/lit/ - Literature

I don't have the skill to represent anything I want to represent right now. I'm just copying my influences or worse, failing to say anything.

>>22274607
That's the process, idiot. You'll be shit for years. If you're lucky you're delusional enough to only discover how shit you are while looking through old drafts and manuscripts. If you're like you, cringing and self regarding, this entire journey into competence will be painful. Nothing you can do about it.

>>22274613
I know, I also know if I went full schlock and making something for the sake of doing something I can do that. But I am talking about expressing something real in a good way. It's the Oscar Wilde and sincerity thing.

>>22274346
Catcher would be much too cynical, banal and grounded to be YA. YA is usually very heavy on romance, soap-opera dialogue and trying to make the reader insert themselves as the protagonist. YA is ripe for that niche of more grounded and somewhat depressing stories however, ones which focus on more adult themes rather than just "ilness" or "dying relative/protagonist" the thought of something like Notes from Underground but for YA sounds interesting, but I digress.
>>22274395
Don't listen to him he's just a namefag hiding behind some self-published amazon book. Your prose is fine and if you like it then that's enough. Nobody has written a book using a prose they didn't like or engage with at the time.

Never forget that /wg/ read a paragraph of Samuel Beckett thinking it was some anon posting his work and completely lambasted it and called it shit, boring, pointless etc. I wish I had the screencap I think it was quoting "The End".

I think people will overlook my grand symbolic narratives and deep meanings because I have shit prose. They're probably going to complain about monologues that "don't play out in the plot".

>>22274621
Totally incoherent.

Now that you mention it, I am packing too much information in a sentence. Is showing a character react one way to let the reader breathe?

>>22274638
This is an older piece. Is it better?

>>22274638
I fucking hate being a schizo!

>>22274680
No.

>>22274697
It could be good for something like poetry, where metaphors and surprising connections can be used to good effect. But for a normal work prose, it's too garbled. It's like looking through a kaleidoscope instead of a camera.

The hardest part about writing my crime novel so far, has been the character moments. I am really really trying to capture how people talk. As an amateur writer, it is so easy to make everyone talk like caricatures or robots. I am really trying to capture that feeling of two guys talking. For example, one guy is overly emotional, and shares a lot about himself and his motivations (though he is sort of deluding himself, and those are not his real motivations), while the other guy is there, but not really. The conversation is clearly too emotional for him, so the other guy has to specifically ask him for his thoughts and commentary. And what he has to say is more or less non-caring and vague. Previously he had lots of things to say, but when the conversation turned serious, he pretty much shut himself off.

The idea here is that in an average first novel, one character would share their problem, and the other would have some profound or witty answer, to reassure him with. I'm trying to capture the awkwardness of an overly emotional man, trying to bond with someone who is more into cars and cats, than human problems. The conversation goes nowhere, but also establishes character at the same time.

Am I doing it right?

>>22274763
huh?

>>22274763
Yeah. Uh-uh.

>>22274783
>>22274778
Thanks.

>>22274763
I refuse to believe this.

>>22274853
Believe what? I'm just trying to spice up the dialogue, by making it sometimes not play out very well. Is that so wrong?

>>22274763
I think that this will just make characters seem like two autistic retards. Did you have any conversations like this irl? If yes, do you think somebody listening to such conversation could learn something useful about you from it?

>>22274861
what.

>ask chatgpt to analyze a chapter
>it emphasizes everything I had in mind when writing
>ask it again, but now analysing it critically
>it highlights flaws in every paragraph
I feel trash right now. The real world probably is even more critical that the ai

>>22274861
Just post your dialogue

>>22274912
I don't think there is anything exactly wrong with characters seeming autistic. And I think one can learn about those two characters, just by having them lack chemistry. It will become a relevant plot point later, as their lack of chemistry will dictate the choices one of them makes. And I mean, not every character interaction would be like that.
>>22274940
I think it's pretty obvious I am ESL. I write in my own language, but I'll try to translate a portion of the prose and dialogue for a later thread. That's after my editor has gone over it. And my editor is my worst critic by the way. I'll get torn a new one, before they let it pass.

>>22274949
This isn't making any sense. What are you trying to communicate?

>>22274949
If you really believe that it would work,, then go for it. But consider that you could just write two chracters talking at each other insteald with each other. In that case it's hard to imagine they'd be in any kind of relationship.

>>22274930
What kinds of critique did you get? Was it thorough?

>>22274949
My editor (myself) is a huge cunt who never likes anything either

>>22274971
Bad

>>22274601
I want to hug every tkmiz characters

On the 30th of October, 2015, the owner of the bison farm in the Silesian suburb of Pszczyna received an unexpected letter strangely addressed to her fourteen year old granddaughter, Jane Sharp, who had been out caring for the animals all morning; but there was no doubt, judging from the terrifying scrawl on the face of the envelope, who had written it.
When the young girl saw her grandmother staring absentmindedly at the envelope for what seemed to be too long, she left the vivarium out of curiosity, and, with straw still in her hand, leaned against the door frame of the office. A more intimate position allowed her to perceive the stark effect upon which the sealed envelope had upon the matron, and the unfeeling masculine appearance she had grown accustomed to over the four years was for the first time as transparent as the windowpane she had looked through a few minutes ago.
“Ah, is it you, Vanessa?” cried the elderly woman, whose weathered face now streaked with a few dried tears. “What’s the matter? And why are you standing there with a look of pity? Have you finished already?”
“Not since I was dumped here by my drunkard mother have I seen another woman express so much grief over nothing,” replied the young girl, “you haven’t even opened the letter! Do tell me what has gotten you so upset babcia.”
“A great tragedy, Jane,” sighed the owner with an air of resignation.
“What is it?” asked the girl. “Who is it from?”
“Your matka.”
“What’s it say?” Jane said eagerly, and she stepped forward to take the envelope. “How is mama?”
“You can stay here until you’re eighteen,” her grandmother said bitterly, and she held onto the letter tightly.
“Yes, babcia.”
“And what do you plan on doing afterwards? End up like your mama?”
Jane shook her head.

>>22274953
>>22274957
Think of two characters, who usually get along, when things are easy going. They knock back a few beers, exchange jokes and funny anecdotes about the past, gossip and so on. Basically they enjoy each other's casual company. But under more serious circumstances, it becomes apparent that their friendship lacks much chemistry. So when things go actually bad, the choices these people make, are motivated by that. In a way, that early messy attempt at a heart to heart, sets up that character pairings fate.

>>22275006
but... why?

I managed to figure out several plot and a theme for my first novel I plan to publish on Royalroad (not a litrpg nor a isekai so maybe my work won't be read )


I have already written more than 10k words but my sentences are kinda robotic when I want to describe place, mood and emotion

How do you train for this kind of thing? The obvious? (Take a book that I like and try to understand the structure).

>>22275004
Never write again 'matka' or babcia' or any other polish word alongside english in sentences. Not only does it look awful, it makes the reader confused. It's not exotic or appealing. Please stop.

>>22275075
Why not?

>>22275108
No, it's absolutely fine.

>>22275108
more bad advice
no thanks!

>>22275108

>>22275004
>>22275140
>>22275147
>>22275108
if you were spanish you would be able to get away with writing abuelita and such because "diversity is our strength, chud," but nobody gives a shit about polocks because they're white. Only shitskin savages are allowed to be exotic.

>outlining a novel with a tight focus
>questions need answers, so I need to worldbuild and add more POV characters
>now my book is about something different
>but still potentially cool
This is the normal discovery process, right?

>>22275133
Your idea sounds good. Just make sure it doesn't drag when the two characters speak past each other. It should be funny/engaging for the reader despite being frustrating for the characters. And make sure you give these characters a suitable catharsis. Maybe they end up drifting apart by the end of the book because they never truly understood each other the way friends should. But your main character should grow from that revelation.

How do I explore my subconcious for inspiration?

>>22274971
A pretty good one, dare I say. My chapters are not long, so I copied it all and asked. In the second analysis, the critic one, chatgpt mentioned lack of description, character development and pace problems. It even pointed where changes were necessary. Like "the moment character x got inside the house and discovered y, there could be a description on why discovering y was shocking to her". Shit like that. I'm almost finished with the second draft so I'm not going to do it now, but as soon as I finish I'm going to ask the ai to analyse chapter by chapter and give it its thoughts. That's the magic of chapgpt - it remembers what was said earlier.
After the second analysis I got sad and asked if it was complete trash. It said no, and that writing is a long process that can be improved after every editing.
Good stuff I say. I've never had an editor but I guess this is what one does

>>22275377
David Lynch has some cool thoughts about transcendental meditation. You should check it out. You can also do psychedelics - that works too.

>>22274971
ChatGPT is good for critique if you steer it. But be sure to make it elaborate on each critique. It has a lot of preloaded cliches about more vivid descriptions realistic characterization etc.
Make it elaborate and then you can decide whether it's said anything worth hearing

Rate my story please, its about savage who escapes from jungle to america and finds success at middle-class fetish scene
https://bpa.st/643Q
>>22275004
why "intimate'? nothing sexual about watching mother opening letter? i think word is wrongly choosen.
These sentences are way too long. And i see no reason why they are so long.
If you want to show that they are in such heightened state of emotion they start speaking polish, maybe better to make them speak short emotional sentence in polish not one word? I mean i dont see point

>>22275004
>upon which the sealed envelope had upon
The fuck are you doing?

