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Youtube “Writing Advice” Channels Are Morons!

Before I start this controversial post let me say this. I am not saying all “Writing Channels” or “Writing Advice” channels are crap. But 99% of them are. I’m sure there are plenty out there that have good advice for you.

However, during the beginning of writing Second Sight: The Decay I ran into a lot of bad advice. I am going to debunk some of that here. I won’t name anyone. I don’t want the drama. This is a cautionary tale about when I wrote this book.

Let’s get started…

I have been writing stories for over 20 years now. I am an avid reader. I love horror, mystery, and anything dark. I have been a horror movie freak for the longest time. Maybe one day I’ll make a blog about horror movies, but this isn’t it.

When I started writing Second Sight: The Decay as an actual commercial product I went to YouTube for advice. I wanted to hear from published authors what the best practices were. I figured if they were published—even if it’s self-published—they would have some insight.

A lot of these channels had THOUSANDS of subs. Far beyond the sub count that I had when I did youtube for ten years. A big reason for that is most of them were young, attractive women. Call it sexist all you want; they were the mass majority of “Advice Channels.” They had a nice personality, and some tried to be “funny” so that could account for some of it. I’m just giving you the demographics of who showed up first in the Youtube search results.

I’m going to toss out a theory about these channels. It’s not about them personally. I’m sure they are wonderful people. I feel like they give advice an English teacher would. English teachers and professors give you the “proper way to write” to pass their class. I’m not saying poor grammar is a good thing. I’m saying that being strict like you are in English class papers DOES NOT translate well into novels.

For example, I heard a lot of people have lists of words you MUST DELETE from your novel. This was the most common piece of advice. Words like JUST, FEEL, REALIZE. Now, what’s the problem here?

We don’t all speak like English teachers. We don’t all write like them either. We shouldn’t if you ask me. To me, if you do that you sound robotic and clunky. By setting up rules like that where you are prohibited from using certain words it kills your writing voice.

I remember going through an early draft—one before the first draft was even completed—and changing it to follow those rules. Low and behold it turned out to look and read like garbage. It was godawful, and I wondered “What am I doing wrong? It sounded fine before.”

Then I had “that moment” when I was at a thrift shop. It’s a thrift store that sells books for a nickel. It’s a nonprofit, and it’s sad to see books being sold for a shiny new nickel but still. I walked in and grabbed a bunch of novels from my genre and took them home as a guide. Not to teach me how to write, but to give me that idea of how super successful authors wrote.

I picked up a few Tom Clancy books, along with Silence of the Lambs. As soon as I opened to page one from one of the Jack Ryan books by Tom Clancy. He broke EVERY SINGLE RULE the “Advice Channels” gave. Every. Single. Rule. Was repeatedly broken in many different ways! It was as if Tom Clancy listened to some “genius” in his past saying you can’t use those words, so he said: “oh yeah watch me!”

Tom Clancy used the word “JUST” in the second paragraph! He also didn’t always say “SAID” or “ASKED” he had all sorts of dialogue tags. TOM CLANCY BROKE THOSE RULES. Then it dawned on me. It’s not about following rules that makes you successful. It’s about telling a story people enjoy, remember, and think about after it’s over. At least that’s how I see it.

To me a book could be perfectly written and following Hemmingway’s style to a T. Hemmingway is the way English teachers make you write 9 times out of 10. Well not everyone wants to read Hemmingway. He was great, sure. Was he the only way? No.

To me, nobody talks about Hemmingway’s language or how many commas he used outside of fart huffing academics who try to be sophisticated. They remembered him for his STORIES. HIS STORY WAS THE #1 THING PEOPLE TALK ABOUT.

To me, I don’t care if Michael Chrichton screwed up a comma in Jurassic Park! I remember the amazing scenes and story he wrote in the book. Same with Thomas Harris with the Hannibal Lecter novels. I don’t care about format, punctuation, or if he used an adverb. I’m not an English professor, and most likely 99.9% of your readers aren’t either.

When have you seen a negative Amazon review that said “Too many adverbs” or “HE SAID THE WORD JUST! 1 STAR!”

If you have… comment below and give me a link so I can laugh at it in a later post!

Yes, you should use proper grammar. Yes, you need to know the basics, so you don’t look like it was translated by a Nigerian you hired on Fiverr to ghostwrite the book. But to me, it’s more about how well does it flow when you read it out loud. How does the plot move you forward? Does it make you think? Does it make you feel a strong connection? Do you wonder about possibilities that aren’t explicitly explained? Do you remember the story? Did you ever put it down because you were bored? That is what I am concerned with far more than being, for lack of a phrase, academically correct.

Also.. one small note. When one of these “Youtube Novelists” dictates to you how to write your story. Do two things. Look up their Amazon Reviews or if they even have a published book at all! One, in particular, had 25 novels written. None of them published and she gave “advice” to thousands. Bad advice at that. Point and laugh at them. Don’t listen to any of that. Write the story that you want to read. Write one that YOU become lost in that makes you escape the real world. That’s why people read or watch movies!

A funny thing I noticed with “advice channels” is even their fans think their work is awful! Why? Because they wrote it like an English term paper not like an entertainment medium.

