20747827
Oh anon I do not myself care.

>>20747857
This can work, yeah. Since it's conflicting beliefs we're talking about demonstration by example would be great for showing what the issue is.

>>20747870
I don’t care. It just clearly has become a /wg/ staple at this point. If it were a recent book? Sure. It could stop. But Call of the Crocodile has been out for 2 years. Why is that the only Gardnerbook that became a meme here anyway?

>>20747878
I’m not sure. That is odd.

>>20747878
Well then in the same way that you've learned to live with Gardnerposting you will have to learn to live with Anti-Gardnerposting.

>>20747878
You could say... it's a pickle for the knowing ones.

>>20747889
Shut the fuck up Gardner.

Dialogue tags after the name or before the name?

"Hello," George said.
OR
"Hello," said George.

>>20747868
i get it but it's annoying

>>20747895
Salt and pepper it as you wish.

>>20747889
What did he mean by this?

>>20747901
If it's their first time speaking in the scene latter, otherwise former.

>>20747834
Whats the name of your story? I really like your style its actually interesting.

>>20743618
>>20743603
>>20742789
shits like the quickening godamn
https://youtu.be/6EfhAFA2yFE

Just finished the Ernest Hemingway book. Super cringe and half of it unintelligible

>>20747958
bird by bird fucking sucked and I lament the time I wasted on it

>>20747878
>Why is that the only Gardnerbook that became a meme here anyway?
Because one faggot that's on an iphone keeps posting about it.

listen to the writing dojo. you may not like their books but they have decent advice

>>20747951
The Diamond Dozen. Here's a google link for the other two chapters.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1rcb-LxY4ZrFSsO-DB7xCBhjCcgoiCR2xmA52yJQUXSw/edit?usp=sharing

>>20747969
yeah that one was shit. the worst one of all though was Screenplay

The cat was trying to make editorial decisions on my behalf. I couldn't blame her, every other room in the house was hot, so with one little brave ac unit and two old box fans, we were all lounging in the bedroom for the time being-- me, my wife, and the cat that insisted on making my legs layered with a winter coat.
I've heard that if you get a cat another laptop they'll mimic you by sitting in front of the other one instead of yours. I think this one's too stupid for that, but at this point I'd give anything to get her soft little paws off my backspace button for a change. Her tail was ever moving, the extension of her brain and the only tether I had to the feline's mood. Had I a smarter brain of my own perhaps I could see it through her gigantic round eyes that looked more like the bottoms of glass bottles. They peered deep into a small fluffy animal, into a brain with zero thoughts. She was empty-headed, no schedule to speak of.
"How I wish I could be you." I kept on typing.

I've never had to read a book on how to write to understand story structure and I'm not a believer in writing things with a formula
Imo the structure should occur naturally

>>20747997
I'd agree, but readers like a sense of familiarity. By all means be original, but veering too far away from what a book commonly is without a splendid tether like talent or a great execution is a risky move
But also I play things safe to a faulty degree so take that with whatever you want. By 'formula' and 'structure' I mean three act structure.

>>20748019
A beginning, middle, and end will happen without needing a formula unless for some reason your story just randomly stops in the middle of the action in which case that's obviously amateurish
When I read about these formulas or story circles they always come across as being too much like ad libs for my taste is all

>>20747421
It's like a 3/10. The sentences are kind of repetitive in structure and a bit bluntly written. Also you don't need to spend so much time explaining that his shirt is gone. You can just say he feels chilly, and the reader will remember from a couple lines ago that he lost the shirt. And then the next few sentences about the shirt don't really add anything. Keep trying though, practice makes perfect anon

>>20747971
Well then it can’t be Gardner. It wouldn’t make sense for him to spam that one book if he has like a hundred others.

anyone else write absurdly long outlines? mine is basically a play by play that covers details, evident or not so evident to the audience in one big nasty oil spill. for some reason this is the only way my brain can do it
>4k
but man it fucking sucks, it's like I write the book twice. to boot on the autism, I also tend to greentext things that don't require much detail

>>20748081
nope. just you. I just write. Takes me 10 minutes to get a sentence i'm happy with, but it works for me.

