My Take on Writing Original Fiction (v. 1.0)
From the Cool Nut Archives ---> Writing Page
Feel free to copy any of this or give any corrections or suggestions. Portions derived from Jack Bickham's writing book "The 38 Most Common Fiction Writing Mistakes", Marion Zimmer Bradley's website, and the SFWA Writers' Page.
Okay, I'm not too good at writing (hey, I'm not even published!), but after all those years of writing and failing (from the debacle called "Mystics' Legacy" to my recent short story, which got rejected by several publishers), I might have gotten mad, but I sure learned a whole lot. Here, I will show the ten biggest bits of info I learned as I became a fiction writer.
You might want to take these with a grain of salt, as I am not published, but these are commonly mentioned by best-sellers. Note that if you are writing fanfics, this is also good advice.
These tips are in no particular order.
1. Get rid of passive voice!
Passive voice is the leech that sucks out whatever action your
character(s) might take. "Ryu attacked Myria" is
active; we all know that Ryu is attacking Myria. "Myria was
attacked" would mean that something is attacking Myria. Who
attacked Myria? I don't know! Don't confuse me, dammit!
Note that the latter can be valid if this is from Myria's point of view; in that case, write something like "Myria was attacked by Ryu, and her animus toward the dragon grew worse!". Again, we know who attacked Myria. But "Ryu attacked Myria; the goddess's..." is just as good, if not better.
2. One point of view per scene, please.
The main task of a writer is to avoid confusing the reader.
Besides passive voice, point-of-view (POV) shift will also
confuse your reader. If we are hearing from Rei's point of view,
I should not know what Ryu or Teepo is thinking unless Rei is a
mind-reader. Have Rei think about Ryu or Teepo, or Rei give his
opinions (in his head) of the scene.
Exceptions include comedies (because everyone tends to be impulsive or simplistic) or omniscient epics. Both are rare, especially the latter, which is falling out of fashion in spite of the resurgance of Lord of the Rings.
3. They will assume that there is no such thing as a
dragoness.
Smart writers will put twists on many, many predictable bits that
defy the current stereotypes of the land, be it regular, fantasy,
or sci-fi. Women (and children) should not always be weaker than
men (like above). Non-Caucasian, non-Oriental should not always
be less technologically or culturally advanced. High magic should
not always trump low magic. Elves are not always snooty,
halflings not always opportunistic, orcs and ogres not always
dumb and ugly, and dwarves are not always grim or standoffish.
And so on. You might have had the male knight slay the evil
dragon and rescue the fair princess, when was the last time a
noble mother-of-two battle-maiden rescued the good dragon from
the evil princess?
When I wrote Forest Dragoness, I thought of "who would be so shafted that they would get revenge, if they could get revenge?" After being mad at the Forgotten Realms (tm) after having so many female elves as plot accessories and having that feeling in the fantasy world as well (the latter part of Lodoss didn't do too well, either), I had them get revenge. But that felt a little cliched. Therefore, I had the female elves so powerful that they could just about take on anything, scaring all neighboring countries with their ferocity. I mean, ever heard of an army of beautiful, savage, fully-armored female elves pillage and demolish powerful kingdoms? You will know now!
And I made all of that logical. :D
4. KISS and make up.
Nothing to do with the band! I mean, "keep it simple,
stupid"! Never use wacko words or such that is on the last
few questions of your English or SAT exams. Your general readers
ARE NOT Ivy League professors or English majors. Your general
readers are you and I, the folks that crawled their way out of
high school or college or the like and want a good, satisfying
story.
For characters and events, never be afraid to be obvious. If Mr. Nialliv is a badass who kicks little kids, smokes big cigars, never gives a cent to charity, and would keep his money like a miser, don't be afraid to say so. Don't let the reader guess and become confused. Writers from Dickens (the obvious one) to Tolkien have been simple and one-dimensional with their characters (and events) and look how popular they became.
As for dialogue, when in doubt, use "said". Never go artificial and say "retorted", "ejaculated", or so on. They are always distracting to the reader. Stay simple and use "replied", "shouted", and the like.
(a): "The place is crashing down!" Rei blasted.
"Let's go," Ryu ejaculated.
(b): "This place is crashing down!" Rei shouted.
"Let's go," Ryu said.
Which is better, (a) or (b)? You tell me.
5. Editors do not buy stories because they are
well-written.
This is great advice from acclaimed fantasy writer Marion Zimmer
Bradley. A corollary to tip 4, Bradley mentions that
"...whether or not you sell your story has NOTHING TO DO
WITH HOW WELL YOU WRITE, OR HOW BEAUTIFUL YOUR PROSE. People who
have no 'writing ability' are making a good living at writing,
and people who write very well indeed have nothing but a
collection of rejection slips and some compliments on their
writing style."
So stop banging yourself in the head thinking of some flowery description. It may make a good story better, but it does not make a bad story good. Just think of plot and keep it simple, stupid!
(See http://mzbworks.home.att.net/why.htm for more info, as well as better advice! :D)
6. Plot structure: One step forward, two steps back.
A huge reason why publishers reject novels is that there just is
not enough suspense, jeopardy, or danger for the main character
or who he/she loves. Readers will keep up with your story when
you make things progressively worse (but not to the point of
hopelessness). They solve this mini-mystery BUT something else
happens. Or they killed that big bad guy BUT they used all their
weapons and they soon find an even bigger bad guy. Or he gets the
big promotion, BUT he is overwhelmed by the responsibilities. Or
things are just not what they seem.
In short, your character should be in worse shape on page 200 in a 400-page novel compared to page one. And in even worse shape right before the climax, where he or she would claim victory (hopefully).
The reason I mentioned "one step forward, two steps back" is because if there is absolutely no hope, backing up, then the reader will become too depressed and not like the story. Give them a sliver of a chance, at least.