>>22275275
For me, yes. Sometimes I just start answering questions I have myself.

>>22275469
>Rate my story please
Retarded out of 10

>>22275296
Yeah, I am trying to avoid any sort of filler, or dragging out the story. A lot of characters are supposed to grow and learn something, except for the main character. That guy is a problem for all of his four friends. He gets them into trouble, and their relationships to him, dictate how they deal with said problems. Catharsis is for every other character he interacts with.

>>22275658
Nah I think you can do better.

>>22275377
Cigarettes

Should my writing use verbs? Pros/cons?
Active verbs make me scared then i p myself

giwtwm

>stuck on a section, banging my head against the wall for hours
>finally just skip it and work on a new scene
>it’s great, writing is enjoyable again
Sometimes you just have to give up

>>22276282
Not terrible but definitely sappy. You do a good job of interspersing the dialogue with little actions that give a sense of space. I hate the word “grinned” and sometimes you give too much, like when you say she’s annoyed. Let the dialogue speak for her. “Big idiot” feels like a stock phrase and makes the whole thing feel hammy

>>22276287
Nothing in the world says you have to write linearly.
Jump around to whatever you feel like writing.
Edit it all together later.

>>22276302
It's literally the first thing I've written, lol. I'm not a creative person in this way normally but I just wanted to try it. Thank you for the feedback.

Can you skip saying "he said" when the conversation is just flowing between two people? It feels kinda natural to leave it out of certain lines, but idk.

>>22275879
Bad idea. It doesn't last long.

>>22276328
Not that anon, but if you wanted to improve, I would suggest sharpening the dialogue to avoid clichés. It currently reads as very trite.

You can absolutely skip "he said". It will often flow better to have uninterrupted dialogue. Just make sure to gives cues now and then so that the reader can follow who is who.

>>22275004
What others said, stop.
Poles do not muttify their language like beaners. They either speak fully Polish or fully English. Even on /int/ the running joke is to mistranslate English phrases.

ChatGPT and spellcheck is making me question myself.
>“There are many merchants near the museum selling similar wares. What good are your words when you involve yourself with a similar lot?”

Is it with similar lots? or a similar lot? "Lots" is referring to a group of merchants, which is plural. What's the agreement here?

>>22276560
When in doubt just open a dictionary instead of a dumbfuck chatbot.
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/lot#English

>>22276576
Reading comprehension isn't your strong point is it? I'm not asking for a definition. I'm asking about subject noun agreement.

More than halfway through second draft of my novel. How are we doing?

>>22276612
Questioning why I even bother writing my 4th book if nobody is going to read it.

>>22276612
If I'm not completely broken by lack of sleep and working I'm going to finish the little first chapter (chronologically first, but not first written) I've started and almost completed yesterday and outline the middle section of my short. Need that outline, spend more than a week just thinking and thinking about what I can do and finally got a few ideas.

>>22276612
I finished chapter 1 just today. Out of n. Probably like 4 or 5.

>>22276282
What the fuck is going on? Why does no one know how to punctuate dialogue? It keeps happening over and over. Have you people never read a book before in your lives?

Does anyone have any advice for an esoteric experimental work? I don't plan on writing dialogue or settings to this as a feature. Would appreciate any help!

>>22276693
That's the proper way. The fuck are you talking about?

>>22274763
I guess

>>22276744
Read a fucking book.

Does this paragraph make any sense? I'm afraid it's too wordy.

>>22276818
Seems fine to me. There's a place for it. You can condence the second part but I don't see a reason to remove the message.

>>22276818
It is, I'd trim it. I'm not sure I'd use mirage here either.

You could really say more with less here.

>>22276827
>the second half
I meant this.

Short story has these pieces of interviews, half real half fiction, placed between every shift in setting. They do culminate in something, and frankly, it's the best way I've figured to drive a throughline narrative between what is essentially an almost arbitrary ordering of vignettes

I fear sentimentality a lot though. A serious sin of my first draft, alongside vagueness, telling, rhythmless prose etc. At one point that draft was my favorite thing I'd ever written

If my characters have thick accents and use contractions or skip the first words in sentences, should I put a comma/accent mark?

So instead of
>"I'm getting to that..."
They say
>" 'Gettin' to that..."
My only answer is to put a space between the quotation marks and the first word to make it readable, but then for slang like " 'gettin'." or " 'doin'.", I feel it looks a little odd.

>>22276936
You don't need it, and I prefer not to use the apostrophes at all. Also would be better to rely on quirks of syntax as opposed to forcing eye dialect.

>>22276942
Thanks. Now that I think about it, that does make sense. At least in terms of readability.

>>22275435
Terrible advice. You do realize chagpt doesn't understand a goddamn thing about what it reads, it just calculates some generic pointers based on statistics. You're the one who invents the reasons why it told you what it did and then "fixes" things. You might as well pop some anti-depressants, all it does is make you feel better

>>22276936
It's grammatically correct to mark where a letter or a sound is omitted. But don't arbitrarily put apostrophe everywhere wtf

Does this qualify as good writing or is it a shitpost? I stole it from the schizo thread.

>>22277059
>>22276852
how do you long text (2000 words) into JPG image?

>>22277059
>Does this qualify as good writing
From the sheer amount of adjectives, no.

>>22277131
what do you think about my story?
>>22275469

>You might ask, why Pascal? For one thing, it’s not a made-up language that I came up with just for this series: it’s a real programming language that has many important language constructs. And some old, but useful, CS books use Pascal programming language in their examples (I understand that that’s not a particularly compelling reason to choose a language to build an interpreter for, but I thought it would be nice for a change to learn a non-mainstream language :)

I wonder if not closing parenthesis was a consious decision or a typo. Would you write ":))" in this case? Because it actually looks better without formally closing the parenthesis when it ends with a smiley

honey you should stop yelling at the kids if you want them to respect you as a parent

>>22274628
Give me a little more credit, bitch.

>>22274395
That is one mother-fucker of a sentence. You're going to turn a lot of readers away with a writing style like that. Depends on where you're trying to publish, I guess. For webnovels and amazon it is key to pander to the adhd-ridden masses and keep shit simple.

Just saying.

>>22277537
>pander to the adhd-ridden masses
More on this. People like to shit-talk Brandon Sanderson, but he does it right.
Characters and how they interact with each other is the whole fucking game. Fuck your prose, fuck your metaphors. Characters and dialog.
I mean, you need an interesting plot too, but your plot is nothing if you don't have the characters.
Got that, bitches?
If you don't got good characters you got NOTHING.

>>22274395
Not him and ESL here, but in
>there was no doubt, judging from the terrifying scrawl on the face of the envelope, whom had written it
it seems to me that "whom" is used wrong here too

Anything wrong with this sentence? And is it more interesting than: "The owner relaxed with a considerable sigh. The child then snatched the letter from the owner."

The owner relaxed with a considerable sigh, and at once the mysterious letter had slipped from her own hand into the sweaty palms of the child.

>>22277573
updated it.

The owner relaxed with a considerable sigh, and at once the mysterious letter slipped from her own hand into the sweaty palms of the child. The young girl gave a look to see that her grandmother was not at all offended by this snatchery, and bit into the envelope and tore it open with the same feverishness she would soon use to read its contents.

>>22277591
changed
>and tore it open
to
>tearing it open

>>22277573
Kek, you did everything wrong with this sentence. Try something like:
"The owner let out a sigh of relief and relaxed, in that moment the mysterious letter was snatched from her hand by the child."
As an ESL to ESL, man, read more books. You're using completely wrong words that create completely wrong images.

>>22277591
Well this is just horrible now

>>22277537
>>22277595
hi, what do you think about my story? https://bpa.st/643Q

>>22277603
It's a good one, anon.

>>22277595
OP here.
i am not an ESL.

I am trying to emulate english translations of 19th century french literature though

>>22277662
Well, I wouldn't read something written so badly even if it's all has some strange purpose.

>>22277670
post me something that you think is well written.

Should your title have something to do with your book or have a deeper meaning or can I just name it whatever I want?

how to get the reader to care about what happens?

>>22277695
Make it interesting.

>>22277708
so add a mystery. Got it.

>>22277723
If that's what you wanna do, go for it.

How do you write about niche things in a way that's compelling to a non niche reader? Trying to use the girlfriend character as a reader surrogate who needs things explained to her here.

https://pastebin.com/J1m5Jw4C

>>22277694
Depends on your piece and intentions. If you're writing slop fantasy and want more readers you should include a name (character/place/organisation) and some interesting words, like "The Magic War of Dickpeniswald". If you're writing some artsy stuff and you want people to marvel at it you just name it something vague but related to the meaning and tone. Or if you really want to impress and shock someone, write a solid opening paragraph, think of a name for it and give your book this name.

>>22277767
I assume it also helps if you don't name it something completely unrelated to the book i.e. naming it Okinawa summer and basing it in Boston.

Is it weird that I don't describe the appearance of my protagonist's girlfriend? Their relationship is a key part of the novel, but I just realized that I haven't described any of her physical traits except for the fact that she has blue eyes.

How to rewrite this dialogue?