>>20748086

Day 46 editing
Chapter 58 done
I did it again today
I chopped a 6k+ fapter in two
When will catering to attention-lets not feel dirty bros?

>>20746282
clunky in a way that i can't quite put my finger on. basically all of the replies to your post so far have good advice in them, if a bit meanly presented. it's fun though, it got me in the mood to write and now i'm probably gonna be up until 2 writing something schway
keep writing and take your pills alice

>>20748078
Shut the fuck up Gardner.

>>20748078
Call of the Crocodile isn’t even the best Gardner book.

>>20748116
Ok Gardner.

>>20747974
This book is funny.

>>20748122

N. Gardner

>>20748134
Gardner tier shop, very sad.

>>20748137
>implying Gardner knows photoshop.

Just look at his book covers. He draws with crayons.

>>20748152
That’s part of what makes Gardner so based though.

>>20748260
I mean that's how it works for literally any ethnicity on Earth
>the original British don't exist anymore blah blah Celts blah blah Romans blah blah Saxons blah blah Danes blah blah Normans blah blah Hanovers and Saxe-Coburg and Gothas blah blah
>the original Spanish don't exist anymore blah blah Visigoths blah blah Al-Andalus blah blah Reconquista blah blah Habsburgs
>the original Russians don't exist anymore blah Varangians blah Rurikids blah blah Mongolians blah blah Romanovs blah blah Soviets
>the origianl Irish no don't exist anymore blah blah the English blah blah potato famine blah
>the original Geerks don't exist anymore blah blah Macedonians blah blah Romans blah blah Turks blah blah
>the original Arabs don't exist anymore
>the original nigerians don't exist anymore
>the original Japanese don't exist anymore

>His eyes met her's
>His eyes met hers
Spellcheck is telling me the second is right, but isn't she in possession of her own eyes?

>>20748348
No, second one is correct.

>>20747662
Slander. F Gardner doesn’t live with his mom and dad. He lives with his boyfriend.

Show don't tell is garbage advice. The greatest writers did a lot of telling. The real advice is to tell when it's better and show when it's better.

>>20747662
shut up fag, i wouldnt want you representing /wg/ because you sound like a bitch

>>20746979
It reads like you suck corporate media cock so you should be successful just say you are a tranny

>>20748387
It’s mainly applicable when the story tries to tell you a character is smart or competent or whatever, but would be better off showing. Obviously you’re allowed to tell your readers the emotions your characters are feeling instead of saying “they clenched their fists and felt their head get hot” as a way of showing anger.

>>20747531

Bolesław Prus.

Imagine just reading about an oblivion NPC simping.

That’s the entirety of ‘the doll’.

>>20748503
I have actually dabbled with only showing. It can work pretty well. Instead of hand holding you just show what happens and lets the reader interpret what's going on.

In your stories, how much do you guys concern yourself over things like geography, what people eat, how they get their food, etc. Do you do research so it can all make sense or do you say "fuck it" and just do whatever?

>>20748362
Why?

>>20748532
I know it's a shitty answer, but it depends on the story.

>>20748532
>how much do you guys concern yourself over things like geography, what people eat, how they get their food, etc.
It's the little details which provide atmosphere. Though I usually just write such things in a way which seems logical to the characters and setting, then on the second draft I see if it still make sense. I'll do some research and change it up if I decide it's not working, otherwise I'll stick to what I wrote originally and just spruce up the prose a bit. I tend to avoid deescribing geography in detail, but that's because it's a weakness of mine. Instead I'll focus on a couple of aspects of the scenery and leave the rest up to the reader's imagination. Don't get me wrong, I can write locations well, but detailed geography is a no-go.

how do you come up with names for factions? originally i just took names from norse mythology since everything was loosely based off of that but now i've went so far away from it i think it would be better to come up with original names

i already have 2 more or less human races and one robot race for a post apocalyptic fantasy thing im writing, do you think a race of furries and a race of scalies would be a good addition or would it be weird since there's also mutated lions and crocodiles and shit as monsters roaming around the world now?