7. Main novel kernel: 100 words or less.
Create a "kernel" that would be the entire centerpiece
of the novel, and as you write, do not look back. You can be as
vague as possible; in fact, you should be vague.
Remember to mention:
(1) the protagonist
(2) the situation
(3) brief events in the situation
(4) the villain(s)
(5) question the book is supposed to answer.
Example with Orson Scott Card's excellent book "Ender's Game":
"In order to stop a massive alien invasion, six-year-old Ender Wiggin is sent to train for battle after a dispute over his Third status. But after he wins continuous 'battle games' and is sent to more intensive training, he becomes incredibly good, and the generals will do everything they can to exploit him in desperation of victory. Can Ender break the yoke of the generals and save the planet from the aliens?"
Here's what I wrote when I began Forest Dragoness:
"Called to duty by her mother, Queen Karanilissa of Canopy, recently promoted Forest Dragoness Rianneth Frostleaf is on a mission to find her half-sister Narilee, a potential threat to both elven and human kingdoms, and kill her. But based on the brutal attacks on the nearby human towns, she thinks of the queen, the military, and her rivals Diana and Selidira as mere aggressors attempting to exterminate all rivals. Can Rianneth get to Narilee and stop the hijacking of Canopy's religion?"
Those just about sum up their respective novels. Note that there are many, many subplots and bits of milieus that go beyond the kernel, but everything in the entire novel has something, directly or indirectly, to do with the character and his/her mission.
8. Go ahead and hit the accelerator.
According to novelist Jack Bickham, of all the novels that fail
due to pacing complications, 90% of them are too slow. If you
feel that something is plodding, take out a couple of scenes.
Think of it like a movie: There are many cut scenes in film, so
what looks like 4 hours of usable footage (actually, more like
six hours) would turn into a two-hour or less actual movie. I
created many, many ideas for my book, but actually will use only
about half of them.
My book will surely hit the 150,000-175,000-word mark, about twice what a salable novel might have. However, I can cut out half easily (there is, for example, one 25,000-word subplot I can axe completely), as well as small scenes that seem to get in the way. I mean, how much do you need for a two-week, uneventful journey? Even when you add thoughts into the equation, one or two paragraphs at most!
So, think of ideas that can go to double your proposed novel length, then cut the worst or unrelated out. Extra words will allow you to find a "best of" in the mess and improve your story.
9. Spit out all your secrets.
Suspense and tension are created not when most of the mystery is
solved; they are created when everything is known to the reader
except for one question: What will happen when everything is
resolved? Think of it as a chess game: We know what all the
pieces are, but we don't know how the players will use them.
Besides, once everything is known to the character, then they can have other feelings besides "What is going on here?" - exactly what the reader might have felt if you kept a lot of things secret.
10. Everything has a chance of getting published if
you set your mind to it.
I heard from both published and unpublished authors that
"it's so hard to get a novel published". Well, they're
right and wrong. One novelist mentioned that "one out of
1000 manuscripts are actually published". Well, that is
bull. If you are good enough, the odds are actually about 10-25%
- far, far better than 0.1%.
Everyone on Earth can think of at least one great idea that would easily make a marketable novel. Conversely, crap ideas make marketable novels.
Realistically, out of 1,000 manuscripts, about 20-50 of them actually get published by royalty publishers. (Royalty publishers, the majority of major publishers today, are the companies that buy rights to a novel, and give royalties to the novelist.) And of the 950-980 rejected, I am sure that 500 of them are just so bad that the novice writer will quit. Another 300 will be from willing first-timers, or people that will never become good: they try to be literary, or are just bad no matter what, yet will never learn, for example. The last 150-180 are only because the politics within the novel are not what the general market is looking for, or have a very slight flaw that the editor and her peers did not like. True, they do make mistakes, but editors are only human. (For example, if a bestseller wrote about a certain subject, and you write about the same subject, yours will be rejected because they are sure that it will not sell. Or, the book looked to favor terrorism and is rejected because the editor is a devout American patriot. Tough luck, and that's the breaks.)
As Stephen King once said, "The secret of getting published is to be at the right place at the right time. Since no one knows when is the right time, they just go to the right place and stay there." Remember, publishers are always looking for first-time writers, and your next draft will always be better.
Other tidbits:
Besides those how-to books by respectable authors, the ONLY thing
you should spend money on is the paper and ink you write the
story with, and the shipping and handling of your manuscript to
your publisher. NEVER spend money on book doctors, editors,
vanity publishers (you pay for the books you write), etc.
Note that I never mentioned anything about agents. That's 'cause you don't need one. The agent a novice writer can get, the writer is best without. Remember that it is the story, not the agent, that publishers are looking for. Even if a publisher explicitly prohibits any unsolicited submissions (those without agents), just go ahead and send it anyway. The worst the publisher can do is reject it.
While publishers recommend you not to send simultaneous submissions, send to everyone at once. Don't waste months waiting for so-and-so to read your manuscript on the bottom of a 1,000-manuscript queue. Again, the worst they can do is reject it, and should two or more publishing houses accept it, you must be damn good. :-D However, you should NEVER simultaneously submit short stories because they are much more likely to get accepted rather than novels.
Do NOT register your copyright on your manuscript. Publishers do that anyway when they publish, and don't worry about them stealing your story: It just does not happen. The social stigmata between the writer and publisher is such that should the publisher actually steal a story, the entire publishing house will probably collapse unless the publisher fires the editor. BTW, once it is on paper, it is already copyright, and it is officially yours.
If you do get a contract and cannot find a reputable agent (one who lives in big cities and ask for no more than 10 percent of royalties), just grab any good lawyer that can finalize those contracts.
Good luck.