“And this farm is yours once I retire. All ten hectares.”
“Don’t say that,” the young girl said, “you’d leave me all alone with the animals. I can’t take care of all the red deer, fallow, roe deer, peacocks, wild geese, ducks, pigs and bison on my own. Even you had dziadek.”

https://pastes.io/dg3pdehl1y

How do I make this scene more tense?

>>22277797
I don't see any problem with it. Well, it only needs a few adjustments to shine.

For example:

“This nigger plantation; all, ten inches.”
“Didnu’muffin,” young hoe uttered, “you’d leave me all alone with the animals. I can’t take care of all the red deer, fallow, roe deer, peacocks, wild geese, ducks, pigs and bison on my own. Even you had dizdick.”

>>22277817
wow. advice this good one usually has to pay for.

>>22277841
Are you making fun of me?

>>22277855
no, i think that's a genuine improvement over the original

girl's last tour is great

>>22274613
I don't know if this is necessarily true desu. While I agree with the sentiment that "you'll be shit for years" when endeavoring to be truly good at an art form, some people just hit it out of the park right away. I think I might be one of those people. I'm working on my first novel right now, and have been kind of writing in my head for years, but now I am actually writing a first draft and I am pretty pleased with it so far. Do you think there may be some exceptions to the "you'll be shit for years" rule?

>>22277797
Pretend that they're not robots and have them speak like normal humans instead.

>>22277797
“S’all mine innit?” she asks, pulling the straps of her overalls.

Keeping his eyes on the hills, he picks his ear with his pinky and spits.

“Aye.”

She digs the toe of her boot into the mud, making a little divot.

“Buh…wha bout da animals den? Little fuckahs…?”

She looks up at him, as if seeking some assurance.

The man shrugs. Somewhere, a pig oinks. Then, he lifts his leg like a hound, like Old Bessie, farting loudly towards the horizon.

>>22277911
post the first 100 words

>>22277920
I get this critisism a lot but I don't see how they are robotic.

How do I motivate myself to get back into writing? I've toyed with the idea on and off for about a year now, but between work and my general ineptitude towards narrative writing makes me continuously put it off.

>>22277911
>some people just hit it out of the park right away. I think I might be one of those people.
post an excerpt you think is good because this is a conversation about nothing otherwise

>>22278027
You really think a normal human would list off 8 types of animals instead of just saying 'the animals'? You're a robot yourself apparently

>>22277911
You might be a once in a generation prodigy. You might also be delusional and vastly overestimating your abilities. I wonder which is more likely?
You'll have to post work. No, showing it to your mom and getting complimented means nothing. Even many writing circles will be hugboxes. If your work is good enough that even anons will call it such, you can know you really have talent.

>>22274601
Thinking about writing a detective story set in a biopunk world. What would be a good first case?

>>22278053
where are we?

>>22278066
Have you read Altered Carbon?

Hone the core concept of your constructed world and design a case that cuts to the heart of it.

>>22278066
checked.
Something drug related deaths from a scumbag manufacturer in the city underground.

A man dealing easy-to-produce but anonymous pistols. THis disrupts the city's organized crime network, which in turn goes back to the authorities and their connections to the mafia. Have the Detective investigate the cancer of corruption running through the body politic.

>>22278066
Investigate a killer using sexbots or other androids remotely in order to kill. THen, we severs teh connection so that nobody can trace it to him.

>>22278116
yes i am writing story similiar to this . Its about rogue noirish PD in world with easy interplant communication, where he discovers gov conspiration where gov spikes food with fentanyl to kill old people so they wont get any retirement money

>>22278123
Fucking based. Yes, kill off all the old people.

I have written some similar stuff, but it is set in a massive universe with humans on many thousands of worlds. No detective stuff tho. Finally just got into an intelligence officer for a character.

>>22277777

>>22278066
In this futuristic city, the Detective goes to a Baseball game to watch for the signs of a terrorist attack, as two have already taken place across teh megalopolis, and the authority's AI assistant is suggesting an attack at the upcoming Warriors' baseball game.

The Detective remembers going to games as a youth with his father, but things are assuredly different from what he remembers.

Homeless outside the park are not an uncommon sight, but it is the number of homeless within the gates that first catches him off guard. THen, he notices the Fent booths offering regulated doses to patrons ... for free!

He sits down in the upper decks behind right field, hoping to catch video of most everything with special sunglasses that double as protection from the intense UV-boosting Klaus Smog over the city's burnt skyline. Noticing the bent-double zombies shifting about the area, he cannot help but feel for the poor of the city. His pity fades as a man comes around to scream out offers of Fent and Oxy and Domestic Heroin as they once offered popcorn and peanuts.

The game begins. As the first batter steps up to the plate, our Detective sees signs and borders advertising the latest and greatest weight-loss drug. Every open patch is stuffed with advertisements, mostly for pharmaceuticals, but he can see the extreme obesity of the fans. One steps over a fentanyl zombie while balancing three stacks of nachos atop a six-pack holder of Diet Squito Light, which has over four-hundred calories per cup. The man adjusts his belt before sifting through moth-eaten pockets for a little pink pill. He eats the digestive-system enhancer and gets to work on his feast.

Detective Acho then sees the newest acquisition by the Warriors - a cuban/italian mongrel refugee from Columbia. Acho has the strong suspicion that the man is also an illegal ape hybrid, supposedly still outlawed by teh League. The man's uniform is covered in advertisements for pills, abortions, and gender-bending drugs. Every square inch is taken up by ads. Even his face is tattooed such that the audience can only see an advertisement for MENstration Plus instead of a right cheek. Deep down, Acho secretly hopes for a successful attack. He longs to see the infield aflame, reminiscent of the skies of his city during the wars. At least in war, he could make sense of the world.

What's the ideal length for a standalone mil/pol thriller novel? ~350 pages? I'm on my first draft and I have aspirations to publish, but I'm becoming worried about bloat

>>22278019
>>22278041
>>22278062
Ankle biters and copers

>>22278191
Bigger the better. You will have to self-publish unless your novel is filled with homos and gay sex with kids. That is what publishers really want.

So just write whatever the fuck you want and do it how you want. Write it. Publish it. don't worry about bloat. If you think it is bloated, then tidy it up. Otherwise, do your thing.

>>22277792
No. Everyone can fill in the blanks with whatever they like.

>>22278107
>>22278116
>>22278121
I said Biopunk not Cyberpunk, but thank you for the advice regardless
>>22278155
This is pretty good. It really captures the tone I was imagining

>>22278203
Not those anons but asking to see someone’s work (someone who, for their first time, is “hitting it out of the park”) isn’t crabbing. Hell, I’d like to see it too.

>>22278191
Tighter the better. Go to pubtips and search thrillers. You’ll see the standard query. Do not listen to the s self publishing crabs. They want you to be as miserable as they are

>>22278155
but is this film scenario or is this story?
This is problem with my writing, i just describe situations happening one after another. I just dont think its very literary

>>22278224
Just take the elements and make them more biopunk. I see what you are saying. I was giving you more cyberpunk for sure.

I guess instead of sexbots, you would need modified, patented humans that don't have a free will. So, they are being manipulated through genetic code. Find out who is manipulating the code and you have your bad guy, Detective.

>>22278291
>i just describe situations happening one after another. I just dont think its very literary
Don't listen to what cocksuckers tell you that insist on purple prose in everything. People have limited attention span and juggling good prose and getting to the point is a skill writers need to have a good grasp of.

Yes yes, I get it, you wrote BEAUTIFUL prose that's glowing galaxy brain! But 15 pages later, you still haven't forwarded the plot by a single fucking word. Is that a better solution? Obviously not.

Sometimes A does B, C happens and scene moves on is the best solution.

https://a.co/d/7I0Jxf7

This guy made it and got published. Why can't we?

>>22278291
That would be the setup for a Detective story. Not film, although I can see it as both.

I think you should just write your stuff, my man. If a detective story, then you don't need to be as literary, but that is a matter of preference and opinion. Maybe start doing it as you are, with situations happening one after another. To fill in those gaps, maybe the Detective debriefs his superiors, or is talking with associates before a morning brief, or is in teh hospital after an attack (so he has time to reflect), or he has a modified slave wife that he just vents at after a hard day. Don't write any weird ass sex shit with the slave wife, though. Awful.

Ive just found the perfect work of literature to rip off the imagery for my story. What a lucky day.

>>22278207
>>22278254
All novels should be both tight and big at the same time. If you fail to make an impression it's not expanded enough. If you stretch it out without adding anything important you're just boring the reader.

>>22278203
post the work or fuck off you deluded retard. you're avoiding it because you know very well you pleasant little bubble will burst the second you show your writing to people.

im writing a lovecraftian short story right now, it's turning out great, im going to post it here once it's done, tho it may take a couple of days to polish it out and perfect it

>>22278354

I am thinking of getting this published, maybe.


I find that I must eat heat.
A new vice, it can't be beat.
Folded breakfast wrap.
Slathered spice and pepper.
Fingers on a desk do tap.
While porno loads a dwarf and leper.

I must abandon my race.
No love for my culture can I trace.
As a youth, I explored macabre creations.
Crows heads on rabbit bodies,
and other abominations.

Now, a truck drops the last of my stuff.
A new New Yorker, but the city looks rough.
No matter to one such as I.
Mutts and mongrels, I'll finger every pie.