Bro you even outsource names for factions? Want me to write the story for you too?

>Write book about stupid and awkward presidential moments
>Title it “Goofy Ahh Presidents”
>Market to zoomers
>Retire early

>>20749000
wipe the shit from your mouth before talking

>>20747621
Did you read the very next sentence?
Such reading comprehension issues.

>>20748348
I don't know for a fact but I intuit if the possessed noun is not listed in the sentence you don't add an apostrophe. In the example you have the man's eyes are described and "hers" is an informal contraction of saying "her eye's".

Same thing happens with "his" and "hers" wedding towels people give out. It's not "her's" since the 's has no noun to connect to.

It's one of those rare exceptions I'm too lazy to read about but that's my theory

>>20748049
It's a passage from "Limbo's Rainbow" by F. Gardner.
3/10 indeed.

>>20748387
When I give this criticism it usually is a short hand way of explaining that the author is telling me things about a character's life before I even care about anything.

Instead of telling me a character has a bad relationship with his girlfriend, show me. That doesn't mean, show everything always and never tell, but just demonstrate that you as the author are filtering information to the reader.

For instance:

>Joey never knew what to say to his girlfriend to make her understand that sometimes he preferred she just not talk.

Is okay, but...

>Joey looked at his girlfriend.
>She was talking on the phone whilst looking at the ceiling.
>He wished he could zone out of the innane conversation, but it was impossible.
>She hadn't brought him up yet, but she would, and it would be something passive aggressive.
>"Oh yeah Michael is always leaving his socks on the floor..."
>This. Bitch.

>>20747535
But I liked This Side of Paradise... t. has never read Gatsby

>>20748387
I think "hint don't tell" is more to the point. It's not clear how to "show" that two people are in love or how that's different from telling that they are, but it's easy to understand what is meant by "hinting" that they are in love. The author gives hints and the reader constructs the meaning themselves.

"Did you just shit yourself, Son" he asked loudly enough that the surrounding guests could hear.
"No Mr President" he muttered staring into his tomato bisque.

I talk to myself every day at every hour. It's exhausting. Is writing a good way to make it stop?

Thoughts fellas? (1/2)
He can’t remember her name, face, or anything about her really except for that they played The Game together, that she went to the high school across from his primary school, and that she had dirty-blonde / ashy light-brown hair (plus that she wasn’t exactly skinny, but not fat either); he remembers she had freckles and what he thought at the time were hairy forearms for a girl. Her hair sat just below shoulder length and was basically always held back from her round face by a solid plain black faux-satin headband. They met Thursdays at 3.45 in the room abutting the main hall for gymnastics, which meeting room was primarily a storage room as best the O.M. can tell. It was the size of an average classroom and had a corrugated acrylic skylight in each side of the vaulted ceiling letting in the room’s only source of light on Thursdays between 3.30 and 4.15. The rest of the ceiling looked to be made of exposed corrugated tin. There were red-painted timber support beams with dust on top that sat so thick he could see it from below. The Ordinary Man remembers the sound of rain on the tin roof and, at the same time, a pillar of sunlight beamed down singularly from the northwest-facing skylight with dust floating within it. He knows those are probably incongruous memories.