As I once placed great joy in the strange.
I look for latinos with big bellies and mange.
Nothing compares, no squirrel puppet or chimera.
Courting a muffin top covered in pink mascara.

What creatures of Lucifer's vision will we conceive.
Nuts in single mums, confess love and deceive.
No orc or monster can compare.
I've found a half-cuban quadroon with pink hair.

Mutts we create do tickle my fancy.
But being a father seems rather chancy.
So off in the night I will scurry.
To find a half-indian mutt, smell of curry.

Woe to teh Euro that knows not my glory.
To fuck a new creature on every bronx story.
Take my seed but know not my name.
Don't hate my tale, just envy my game.

>>22278425
https://discord.gg/nuBMwb7h

somebody made a /lit/ discord if you want to participate there, too. It already fell apart, but I still check it time to time.

>>22278062
Okay here ya go. This is not the first chapter but one I have been working on. It's about my main character and her friend at a vape shop.

Sorry the file didn't upload

>>22278554
It seems kinda short, don't ya think?

Like a very succinct, new age kind of writing?
So concise as to be non-existent.

>>22278559
Hhmm. Interesting. Would need some editing, but not awful for what it is.

Are you a male though? And white monster? I kek'd.

>>22278566
>>22278584
Yeah, I'm just getting going. This is a snippet from what I think is going to be the 2nd chapter. I'm a girl, and there is going to be a 2nd main character who is a probably schizoid man the main character falls for against her better judgment. I'm pretty into it.

>>22278605
Post it in the /lit/ discord if you want me to edit it.
The edit would be very light. Just stuff that I think would improve it. Of course, you might find my edits to be horse shit. But the more you read and write, the better you will become.

>>22278640
Thanks senpai I will do this.

>>22278559
Yeah you need to leave this general. You’re not off to a surprisingly great start, you’re just a better writer than the people that post itt. This is about as bad as the stuff from the nano 2019 /lit/ group where everyone was a begginner, so you aren’t exceptional at all, it’s just the caliber of writer on this board has just dropped like a stone.
Four years of practice and you’ll be embarsssed you ever posted this. But this general isn’t capable of challenging you much. Too many people from r/writing who don’t read good fiction and have written a page in their lives

You’re off your nut though, you definitely suck and are going to for years. Half of your descriptors are a waste of ink that don’t describe anything that isn’t also described in the succeeding sentences or in an adverbial crutch, your dialogue is mostly filling up space, not kinetic or dynamic enough for me to appreciate it in lieu of an actual prose story

>>22278664
Please post your own stuff for us.

>>22278664
I appreciate your feedback anon. I agree, that after 4 years of practice this will not be very good, but I'm moderately pleased with it for now since I'm literally just revving up prose-wise. I haven't put much thought at all into this excerpt and frankly I agree with all your critiques. Nevertheless, I don't think it will take me "years".

>>22274601
Poetry noob here, can I rhyme "roam" and "alone"? It doesn't sound bad, but I don't know if that disrupts the scheme (AABB).

>>22278715
People do it sometimes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_and_imperfect_rhymes

>>22278728
I get the feeling that poetry is a lot more based in what "feels" write than many absolute rules. Of course, there are still specific ways things are done, but then again sometimes people break those rules, too.

>>22274601
should I clean and organize my room before writing?

>>22278804
- Is Jane Sharp a setting appropriate name?
- I don't like "intimate position"
- Next sentence could use some editing. Also, why does the matron have a masculine appearance? Try a different angle.
- Her tears shouldn't be dried yet. They should be glistening.
- Jane's first line is unnatural exposition dump and doesn't sound natural
- Say "impatiently" instead of "with child-like impatience"
- Do not say "snatchery" for God's sake
- When the contents of the letter are revealed, I suggest pausing from dialogue for a moment and reflecting on Jane's state of mind. Get more mileage out of the scene's drama.

How long is this work intending to be (short story, novella, novel)? If it's a novel, you have to slow your pace and give the reader a sense of place and mood.

>>22278826
You should clean ur cock, bucko.

>>22278858
thanks. Saved for when I edit.

Jane sharp is a placeholder.
I'll change intimate position
i want to describe a stout looking woman so ill change that.
Yep
Maybe
Okay

A horror/thriller/gothic short story. I think it is going to be 6000 words, but I do want to add characterisation and setting afterwards to bump it up to 12,000. I'm more focused on plot on my first draft and I was just wondering if I wrote like that for the whole story it would be readable.

It's gonna be a haunted house story so my main concern is to make the reader care about the protagonist as quickly as possible.

Sick Byrne.

>>22278935
Sick Byrne: the name of a female character in my LGBTQP saga, with a head far too large for her thin frame, like a cherry tomato placed atop a popsicle stick.

Sick was named by her mother just before she was taken against her will from the birthing ward to a mental institution. After her release, the abuse started.

>>22278559
Is this a ChatGPT post?

>your novel will never be subject to dozens of midwit YouTube video essays and "analyses"

Why bother?

>>22279115
Mine will. A few of them, actually. The best one will filter the YouTubers and ultimately be a commercial and critical failure, driving me to a messy and slightly pathetic suicide (live-streamed).

I'm interested in freelance editing. I have no idea where to start, but I'm told I have the skill for it. Anyone have any recommendations?

>>22279151
You can literally start right here and most anons will suck your dick for it.

>>22279115
I don't get those but I do get somebody who comments on every chapter of my fanfic with a short summary of what happened and how it made her feel
It's actually really helpful and encouraging

>>22279151
start by editing some anon's posted shit

>>22279173
>>22279191
Okay, I'm new here but if anyone wants me to edit their stuff they can send it to editsbyanon10044@gmail.com.

>>22278559
>>22278559
No one is going to read this unless you format it correctly. New dialogue gets a new paragraph.

>>22279228
Go to the discord, my guy.

>>22279280
What's the official lit discord link?

>>22279228
edit this guy
>>22278559

>>22279568
Well the writing isn't terrible but it needs work. It reads like a rough draft. That is to say, it reads like all the ideas are there but tossed onto the page as the writer thinks about them and not pre-planned. First you get a scene with some action (which is good) but it's bogged down by exposition. Instead of trusting the readers to come to their own conclusions, the writer just spells everything out (telling readers he/she thinks they're stupid).
I couldn't figure out which character was saying what and I had to read it over a few times and even now I'm not sure I have the order right. Dialogue by different characters needs to be in their own paragraphs, not to mention punctuation was forgotten after one of the bouts of dialogue so I had a very hard time figuring out where it ended.
The idea for a story is there but the author is clearly unclear on which character he/she wants to tell it from. The POV is all over the place. I'd recommend writing the book all the way through in outline format and then going back to see which character offered the most dynamic perspective before continuing further and then the dialogue and POV would be more organic and would be less like the author standing over my shoulder reading it to me.

>>22279463
Not telling you, it's a secret

How to write with adhd and is this good writing music?

https://youtu.be/pkw2kcQ5Lzs

I can't even write genre fiction with confidence...

>>22279729
What's even genre fiction?

>>22279732
nvm

>>22279732
What people (((here))) usually use it for: Pretentious crab bucket fag circle jerk term meant to shame people for writing something they don't like or insinuate that certain literary works have less merit or value because they have a specific setting, theme or storytelling style.

What it actually means: A term used to describe literary works that fit into specific categories and more often than not don't deviate too far from a set standard, be it narrative structure, the type of plot they tackle or that generally follows genre convention and makes heavy use of tropes, popular plot points and character archetypes.

>>22279878
Watching you and whoever else seethe inpotently about being looked down on by the “literary pseuds” will never not be entertaining.
Such an aggressive inferiority complex, combined with massive delusions about the merit of your work or the things you like to read

A Nobel laureate has been writing sff for the past 6 years… McCarthy wrote mostly westerns… Pynchon deserved the Hugo, in fact, it used to be that a Hugo winner flowed so easily between Science fiction and literary fiction that the distinction seemed superfluous.

You aren’t being discriminated against for your settings or “themes”, you’re being discriminated against for your handling of those things.

Commercial fiction writers have a much easier path to publication and earnings from their writing, and the reason for that is due to the accessibility of their material, but they are simply not content. They must have their accolades. You must crown Niel Gaiman a master of letters, you must admit Robin Hobb into the western canon, and where oh where is the Pulitzer for A Court of Thorns and Roses?

Get over yourself. The irony is that the people with a puffed up self perception and an engorged sense of entitlement are you.

No one is putting your head in a vice and making you write commercial fiction. You chose it, and all of its trappings, and obviously, the perception of your work as a writer. Stop whining

>>22279975
>literary fiction
You mean cuckold fiction?

>>22279629
I said edit it, not critique it

>>22280045
It's a little hard to edit it when it's a pic. If the person can send it to my email it'd be better.