>>20749510
(2/2)
He remembers opening the left of the dull-green double doors with a thin vertical Georgian wired glass window near the handle and metal kickplates at the bottom which opened into the grey-carpeted room with pale yellow walls, the type of yellow that looked like the walls were once white and have been stained yellow, with a thin exposed timber wainscoting trim (but no wainscoting) around O.B.-shoulder height. Dust sat heavily on a deep-backed CRT TV atop a trolley to the O.B.’s right as he entered. There was an air of ‘this room isn’t for students’. To the left of the doors lay two carts impotently half-filled with various de- and inflated footballs, basketballs, netballs, and even a frisbee. He often thought of grabbing one of the inflated balls and kicking it around and maybe off the red-brick exterior wall of the storage/meeting room while he waited the 45 minutes between school and gymnastics, but he didn’t have a pump, and he couldn’t see one lying about despite there seeming to be just about everything else lying about the room. Her anus was pink and hairless. She obviously shaved her armpits but had a basically hairless downstairs region except for a small tuft on her mons pubis. To the right of the ball carts were two notice boards on wheels with brass pins stuck in the fuzzy blue skin, a smiley face was stuck into the front board’s upper left corner. She waited behind a mobile combination white- and pin-board, which was situated to the right of the double-doors and obscured a two-metre by three-metre spot of carpet against the far pallid wall under the north-west facing skylight. She was always there when the O.B. arrived. He made his way over to the spot through a maze of grey plastic-seated, metal-framed chairs, some stacked as high as he stood. He had left his bag outside this room in the vestibule between it and the main hall. He reached the hiding spot, and her occiput faced him. She was rarely in pigtails. She almost always wore a headband. She almost always wore sports shorts with her polo shirt tucked into the waistband at the back but not the front. She turned around and smiled while cocking her head to her left. She almost always wore pink underwear.

>>20749510
>>20749516
I think it needs more description.

>>20749524
Is it the lack of description of the outlets in the room that is lacking?

>>20748152
>>20748154
>>20749143
Fuck off Gardner.

How much effort do you need to put into making a fantasy language that's A: Never presented in its entirety, just a few sporadic words, and B: Not supposed to be based off of any real-life language?

Is just making sure the words I make up don't mean anything offensive in real languages and stay internally consistent good enough? Will anyone other than linguistics nerds get angry at me if I don't do it 100% right? I'd really rather avoid going full Tolkien here.

>>20749510
Unpleasant tense shifts. You state at the beginning it's a memory, so that's enough for the whole flashback.

Call him the Ordinary Man from the first sentence.

Remove all the filter words. He remembered, he thought, he saw, as best as he could tell, etc.

"There was an air of ‘this room isn’t for students’." You don't have to think for the reader. It's obvious from your description or not.

Don't put so many modifiers on one noun. 'red-painted timber support beams' 'grey plastic metal framed chairs.' Either chop them off or extend the description some other way.

I hope the excessive description is a way to show the OM is crazy or has weird memories. If the whole story has this much pointless detail, it will be unreadable.

>>20749600
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFWc0sBO62c&list=PL12QwurMdjmiPwjM0MBTiyYmg6fAFdTjE

>>20749612
That video series does seem quite useful. I'm definitely going to watch through all of it before I go further with this. However, I guess my most direct question is, if I really just want some character names, place names, etc, can I gloss over the rest for now? When characters are speaking full sentences in the other language, I was planning to present it in translated English form if any of the point-of-view characters can understand what's being said.

In the plan presented in the video, can I skip from 2 straight to 6 and come back when it's actually relevant what their alphabet looks like, or how a full sentence is structured?

>>20749602
>Unpleasant tense shifts. You state at the beginning it's a memory, so that's enough for the whole flashback.
I may be blind. What tense shifts?
>Call him the Ordinary Man from the first sentence.
It's part of a larger piece that begins with 'The Ordinary Man...'
>Remove all the filter words. He remembered, he thought, he saw, as best as he could tell, etc.
Thanks
>"There was an air of ‘this room isn’t for students’." You don't have to think for the reader. It's obvious from your description or not.
Thanks
>Don't put so many modifiers on one noun. 'red-painted timber support beams' 'grey plastic metal framed chairs.' Either chop them off or extend the description some other way.
Yea, fair - thanks
>I hope the excessive description is a way to show the OM is crazy or has weird memories. If the whole story has this much pointless detail, it will be unreadable.
This is one of a few dateless vignettes thrown in as chapters to provide background to the Ordinary Man. The main story is more plot and dialogue driven. Reckon that would be okay every now and again?

>>20749600
Absolute minimal effort, just pick an existing language to copy off then tweak words a bit so they're unique but seem coherent together. Nobody gives a shit about how mountain elves trill each r unless you spend a 100k hours developing the whole language and then .1% of your readers may be interested.

>>20749612
Actually interesting looking though, anything that gets writers thinking in terms of IPA is good and will help your prose read better (reminder to read every single line aloud for flow).