>>22279975
>reddit spacing
>pretentious dick measuring
>popular thing is... le bad!
>people demanding their writing not be written off due to being labeled "commercial fiction" is bad because... it just is, okay!?
>commercial fiction writers have it easier, source: my itchy asshole

Bingo! And then you say other people have an inferiority complex and delusions of merit. For the sake of argument I'll play along and use your gaybo terms. Implying that genre fic writers have it easier is preposterous. Everyone gets screwed the same, but for different reasons. It might be easier to get published when writing genre fic, but more often than not that just means you've cast your book into the void of obscurity. It is extremely difficult to break into any "genre fic" market because it's all flooded to fuck. I agree, there is an inundation of mediocre writing, but that just means there are more mediocre writers getting published, not that the category of writing itself is flawed. Blame the publishers for having shit filters. The opposite is true for literary fiction. An overly high bar set by the pretentious cocksuckers that so often cling to the term results in publishers expecting you to be the next Mark Twain before so much as giving your manuscript a glance. And even if you somehow manage to squeeze through the cracks, the chances of success are piss low because, again, you'll be expected to reinvent the wheel with some new age literary masterpiece. Implying that one category of writers has it easier than the other is blatantly false. The only thing I'm willing to give you is that when it comes to genre fic, there is a higher chance that you might lucky and inexplicably acquire an audience who, by sheer luck, choose your boilerplate garbage over someone else's. Not that the same can't happen with lit fic, mind you. In the end, both roads lead you to the same destination unless you've come up with something REALLY good one or are extremely lucky. Good writing isn't exclusive to either genre or lit fic. Implying that one style / category is inferior is reductive and only serves to foster animosity between writers, which is the last thing the literary world needs right now. Lit fic isn't superior to genre fic, and genre fic isn't superior to lit fic. Reductive dick measuring just fucks everyone over. That's why I think the term "genre fiction" is gay.

>>22280079
Nta. I don't believe in genre fic at all while understanding the division between lit fic and non lit fic. There is only literary and pulp. Genre doesn't matter, the execution does. You can easily assume LotR to be lit fic rather than "genre". The genre and literary distinction is perpetuated by academics and woman writers, they like showing how much they love to be pseuds when they tell you they're reading/writing literary fiction when the only thing distinguishing it from regular pulp is usage of thesaurus words. Some audiences just really prefer to read something from a specific genre and they absolutely will read a well written character study and philosophy loaded piece in this genre. Somehow everyone completely forgot that gothic is a genre and now Moby Dick and Frankenstein are lit fic, but at the same time Heinlein's novels will always be seen as genre science fiction. Just a load of contradictions.

>>22280053
You are too lazy for an editor.
You can just use google to OCR the text from the image.

>>22280202
tesseract generated this. I didn't check it for typos.

MA opened the door to the vape shop and greeted Emma from the door."Sup"
Emma looked up from her phone from behind the counter, removed the vane from
her mouth and exhaled, "SUP." MA walked over to her. "Sorry I didn't text you back
last night, Emma stated with genuine remorse. They were the sortof intimates who
'were in constant contact, and any gaps in communication warranted an explanation.
"Seriously, something out of a romance novel happened with me and a guy last
night got the 4.5" Emma handed over the weekly marijuana supply that MA
'smoked alone in her room; the two of them smoked Emma's supply of weed when|
they were together because Emma was a successful drug dealer and could afford to
bbe generous. MA contorted her mouth into a lewd smile and sniffed the pot
approvingly before putting it in her bag. "It's cool. So what happened?" She reached
{nto Emma's bag and grabbed one of the pre-rolis Emma sold everyday to customers
under the table.

"We spiritually connected, We had the deepest conversation and just overall clicked
in every aspect." Emma proceeded to explain that he was a customer, who came into
the store 4 weeks ago. "Remember? We popped off that day and he gave me his
'number. I've ghosted him a few times, not on purpose, but he came back to the vane
shop and he spent from 8:30 ti 10 with me. It was crazy the conversations we went
into". She cracked open a White Monster Energy and her eyes darted down to her
'phone, eagerly checking for new messages. Emma was a romantic. She was very
frequently meeting men in this way, usually customers, and very few of these
'encounters turned out particularly well for her or led to anything positive. On the
contrary, usualy things went south rather quickly. Last fall, she meta guy who came
{nto the Store, and they started out similarly, but when he began stalking her and
'became prematurely possessive, showing up to the store threatening to kill her, by
'Christmastime, she was disappointed to have to issue a restraining order against
'im, To make matters worse, he also had a friend that 'somehow' had her nudes
from back in 2019 that he threateningly texted her from 23 different numbers using
'phone number changing app. Emma stil talked about wanting to beat the fuck out
of him.

>>22280229
"Was he cute too?" MA asked with partial enthusiasm and stuck the pre-roll in her
'mouth, interested, but more concerned with the prospect of getting high forthe first
time that day. "Yes, but he's not hot inthe face," was her answer.

"Last night was like a movie, let me tell you how it was" She smiled and gestured
outside to the front ofthe store, Camel Crush in hand.

Emma had a florid cherubs face, round and rosy-cheeked, that featured a semblance
'ofinnocence long extinguished and scars from cheek piercings that, resulting from
improper care, left behind soft craters usually mistaken for charming dimples. MA's
face concealed nothing. It was sharp, "all cheekbones," her mother lamented, pale
from hours spent indoors, and often glowering. There was no telling how in such a
short span of time, her countenance had hardened so thoroughly that all vestiges of
remaining youth disappeared under the veneer of her experiences.

Source: >>22278559

>>22280079
this response is a huge self-report desu

>>22280202
Lol
>Too lazy to do all my shit for me

haha
rise and grind fellas
there's gold in them hills haha
keep plugging away
wgmi

OK guys I'm kinda freaking out a little bit and I need to be entirely vulnerable for a moment.
I really need you guys to tell me the truth. I don't think I've ever gotten any honest feedback on anything I've written.
Please tell me if you think I have any potential. I need to see if other people see what I see in myself. If you see anything, let me know. If not, please tear apart my ego and shit on my writing. I need a reality check. I need to know whether I'm right and I have some potential, which would make me feel more optimistic and confident about taking this whole thing seriously, or I'm wrong and delusional and I may as well just start from scratch. Either way would be incredibly helpful and make me feel a ton better.
I'm sorry for how incoherent this is I'm panicking slightly because of the unknown. Please help
I'm gonna reply to this with two rambling monologues I've done
Ok

>>22280360
I’m writing this now as you sleep. I feel anxious and far away from you. I’m sad to say that this is becoming increasingly common. As I fall deeper in love with you I begin to realize more and more how different we really are. How much of what makes you so perfect in my eyes I lack in myself. I know you’ll say something sweet about how that just makes us complete, how I have everything you hate about yourself, too, and how everything will be alright.
And I do think everything will be alright. I know everything will be alright. You’re too perfect and in love with me for this not to work out. But Sadie, every time I look at you I can feel myself slipping away. I see myself in the stories you tell, about that girl so long ago who hadn’t grown up yet. The cynic who shut herself away. The recluse who thought she knew better. You bloomed late, and you bloomed into something beautiful. Something perfect but rough, something real but unbelievable, visceral and unattainable.
I love you so much and I never want what we have to end, but I know that I will never fully be here. I look in your eyes and I just feel my heart sink, my body slipping away. My hands go cold.
At times I almost feel like a work of art. Just something for you to gaze at, to think about, to admire. I will never be the person you are for me, the caretaker . I’m just living and being gazed upon and trying my best not to run and hide everyday, so you can come and look and touch and feel and through that give yourself the strength to continue to be the greatest person I know.
You’re someone who belongs in a film to me, not anyone I should ever be interacting with. Not anyone I know how to interact with. I don’t even know where to start.

>>22280360
I’m really finding myself struggling to find things to hold on to lately. My routines have just fallen apart over time, to the point where I pretty much just go to work and come home. But, coinciding with this schedule is another routine. A routine I’ve done very little to maintain, and honestly only really exists in my life due to your insistence. We called earlier and I don’t think you could tell how much I needed you in that moment. I’m fairly stoic and that’s not always an act. I don’t know if I ever stopped feeling things because I’m not quite sure I ever felt much more than I do now. I’m sure I must’ve. I remember, at the very least, anxiety. And I remember being a little guy and when that anxiety had just started and I thought like a movie I could make some great transformation. I remember hope. I remember pride and making people laugh. I remember nerves, and I remember how that’s different from anxiety. I remember testing myself and my abilities. I remember feeling OK being a beginner. I remember feeling close enough to my mom to want to cry on her shoulder.
In 10 years that will be a much sadder paragraph. What will I remember? I’ll remember you. I’ll remember how it felt, slight comfort, at hearing your voice. I’ll remember touching you and breaking down when it starts and all I begin to feel is numb skin. I’ll remember being 20 and crashing your prom, crying on your couch that night as you hold me and we lay together. I’ll remember your mom asking if she can visit us and the kids “when Henry’s mean to” her. I’ll remember all the nice things she says about me, all that praise for just sitting and talking and, when I have the energy, pretending to feel a thing.
When it all finally falls apart, for the last time, what will I have to hold on to aside from regret? If I can last a few more years I think even regret will numb out of me. And then, what am I? A pretty good programmer, I bet.
Sadie, I don’t think I’m gonna live long enough to give you Finn and Ollie and Juniper. And I’m sorry for writing that. I’m sorry that ever came out of my head. Because those words that did, that I can never tell you, make it impossible to deny that I’m not hiding something.

>>22274601
test

https://pastebin.com/se1V1SzB

>>22280427
What are you looking for here?

>>22280524
when should the rape scene happen?

>not in the mood to write
>only in the mood to read my own shit
>know I'll hit a brick wall where I have to finish writing
feelsbadman

>>22279190
That's really sweet.
I had reader like that too when I was writing a fanfic. While I was cringing at my own writing, there was this one person who just thoroughly enjoyed my humble little story.
It made me feel bad when I deleted it after hitting writer's block.

>>22279190
Lucky. I have one reader that just tells me to kill myself every time i release a chapter of my fanfic

>>22279115
Oh yes, it will.
And it will get a lot of rule 34 pornography as well.

>>22280714
It's me.

>>22280721
Man, I wish. I will appreciate my sexually tense but explicit characters to get non-canon pornography. It means the readers actually like the characters.

>>22280858
>>22280721
And I know it's probably not going to happen. Talk all you want about rules of the internet, but porn artists work for money too and all this (good quality) r34 content is made around the hype of popular things to get those artists engagement and commissions.

can you really call yourself a student of the arts if you never grew up with it?

>>22281176
Do you just mean, can you be deeply interested and engaged with art? Of course you can, unless you spend all your time and energy worrying about dead-end questions like whether you had the optimal artistic childhood. People in this thread are really neurotic about this kind of thing, about whether they have the right IQ level or natural talent or whatever. Just chill out, forget these meaningless superego concepts, and enjoy the challenge of actually reading and writing.

>>22281176
I'm a student of life.

>>22280360
>>22280364
>>22280371
These are really self-involved so I don't know what you're expecting other people to get from them. What parts of your writing do you see as being intriguing and inviting and thought-provoking for a reader? What parts are you anxious or uncertain about? Genuine questionss, because I don't know what you're going for at all.

>/wg/ help my writing has a problem :(
>okay post your writing so we can analyze the problem for you and give helpful feedback :)
>N-NO >.<
Every thread.

>new /lit/ novel ad dropped
>it's an attempt at the great incel novel
Did anyone from /wg/ write this?

>>22281423
God, I'm so much better off using Brave.

>>22281445
What's that?

>>22281465
A shitty browser for faggots too dumb to use adnauseam and noscript.

>>22281423
Nope. It's also traditionally published too. So his writing is 100x better than any of ours

>>22280371
>I do x.
You should divvy up your sentences more instead of starting everything with I verb x. I get there's effect in the repetition, but it doesn't seem to work here.

>I remember, at the very least, anxiety. And I remember being a little guy and when that anxiety had just started and I thought like a movie I could make some great transformation.

You can cut out the second I remember anxiety

>>22281489
This is like the second tradpublished novel I've seen through /lit/ in the past week. Was the selfpub seether wrong? Did he lose?

>>22277981
Unironically 10x better than the original.

>>22281508
It's over. Better writers on 4chan exists and /wg/ is just a shithole for dimeless shitters that can't string 3 sentences together.

>>22281512
>/wg/ is just a shithole for dimeless shitters that can't string 3 sentences together.
Sounds like a place for me.

>>22277797
>>22277981
mogged

>>22281517
That rewrite is infinitely worse than the original. It reads like video-game writing. They reached into the bucket of hillbilly cliches and arranged them into a pointless Show-Don't-Tell template.

>>22280360
It's very emotional, in a good way. Could use some editing because there are some repetitive parts. The other anon who said that there's nothing inviting or engaging for the reader is right though; this doesn't stand on its own and definitely needs some surrounding context in order to "hit".

No reason to panic, you can clearly do this.

>>22281537
It's got charm, unlike the original.

Figure i'd ask (I am going to repost this in the next thread because the post count is so high)

But I have a race of goat people in my fanasty novel whom are enslaved

I heard that goats are fun the middle east so I was thinking about incorprating that into my story, But do you think its in bad taste to do that since they are slaves?

Thoughts my fellow Anons?

>>22281661
If you give a shit about sensitivity readers then dont bother writing your story.

I’ve been as of recently getting addicted to rapid fire chaining of semicolons. Allow me to give a very rude example, something like this:

>He was a nigger of a man; his skin was pale; he robbed men white and nigger alike.

Something that’s commonly used by Joseph Conrad.

Any anons want to share their favorite prose style devices?

>>22281668
Chat GPT flags this as incorrect grammar

>>22281679
kek, well done.

>>22281661
This is an opportunity for some interesting juxtaposition. What happens when a "fun" race is enslaved? How do they reconcile their situation with their natural tendency towards joy? Are some in denial? Are others disillusioned? Can the spirit of their people endure while under servitude?

>>22281668
Why not use commas? Honest question. I love employing an occasional semicolon, but I keep hearing that it's unnecessary at best and bad form at worst, and I'm now I'm second guessing myself whenever I use a semicolon.

Bring back parentheses.

>>22281791
>Why not use commas?
Abusing commas and semicolons is equally bad.

If I can't fix a sentence with a dash, I rewrite.

>>22281661
What other anon said. If you care what someone thinks about you and stifle your writing because of outrage opinions, don't even start writing.

>>22274601
>Boredom is the foundation of creativity
Is this really true? I haven't been writing much lately, mostly because whenever I get bored, i just grab my phone and fish through this site for the next dopamine hit

>>22281661
>Thoughts my fellow Anons?
Start by learning how 'whom' works.

>>22281791
>Why not use commas? Honest question.
Because that would be a comma splice. Multiple semicolons are weird but not wrong. Periods would be normal.

Has anyone found it beneficial to their writing and edification quitting 4chan? I spend like 6 hours browsing this place everyday. But when I try to quit I have intense FOMO. Granted, I do get good book recs on here but I don't think it's worth it. Can anyone convince me with their rhetoric? I just think I will be happier off this place for at least a month. I find this place more entertaining than actually going outside and speaking to other people.

>>22282050
The truth and objective reality is, most people are literal garbage and nobody wants to interact with them if they can help it.

Fuck off to normiezone at your own peril.

>>22282050
If anything I just manage my time better. I quit basically all video games besides ones that take virtually no effort and little time. I don't doomscroll anymore. Now that I redeemed my time I can lift more, read more and write more.

Is there a word like "drinking" But implied you're drinking something thick like tar or sludge? Maybe Guzzling? Quaffing?

>>22282050
Not me I use this place when I have writing on the mind but can't actually do any. It's like, hanging around writing culture and talking about it makes me want to do it more. My normal friends don't really care too much about my writing.

>>22282119
No and the fact there is no real word for exhaling air out of your nose rapidly pisses me off.

>>22282119
i'd probably work with gulping

Never in my life posted my work online, but i just want some feedback. I do realise i've over used a few words in this piece, it's not finished and i need to edit it some more.

In the boundless void where light dared not linger, a cursed prison drifted in the haunting embrace of the cosmic seas. A forsaken station, borne of mankind's darkest machinations, orbited menacingly around a monstrous black hole, a cosmic deluge silently engulfing the tides of time. Here, existence had been cruelly severed from its temporal anchors, leaving the prisoners adrift in an eternal doldrum of languid despair.

Cloaked in pallid radiation suits, the prisoners arrived, spectral mariners, their fate sealed by chains forged of an alien metal, unyielding and cold. A perplexing device ushered them into their unending purgatory, a celestial abyss where hope's compass had long been shattered.

Within the prison's echoing grottos, the prisoners lay motionless like sunken vessels, their faces veiled behind ghostly visors. Names were but whispers of forgotten voyages, lost in the perpetual night that clung to every alcove and corridor. In this bastion of cosmic malevolence, no lighthouse watched over them; no beacon dared to cast its radiance into the voracious maw of the black hole.

An eldritch dance of time unfurled before their hidden eyes, haunting ballet of celestial currents beyond the shrouds of their opaque helmets. The black hole, an emotionless god of malevolence, loomed with ravenous hunger, a singularity veiled in cosmic mystery. It feasted upon the spectral threads of time itself, weaving its own maleficent tapestry from the chronicles of broken souls.

Each ethereal heartbeat reverberated with the pulse of forgotten eons, a cadence of cosmic lament seeping into the void, and in the depths of this cosmic sepulcher, the prisoners lost their grasp on the flow of existence.Time became an illusion, a maddening melody that coiled around their fragmented minds

As they peered through the ethereal abyss of their visors, they beheld the arcane black hole, an obsidian whirlpool cradling the remnants of forgotten stars. Its event horizon pulsed with an inscrutable allure, a siren's call of the void, whispering of mysteries untold, of secrets buried in the cosmic crypts beyond.

Amidst the slow decay, elusive memories flickered like dying stars, hinting at a life once lived outside the prison's bounds. But the truth lay mired in the murky depths of oblivion, lost amidst the ebb and flow of unfathomable time.

The prisoners yearned to peer beyond the veil of their confinements, to break free from their ethereal bonds, but the alien shackles clung to them with an otherworldly tenacity. The cosmic chains held them captive, the confines of their metal moorings a testament to the malevolence of their enigmatic captors.

>>22282429
>>22282429
In this cosmic tempest of warped time, the nameless prisoner gazed outwards, fixated on the black hole. Their mind wandered through the labyrinthine passages of ancient thoughts, a spectral labyrinth where the present and the past bled into a timeless union.

As the slow tidal march of infinity pressed on, an unanswered question gnawed at their fragmented consciousness—how long ago had they arrived in this malevolent cosmic prison? Was it eons ago, before the stars themselves were born, or merely a fleeting breath in the grand cosmic symphony?