>>20749672
Gloss over it for now. When you have 80k words of solid novel with good grammar then you can go back and slave over making up entirely new sets of fake grammar to apply to the 100 relevant words you put in the book in that language and can easily edit.

Egregore anon here.

I have a bunch of deprecated print copies I need to unload.
I know this is shifty as FCKU, but email me your address and I'll give you a free printed copy. US ONLY

>>20749755
spencerwweedman@gmail.com

>>20749752
>Gloss over it for now. When you have 80k words of solid novel with good grammar then you can go back and slave over making up entirely new sets of fake grammar to apply to the 100 relevant words you put in the book in that language and can easily edit.
That's pretty much what I've done so far. I'm just getting to the end of my first draft and was thinking maybe I should have put more thought into the language when I started.

>>20749385
You could try anon, I can't give you a yes or a no.

>>20749755
I'm going to get a PO box soon, you wanna hang onto a copy for me? I'll read your book and do a review via Unreal Podcast if the host has time for me

>>20749912
Sure. Be sure to shoot me an email.

Why and how should I describe the setting when I start a new scene?

>>20749755
>US only
What if I pay for shipping. UK anon here.

>>20749759
Is that extra w supposed to be there?

>>20749930
>We walked through a high hallway into a bright rosy-colored space, fragilely bound into the house by French windows at either end. The windows were ajar and gleaming white against the fresh grass outside that seemed to grow a little way into the house. A breeze blew through the room, blew curtains in at one end and out the other like pale flags, twisting them up toward the frosted wedding-cake of the ceiling, and then rippled over the wine-colored rug, making a shadow on it as wind does on the sea.

>The only completely stationary object in the room was an enormous couch on which two young women were buoyed up as though upon an anchored balloon. They were both in white, and their dresses were rippling and fluttering as if they had just been blown back in after a short flight around the house. I must have stood for a few moments listening to the whip and snap of the curtains and the groan of a picture on the wall. Then there was a boom as Tom Buchanan shut the rear windows and the caught wind died out about the room, and the curtains and the rugs and the two young women ballooned slowly to the floor.

>>20749972
Yeah that is interesting to read but why and how did the author choose this specific information to depart to the reader?

>>20749962
Yes
>>20749936
Complicated. Shipping right now is crazy and you'd probably be better off ordering from amazon.

Sorry m8.

>>20749930
It's probably best to start with need-to-know info and then fluff it up in parts where it matters. In 12 or so years of willingly reading I've always found my eyes slipping away from long descriptions, searching down the page for where the story continues again.

>>20747509

Dune pulled it off.

Just don’t explain anything unless it’s absolutely nessecary and then have an excerpt from an in universe history book lore dumping.

>>20749979
every detail is used to convey the mood and tone or to reveal something about the characters and their relationships.

>>20749930
Vaguely. Establish immediate objects and the feel of the room but nothing else. Chekov's gun, etc. Just as being overly descriptive with character's appearances, too much description and readers will just start skimming.

An exception: when the setting has elements relevant to the plot, or you are attempting to create atmosphere, again, less is more.

Here are some examples from one of my novels.

>Complete description of a character:
He was a real caveman in the eaves.

>Complete description of a setting:
A mountain, so swollen with quivering blue green that moonlight in the middle-distance billowed like vagrant smoke.

I would even say my setting example needs paring down. Billowed feels like an odd word, though it works. Eh, well, just first draft things.

Last night I went to bed with the thought of describing a sex scene with what's happening around it. Here's my first attempt

>>20750119
An alternative, in looks only, version that I saved because the setting is post-apocaliptic, and this kind of looks like a fallout computer

I'm starting the "red rising" series. It's a dystopian adventure, urban fantasy.
I'm envious about the first chapter. it does everything you'd want.
We like the protagonist. We really, really hate the antagonist. And it does a ton of world building.
It's worth studying for anyone who writes.