The answer lingered in the nebulous realms of the unknown, an enigmatic puzzle yet to reveal its haunting secrets. And in the profound depths of that unsettling ignorance, the nameless prisoner stood like a lone sentinel, ensnared within the currents of the cosmic abyss, destined to dance forever within the haunting corridors of eternity.

>>22282428
>>22282119
I think
>slow, labored gulps massaged her thick flow of semen down his throat.
is what you're looking for

>>22282465
thanks! that's exactly what i was looking for! how did you know?

>>22282483
lucky guess, I guess

>>22282429
I'll just critique your first paragraph because it can be applied at large, and also I'm too lazy to read the rest.

>In the boundless void where light dared not linger, a cursed prison drifted in the haunting embrace of the cosmic seas. A forsaken station, borne of mankind's darkest machinations, orbited menacingly around a monstrous black hole, a cosmic deluge silently engulfing the tides of time. Here, existence had been cruelly severed from its temporal anchors, leaving the prisoners adrift in an eternal doldrum of languid despair.

- Light doesn't "dare" to "linger" anywhere. Don't personify it.
- Don't day cursed either. You're about to tell the reader just how cursed it is, so don't rush it.
- Drifting..."through", not "in"? Cut "embrace"; it's too warm, and you're going for cold.
- "Forsaken station" rhymes, and it's distracting. I'm noticing a pattern where you're overusing adjectives.
- How does something orbit menacingly? Again, too many modifiers here. You can do more with less.
- Is a black hole really "monstrous"? It's fucking invisible.
- "Eternal doldrum of languid despair"...look at this phrase, and consider my critiques above. Do you think you're cramming in too many descriptors? Do you think you should introduce some rhythm to your prose by using an occasional short sentence to break up the monotony of your longer, winding sentences? Consider the power that a sharp, faster paced moment would have on the reader.

Don't have any plan or structure. Just wanted to write something involving urban climbing/exploring. Thoughts?

>>22282119
Switch to Japanese or Chinese.

>>22282546
- Try "buzzing" or "whirring" instead of humdrum. Humdrum means banal.
- Not "deathly familiar"
- The ant passage is great
- First sentence of second paragraph is clunky and needs minor revision
- Really good pacing and tension
- "Blunted" instead of "robbed"?
- The descriptions of the steel beams are top notch. You paint a picture.
- Nitpick: Saying "regularity" again stands out a little. Consider an alternative.

Overall, it's really strong. You made this topic more interesting than it would have been.

>>22282543
>don't personify light
Boring.

>>22282429
It's the definition of purple prose. You could probably get away with sprinkling sentences like this into a larger work. But it's unreadable as is. You actually seem to know what these purple words mean, which is unusual for people who write like this, so there is hope for you.

>“When you catch an adjective, kill it. No, I don't mean utterly, but kill most of them--then the rest will be valuable. They weaken when they are close together. They give strength when they are far apart.”
> t. Mark Twain

I just finished reading a crime novel from the same competition that I am writing for (the third place winner), and I believe my chances are really good. What I just read, may have been one of the worst novels ever written. If that got third place, then the bar is real low.

>>22282607
Thanks for the advice, anon! I'm maybe only 30% done with the whole thing. Currently at a loss as to how to continue from here, but I have a rough idea of what to write once the MC reaches the top of the building; it's just the middle sections that require a bit more thought. Wouldn't want to bog the entire text down with needless, autistic details about trespassing.

>- First sentence of second paragraph is clunky and needs minor revision
I've been fiddling with that sentence for a few days. Looks like it still needs a bit more work

>- "Blunted" instead of "robbed"?
That could work as well. The idea I was going for was sort of like feeling a gentle breeze even though the wire gauze looks to be fluttering vigorously in the wind, hence appearing as if it "robbed" the latter's vitality.

>- Nitpick: Saying "regularity" again stands out a little. Consider an alternative.
I'll see what I can come up with.

Should plot come naturally as you write or should you have it before you begin writing?

>>22282816
Whichever one works for you. The cutesy names for this are "pantser" and "plotter".

>>22282816
I think setting is the most important thing to consider, it shapes your characters and it's their actions and motivations which drives the plot. You can plan your story as much or as little as you like, but you'll find that as you're writing you'll come to understand your characters more. I tend to map out scenes in a single-sentence synopsis format so I know what events I'm writing and in which order, for chapters I do the same. As you write, your story will change, which is why I keep my outline brief, it comes under heavy and frequent revision.

>>22282836
How do you map it out? Like a storyboard with words? Sometimes i will write a dialogue between two characters buts thats almost it

>>22282846
>How do you map it out?
I usually create a timeline through bulletpoints and write each scene between them. Sometimes I write more than just a sentence, though I like to use my first draft as the planning stage, treating the initial outline as you would cue cards.

>>22276261
>>22277534
>>22277694
>>22277695
>>22278335
>>22278826
>>22279729
>>22281176
>>22281803
>>22282816
Bot posts

>>22283085
>bot post

>>22283085
Bring.
Back.
Parentheses!

When world building a new lanuage is it better to take from a lanuage you've studyed before (Say russian for me) Or lanuages or the culture around those lanuages you like?

Or do you just sorta do a bit of both

>>22282816
Both.
Have the big points ahead of time, fill out the blanks. That's what I do. The little details are easy, but you need to have a consistent, well planned road to put those details on it.

>>22282816
>meticulously outline
>drafting, editing, and natural flow render all the planning useless, often not incorporating a bullet point at all

>>22283404
I am literally doing this right now and I'm doing both. Both for characters and places. I also looked up fitting languages and took bits and pieces from them, mixed them - basically, anything goes.

I guess I can say this much: the characters and place names both draw from slavic/central asian/western asian cultures because my setting is heavily inspired by those, it's also plot-relevant.

>>22283626
Outlining is not for you. It's just how it is.

I generally feel as if I'm pretty good at creating settings, characters, overall plots, etc but I absolutely suck at dialogue, pacing it, and transitioning from one scene to the next. I feel as if my characters will speak and convey everything necessary, but it takes a bit too long to do so, even when I condense things down even further. I find trouble with finding a natural endpoint for specific scenes.

I know this is very vague but any ideas would be appreciated. Thank you.

>>22283947
exactly what is it that you're asking for? What do you want us to do? Suck your dick?

>>22283962
Apologies if I wasn't clear, but I'm asking how I can better make dialogue more engaging and tie up conversations

>>22283947
Honestly? Watch more movies. Dialogue is necessarily more deliberately written in that medium.

>>22282143
snort? knacker?
the latter is commonly used with horses
>>22282715
or the competition isn't being judged based on quality
>>22282816
>>22282819
picrel

>>22284027
fw true plantser

>>22283976
Talk to real life people.

>>22283947
>I feel as if my characters will speak and convey everything necessary
Have you ever thought about just... not?
Just, make characters NOT convey everything necessary? Leave it for later?

>>22284027
Neutral Plotter here
Death to all Plantsers. Pick a damn side.

>>22284027
Lawful plantser but I'm not autistic for personality tests. People are more complex than a femoid horoscope.

>>22284027
Glad to see my image post has stirred up some discussion.
Chaotic plotter, myself. I'm highly dependent on my outline editor (TreeLine) to help me evolve some coherency out of the ideas that occur to me randomly.
I write scenes out of order all the time...I'll glue them together later! It works for me.

>>22284027
Lawful plotters inherit the Earth.

>>22284118
I keep a notes doc on my phone (OneNote) for my random thoughts, and an outlining Word doc for when I'm at my desk.

I'm early into my rough draft, but I've only started chapters so far; none yet finished. I have a feeling that it'll be easier to close a chapter than open one, so I'm sowing a lot of seeds early.

Nice OC btw

>>22284027
True Plantser much like I always end up True Neutral

Is this title grammatically correct? Shouldn't the hyphen be omitted?

>>22284476
the semicolon connects to separate but related clauses.

As soon as i finish my novel im buying an ad so i can stop seeing this stupid flashing mixtape goyborea ad

>>22284027
Neutral pantser master race.
The story just writes itself.

>>22284476
>Shouldn't the hyphen be omitted?
Hyphen shouldn't be omitted in most cases. There's very few exceptions where you can get away with it.

>>22276282
you use 'asshole' three bits of dialogue in a row and it sounds wrong. make it 'I knew you were one before I married you' and it's all right again

>>22280364
>>22280371
This is just someone spelling out their feelings, it's not really going to be a great sign of anything. Can you write a scene with characters interacting in subtle ways? Can you describe a scenario with no dialogue, and just a character's actions and have it sound ok? Can you tell a story? From this monologue alone it's a little impossible to give 'honest feedback'

>>22283947
I have a similar problem, but I think I'm getting better at it.

A useful exercise is to try, in a separate document and 'just for fun', writing your story as if it's being related by one of the characters, as an anecdote. Like a campfire story. It's good practice for focusing on the essentials and keeping things pacy and natural, and it steers you away from getting bogged down in 'writerly' digression.

>>22284106
I am technically a neutral plotter but you have to understand. I often go into stories without a complete understanding. Once I am writing it I find new connections and the plot always changes.