Hit 98k words today. Will finish a batch of three chapters tomorrow, just need a little more connective tissue between segments on each. I've gotta tell you, the books is finally starting to feel like it has a concrete shape and everything is headed right where it should be.
Currently my main problems are chapter 2 and chapter 16. All other chapters in my book are told from the limited 3rd person perspective of one of the two protagonists except these. Chapter 2 is split between the two of them and chapter 16 is entirely a different character since neither protagonist could be present for the events covered therein.
I've already written notes to myself that indicate I should cut 90% of chapter 2 and put the remaining 10% into chapters 1 and 3, which I definitely will do once I enter the editing phase.
This leaves chapter 16 as the odd one out. I can't cut it and I can't leave it be as is. The only solution I can think of is to include more POV chapters for that character (and I've already been thinking of at least one for fourth one but haven't been willing to commit to it) which would make things more consistent.
This is the only big problem for me at this stage, everything else is proceeding almost under its own velocity.
Feels good, man.

>>20749999
Checked. Good advice and I do the same when I see hundreds of words of long description.

>>20750408
98k words
What are you writing? I can barely hit 60k word before I start thinking this story needs to end already

>would spend my late teens and early 20s writing daily
>ended up getting hired by multiple news publications as a journalist
>had a lot of fun, started to write short stories out of boredom
>start noticing a bit of a trend appearing
>shrug it off since i don't really pay attention to others
>figure it might be good to see what others do actually think of these creations; send off works to a few small online publishers
>initial reviews are fine, very few rejections due to the writing itself
>every other rejection was because i am white, straight, and male from a first world country
>tfw started writing around the start of the pink haired taliban
it only got worse from there, i knew i wasn't ever going to get published even on meme online publications, everyone just wanted disabled women/trannies from third world countries

>>20750501
I'm a 1st generation Chang and I'm getting rejected left and right. I hope it's not my writing. but people here say it's fine to liking my writing. No clue.

I've literally gotten like 400 views today on RR and no comments.

What the hell do I have to do just to get interaction?

>>20750563
Beg like a dog. I'm curious if any anons here made money on RR through Patreon subscriptions

>>20750540
rejection itself a normal part of the process, that's for sure, i even had my fair share of rejections before breaking into journalism

it was already a very difficult thing to break into unless you're somehow blessed with connections, but now it seems like you can't make it at all unless you're black, trans and with polio

i remember slowly giving up on journalism as well; while i really enjoyed it, it became so stupidly competitive as a new wave of retards flocked to these jobs willing to accept zero pay

>>20750563
write on peakd.com instead

>>20750570
I'm thinking of just self publishing. This is just a hobby for me so I'm not too interested in becoming a traditionally published author. It'll be nice of course but I don't expect it to happen

>>20750570
how do you get into journalism?

>>20750484
>60k words
but that's just 6 chapters

>>20750634
it's impossible now, but i just randomly applied to a few publications years back and one replied and had me perform a few tests

from there i ended up getting hired and then the editors would send my email address to other publications that they worked with that were looking for more writers, eventually it just spiralled into something bigger

some would pay me monthly in a fixed sum, some would pay me per word and that rate would increase once i moved out of the general 'intern' phase

it's all very different now, and it became harder to maintain an income of any sort as shit like wordpress would appear and people were desperate to write for actual companies; most of them ended up firing large portions of staff and then just "hiring" volunteers because they'd stupidly accept thinking one day they'll make money from it, only to realise they're working for free and leave to be replaced by the next fool

these days you'll need to have a degree and go through the typical job application process if you want to get a salary, and the same thing is happening there: they'll hire some freelance tranny and pay them in exposure or literal pocket change

>>20750578
>peakd.com
>blockchain
Discarded

>>20750703
>better interaction
that's what you wanted

>>20750638
Jeeze... My chapters are only 2-3k words. Can you post a chapter so I can see what I'm doing wrong?

>>20750638
No. Unless it's sci-fi or fantasy anything more than 85k is way overwriting.

>>20750607
Just do it. It worked for F Gardner. No reason why it can’t work for the rest of us here.

>>20750753
You are doing nothing wrong. Chapters are trending shorter these days.
>>20750607
If you want complete control of your product, self publish. If you want to hone your craft, attempt to tradpub, learn the industry.

You will probably self-publish either way, but some lessons can only be learned through sticking your ego into the meat grinder that is tradpub.

>>20750804
I've already been rejected about 20x for a project. No feedback to tell me what's wrong though . Not going to pay another $700 for another editor.

>>20750796
Screenshot from the last thread. Just write a book as weird as this. That’s the ticket to Gardner tier fame.

>>20750607
self publishing as the others have said is definitely more likely to yield results

just keep in mind that self publishing is like throwing a droplet of water into an existing ocean, and it'll take a ton of effort
>>20750817
>No feedback to tell me what's wrong though
that's the hardest part, because then you fall into self doubt despite the fact that you may be doing things just right

>>20750817
Post your first chapter and I will tell you why you are rejected

>>20750839
Unfortunately I can't post anything on here. Being 4chan and publishing rights and all

>>20750817
Was it a copyeditor or proofreader? How experienced was the portfolio?

>>20750847
Who convinced you that sharing the first chapter voided your publishing rights? That's not how it works.

>>20750817
20x rejects is literally nothing right now.

Common number before getting an agent is in the hundreds ~150.

Also remember that white dudes are just NOT getting represented right now.

>>20750817
DO NOT SPEND MONEY ON EDITORS YOU ARE BEING FLEECED GOOD GOD

BUY GRAMMARLY AND PRO WRITING AID. Learn to proofread yourself.

Stop throwing money at a hobby that WILL NOT pay you.

>>20750847
If that were the case, you wouldn't be able to query.

Man, I would like to speak with authority on these subjects, but none of you have read my book to concur I know what I'm talking about.

Support the /lit/ authors

>>20750880
He's right. Posting anything on a public forum is considered publishing and usually prevents future publication of said piece.
>>20750906
Shut up when you don't know something, bitch.
>>20750898
>buy grammarly
>buy pro writing aid
No. You don't need an AI to tell you to write sentences more like Hemingway would. Why you would even pay for that is beyond me.

>>20750898
I did, but a "professional" editor was supposed to make my story more sellable to agents. I learned there really is a lot of gatekeeping going on. I think I'm going to go with the wauldun and Daniel Greene route of marketing through YouTube

>>20750910
Are any of the /lit/ authors besides Gardner any good?

>>20750914
Posting the first chapter of your writing is considered marketing, not publishing. Fuck off.

>>20750965
Son, you literally got memed. 100% wasted your fucking money, I'm sorry you got scammed. An eagent is not looking for your prose, because they know the trad publishing process involves sending your manuscript to a professional editor to fix your shit.

>>20750971
I think I'm good, but I hate shilling myself on >4chan< of all places. I don't want to be a tripfag.

>>20750914
You are thinking of the Hemingway app, which has its own merits but does not do any proofreading.

>>20750965
Booktok. Inb4 Ugh, i know! I know! I'm just not!

>>20750831
One of these days I’m going to read through all of F Gardner’s books to see what other insanity awaits in them.

>>20750980
>Son, you literally got memed. 100% wasted your fucking money, I'm sorry you got scammed
Fuck.

>>20750971
Read a sample of my book on Amazon. Yes, I'm shilling. IDC, I need reviews before I start an ad-campaign. It is in the post here:
>>20749755

>>20750914
>Posting anything on a public forum is considered publishing and usually prevents future publication of said piece.
Stupid, but as expected of a tripfag. Share via a gdrive burner email with an expiring link or self deleting pastebin. If you really think any publisher will ever find out through an elite hacker then also give a shit 5 people online read a writing sample of yours you can also find/replace all the character and place names for the sample chapter.

>>20750990
Understand that part of the process of learning to write is also learning to avoid getting fleeced.

Roll with it. Seriously. From one writer who has fallen for a few scams myself to the next, just roll with it. Put your head down and write. Tradpub is a nightmare right now.

>>20750990
If you want to get any value out of it, you need to study the edits he gave you and ask how his changes change the flavor of your writing. You basically paid for coaching, justify it to yourself that way.