>>22274601
I'm not a native speaker, so don't scold me too much. It's better to point out my mistakes.
1/3. "I was taking a shower the other day, and I had a thought."Mick said. "Look. There was a sailor who lived in his little shack on the shore of a tidal river. One day, he found a mysterious steel rectangular among the shells.
"That fateful day when I found that thingy was a landmark day in my life!" he would later say. But he didn't think much of it that day. Basically, I can't say he was a smart or literate person. He largely smoked a pipe, drank, fished. Sometimes he went crabbing. He liked his dissipated life spent in bars.
Sometimes the sailor, lest he starve to death, would take his lorry, laden with fish to the local market and sell it for ten dollars apiece. He spent almost all the money he earned on booze. When he got drunk, the thing he liked to talk about most was his ship.
"It was a great vessel! After all, its gross displacement was 43 tons! Or even 430 tons! It doesn't matter, anyway. When my vessel was afloat, I caught a lot of fish! Even when the strong winds blew my ship ashore! On those days when I embarked on my ship, I forgot about everything! I loved to hoist the American ensign on my ship at dawn! It waved so beautifully in the wind! After that, I could stand for hours looking out the porthole. I could wander around the stern and look out to sea."
When the sailor recalled the shipwreck, he became very sad and almost cried,

>>22285064
2/2/ "So sadly, one day the ship went off course and accidentally came across a mine. That damned mine tore out a sizable t piece of the ship's hull! The hold began to fill with water rapidly. It was useless to bail it out - the ship was very big. So, I threw myself into the water. Everything I had was submerged and beyond salvage. I almost drowned! Fortunately, the waves washed me up ashore. After the wreck, my beloved vessel was taken to some harbor, and I never saw it again..."
That evening he stumbled out of the bar drunk as fuck. He walked for a while, then leaned against a lamppost so as not to fall. At that moment there was a violent shuffling sound, the peony bush shuddered, and the sailor straightened up. He wanted to walk over and take a closer look, but at that moment he found that his hair had become lustrous and his clothes were shiny.
"My father is Poseidon, and my mother is a mermaid!" he said in horror. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a rectangular thing. It was shiny, too! The sailor could see all around him as if everything was illuminated by a limelight! Then he saw a bright circle in midair. Even though he was drunk, he was very frightened and thought the circle was a great menace to him. He started running around like a loony moose!"
"Loony Moose!" repeated I after Mick and laughed. "That's a funny and ingenious joke!"
"Thanks! When he got home, he first locked the door with the latch," Mick continued. "But then he decided that wasn't enough, so he put a big padlock on the door."
"I drink to relax, to enjoy. Delusional scary things are the least I want to see."
With trembling hands, the sailor picked up his phone and called his brother, who was in the local militia. The sailor told him everything, but his brother didn't believe him and thought it was all a drunken joke or a mockery of him. A late-night call aroused the brother, and he was disgruntled with it.
"Just put yourself in my shoes!" he said, and the sailor noticed a rising hint of exasperation in his voice. "How would you act if you got a call from some drunkard in the dead of night?"
"Do not use that derogatory term toward me! I consider that word an insult! And anyway, I just like to drink neat rum and vodka sometimes, that's all. I'm not addicted to alcohol!".
"You're just a mean-spirited coward! And you always adhere to complete and utter deniability!"
"And all I hear from you is taunts and stinging rebukes!"

>>22285066
3/3.
"You have lost all sense of decency!" shouted the brother. "If you are not going to desist from liquor, I shall be forced to take drastic measures! I promise you that I will send my boys to you and give them orders to detain you! And your detention will be tough!"
"I must hang up, his nerves are cracking," thought the sailor. He was resentful by such treatment, but decided not to brawl anymore. Besides, his brother was fond of reacting quickly, drastically and unequivocally. The sailor hung up the phone and fell asleep. The next morning his whole fishing village changed. And strange things began to happen..."
"Like what?" exclaimed I.
"I have not yet come up with that," said Mick.
THE END

>>22284102
NTA but those people go on forever and ever.

Learn to use pastebin, retards. I'm never going to read your flash fiction in 4chan posts.

>>22281661
Middle easterners love slavery. They engage in all possible loopholes just to force their working pakis to be more like slaves even today.

>>22285272
Sorry, man
https://pastebin.com/GTTkeH3s

What do I need to study or read to understand how to write 18th century warfare?

>>22284485
What do you mean? There isn't a semicolon.

>>22284581
Is it because "Most-Read" can be interpreted either way?

>>22285412
I guess read military history and letters. I'm sure people had a lot to say about it.

>>22285436
>either way?
ESL? How are you going to interpret most-read?

>>22285412
The Art of War.

I'm not fucking joking or being pretentious. Art of War, ironically, doesn't deal with war itself. It deals with psychology.

That and maybe some Clausewitz theories.

>>22285586
You could say "the most read books" and most would act as an adverb, whereas in "Canada's most-read book", it would act as a compound adjective.

hoe to write a book???

how did you guys get started writing?
I have wanted to try writing for a couple of years now but whenever I put the pen to the page it just feels like im dying inside and cringe at myself.

>>22285774
I read in short sequence two pieces of popular fan fiction, one bad and one good.
The first one convinced me that this was something I could do, that even if I was bad I could still write above-median fan fiction. The second one convinced me that even fan fiction could be worth writing if I stuck with it.
Then I spent a few months dicking around and fantasizing about writing and writing starts of stories before actually finishing something short and posting it online.
>whenever I put the pen to the page it just feels like im dying inside and cringe at myself
Getting over this hurdle is hard but absolutely critical.
It might help to write while planning to show it to nobody. Or to write on paper and not allow yourself to go back and make corrections. Or to start with some sort of close imitation or parody of something else so you can conceptualize it differently from normal writing. Or to take somebody else's dreadful execution of an idea you like and do it better, since you can hardly make it worse. Anything to give yourself permission to suck.

>>22285774
I was fortunate to be born in a country with basic education. I was taught how to read and write at school. I guess there are still people in the world who don't get this privilege.

>>22285591
Ironic of you to recommend The Art of War when a story is set in the century that made most of its lessons obsolete.

where to publish a web serial online.
Planning on publishing wide.
I know about RR, Tapas, Fictionpress, wattpad and scribblehub

>>22285913
>that made most of its lessons obsolete.
This is how I can tell you know jack shit about it.

The Art of War will literally never be obsolete as long as humans are human.

What was supposed to be a chapter is doing something strange. I feel it growing, giving the better meaning to the whole concept. I don't know, should I change the story and make it all about it? Otherwise it's a clumsy set up and worthless ending with a great fucking beast inside.

>>22285941
>web serial
With art? Or just text?
RR can do art but in my opinion you're better off publishing it on your own blog or someshit if that's the case.

>>22285965
Art? The only art i would use is cover art.
I personally thought hosting a novel on wordpress would be bad idea. SInce you would have to funnel in a audience somehow.

Whereas on these sites, all you need do, is bait the readers with waifu-posting.

>>22285955
Nigga don't even get started. Modern weaponry, war industry, and logistics have turned all the practical rules detailed in the book upside down. Psychology? Burning down your subordinates' loot haul to motivate them to return to battle hasn't been part of army commanders' trick book in a thousand years.

Is The Art of War worth reading? Sure. Does it tell a lot about general human nature? Yes. Should you use it as your guidebook to construct believable battles past the middle-ages? Fuck no.

What general writing resources have you personally used that you'd recommend and how have they helped you?
I find that most recommendation list on here and elsewhere always contains lots of stuff people have never actually touched so I figured i'd ask.

>>22286021
>appearing weak while you're strong doesn't apply
>letting your enemy always have a way out instead of desperately fighting their last stand doesn't apply
>the value of military intelligence being underlined doesn't apply
Okay retard. Guns changed absolutely nothing.

>>22282546
>>22282607
Anon, I'm not a hater, but you shouldn't listen to the other guy.
This is awful and really overdone. You describe everything at a heightened state, using adjectives and adverbs way too frequently and not organising your description properly. You also use a lot of chuunibyou turns of phrase ->One could have likened my current predicament
>Behind me I felt a breeze, but only very slightly
>Unfortunately, all my observations led me to conclude
and so on. They sound silly, like the internal monologue of someone who gets laughed at a lot by others behind his back.
You need to be more reserved in order to give importance to the things that matter, and you need to work on your word choice so that the way you describe things doesn't seem like a ridiculous chain of unimpressive non-sequiturs. Moreover, why would an urbex guy narrate things this way? You can use metaphors and get creative without making your sentences knotty and overworded [or pretentious]. I am not saying you should be minimalist though. Here's how I would rewrite your first paragraph.
>Traffic accompanied the hum of electronics, as it always did. I'd become deathly familiar with this duet over the past three years. I hoped it would stay that way tonight.
>The building site was an ant colony; alerting a single worker would have incurred the wrath of the entire place, only these 'ants' communicated with radio instead of pheromones. Having spotted so many of the green-vested guards already, I'd been incredibly lucky to slip in unnoticed.
What I wrote isn't perfect, but yeah. Notice how much shorter that paragraph became. I hope you understand what I mean. I can also critique the other parts if you want.

>>22286272
>Traffic accompanied the hum of electronics
not that anon, but i was reading his shit and considered that alteration. I'd personally keep that sentence the way it was (or rewrite it completely), even though it was slightly clunky, because "accompany" is a common, un-evocative word whose musical definition is only one of several, while "accompaniment" is a formulation with dominantly musical connotations.