But seriously, I'll read your first chapter and tell you why you get skipped. It might be "because agents are cunts"

>>20750990
I gotta know. I'm sorry anon, but I gotta know. How much did you spend on the editor? And then, did you at least feel you got worthwhile feedback.

>>20750898
if you've been writing a couple of years, hiring an editor for a $1,000 isn't necessarily a bad idea.

get a book you like and see if the editor is mentioned in the acknowledgements part. ask that editor if they'll edit your book or if the can recommend a good editor.

look at how much money the guys in /k/ spend on their hobby. a $1,000 is nothing to them.

of course, they have a gun at the end of it

make sure you've advanced enough as a writer so that editing will benefit you

make sure you don't get ripped off

while you're a noob, find other noob writers, swap books and edit them.

>>20751053
Shooting guns is fun. Waiting 6 months for a form rejection from an agent who doesn't want to represent white guys is not. 1000 dollars is a lot of money to spend on a "smash your face into a brick wall" game at the hobby carnival.

>>20751033
$700. It was 0.0001 per word. The feedback was okay I guess. Nothing that I couldn't have gotten if I posted my book with comments enabled. But the word choice was definitely much better. I also find myself writing more actively and deleting sentences as I write. I stopped word vomiting as much
>>20751053
That was my reasoning. It's a hobby and I made something the best I can. So that's that.

>>20751082
Either you wrote 7 million words or you failed math.
>paid for an editor
Must be the latter

>>20751082
> also find myself writing more actively and deleting sentences as I write. I stopped word vomiting as much

It was probably worth it then. Sounds like you used it as an opportunity to grow.

is the 2007 writers guild strike a good enough excuse for a character to have failed at breaking into acting? I assume it effected the entire business considering projects were being shelved left and right. I'm writing a backstory for a character and that kind of event seems to fit in with their timeline well. if not I can make some fake excuse but having them quickly explain it was the writers guild strike would make it easier move along quickly

>>20751143
>is the 2007 writers guild strike a good enough excuse for a character to have failed at breaking into acting?
literally any fucking excuse is good enough, it's a stupidly tough industry to get into; it'd probably be more engaging to say they had a few gigs here and there but nothing took off
>t. work in the film industry

>>20751100
Failed math. Probably why I also got scammed. I'm not a smart man.

>>20750971
Gardner, you will never be good.

>>20750971
me

>>20750971
Depends on your definition of good. Gardner writes the craziest books.

>>20751392
Kino. This proves all the doomers saying this is bad we’re just being pedantic. This unironically seems awesome

after previously being a heavy outliner, but outlining a few of my ideas to death, i'm writing my latest manuscript completely "pantsing"-style. i'm aiming for 2k words a day, at about 30k right now. but i'm starting to run into some slight mental blocks.

i was writing each scene as kind of a standalone scene, but now i need to start tying them together and make sure there is one coherent story. any advice for doing this without killing my inspiration/creativity by falling into the trap of heavily outlining things?

>>20751392

>>20751392
Jesus christ will you people pick a different book and discuss it?

One thing I like doing is this: In terms of strength, nobody in the story is a jack-of-all-stats or "Has no weak areas." Everyone has weak and strong areas, and those weaknesses actually exist and aren't just some Kryptonite-tier superfluous "Weakness" that never comes into play. Even the protagonist has weaknesses, like how he's easily thrown around due to being one of the lighter characters, is really hesitant, and really dry environments fuck him up bad.

>>20751457
Call of the Crocodile is the only Gardner book that’s a meme.

>>20751481
I meant another /lit/ author, not another Gardner book, for fuck's sake

I was about to post something about my writing progress but then I realized that no one is gonna reply to it so I just wrote this shitpost instead

>>20751492
I think Call of the Crocodile is like the only “meme” book there’s been from /lit./ Probably because of all the banner ads.

>>20751457
Nobody read the other books

>>20751601
Don’t forget that we’re living in clown world. An entire board of writers and what’s the magnum opus? Call of the Crocodile.

>>20751749
>>20751749

New thread