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Published on June 18, 2018 19:21

#WritersLife – Second Sight Cut Content #1

There was originally a choose your own adventure book that I described in the previous post. It was called “The White Room” which was one of those “Trapped in a room, how do I escape?” scenarios. It was one of those books that I wrote a long time ago. It was originally called “Escape from Hell.” It was written many years ago but never completed. I made various versions of it but never published or bothered with it.

A modified and completely different version of it is in the book Second Sight: The Decay (Click Here to Order It Now).

The original is much longer and has a lot more focus on the room itself. It was going to be a radio drama—as I mentioned in the previous blog post—and it just didn’t work out. It’s not the smoothest version, but it was the rough draft. Hence, it didn’t get the same treatment as the official book that was released.

So, here is the original cut of “The White Room” in its entirety so you can see what would have been in the radio drama that I ended up being continued in Second Sight!

The White Room (Extended Version cut from Second Sight: The Decay)

Day 1?

I am writing this diary because I don’t know what else to do with my time. I woke up in this strange room with a pen and small notepad a few hours ago. The walls are all white, and the floor seems to be white tile. Every step or sound I make has a loud echo inside of here. I must do my best to stay as quiet as possible in here.

There are no doors in here. Only white walls, floor, and a very bright white light above me. It illuminates the entire room to taunt me with its complete emptiness;

There is silence. Not even a sound beyond any movements I make. When they always said “silence is deafening” they were right. It wouldn’t do me any good to scream. I already tried that. All that got me was a headache.

I checked all the walls, floor, and corners to find some type of entrance or exit.There is no exit from this place.

I don’t know how I got here. From what I remember I went to sleep and woke up in this room. I don’t remember any scuffle and the door to my apartment locked with the security system on. Nobody would have been able to get into my house without me knowing.

All I can do is wait I suppose.

The least my kidnappers could do is give me a chair, a desk, even a bedroll to sleep on. Have a little compassion for your captive will ya?

I am alone here, stuck in my mind. Wondering how I got here, and what will happen to me.

Anyway, I guess the best thing to do now is to try to sleep on this tile floor. It’ll make time pass at least. I hope I’ll wake up in my bed and this is all a dream.

Day 2?

As I woke up, sore and stiff from sleeping on that horrible tile floor. I inspected my surroundings around me to see if there was anything new. In fact, there was something new.

I found a clock on the wall. Strange, but at least I have a concept of time now. The clock read 6 o’clock. Not sure if that’s AM or PM. In my current predicament I doubt it really matters.

I’m not afraid at the moment, only confused and sore. I still don’t know how I got here. Since they were “nice enough” to give me the clock, I hope the bastards who took me will at least give me a sleeping bag tomorrow! Would be nice to get a good night’s sleep..

I inspected the room again. Still no doors or anything that resembles an entrance/exit point. It makes me wonder how they got the clock in here.

Why did they give me a clock anyway? Was it to tease me? Was it there to torment me with the fact that now I know how much time had passed since I’ve been in here?

Regardless. It’s still completely silent outside, if there is an outside. The only thing I can hear now is the ticking of that clock on the wall. It never stops.

Every second it ticks. I’m sure that will drive me insane over time but for now, it’s okay.

I guess the only thing to now is to go back to sleep on the hard tile floor. Hoping that something will happen once I wake up again…

Day 3?

Damn it! This floor is driving me crazy at this point. It’s so uncomfortable and unforgiving. At this point, I would give anything for at least a blanket. Anything to wake up without feeling like I got hit by a truck.

I looked around the room again finding and in the corner was a sleeping bag!

Did they come and read the notepad and take pity on me? Finally, I can get some relief and a good night’s sleep.

Day 4?

I woke up to look around the room and nothing has changed. I am starting to get hungry.

I am marking the entries by “days” even though I have no idea if it has been even a full day. I am noting it for every time I wake up.

Based on what I know about the human body can survive around a month without food, but only 3 days without water. It’s “day 4” so it at least been less than 3 days…. I hope.

Day 5?

I woke up to hear some type of sound. It wasn’t by me though. I looked around the room and saw a full body size mirror on the wall. I can hear someone crying outside of here. It’s a very faint crying. Like the crying of a child. A very small boy. He was crying, not a full sob or scream. More akin to a whimper…

I felt awful for him and began to cry too. Is he trapped in a room like I am?

I called out to him but no response, the crying seemed to go silent once I said something.

Who was he? I have to get him out of this place! I have to find a way out of here to save that boy otherwise we may both die in here!

I tried to move the mirror and it won’t budge. I felt around the room again for something to break the mirror with but found nothing.

So, I took my sleeping bag and ripped a piece off using my pen. Then I slammed my clothed fist against the mirror for it to only shatter…

I saw a blonde haired boy in the mirror still crying. Suddenly, the boy disappeared into a puff of smoke. The mirror stayed there cracked in all directions but still functional.

After that, I went and got back in my sleeping bag. I lied there for hours. Thinking. What happened to that boy? Did he die? Was he an illusion brought on by psychosis? I am not sure yet…

Day 6?

I wake up again. Do my usual routine of checking the entire room’s walls and floors. In the corner of the room, I see a silver platter of food. A juicy rib eye steak, some mashed potatoes, corn, broccoli, and a 2-liter bottle of water.

I ate it all and upon finishing I look at the bottom of the platter which says the words “thank you” in black ink.

I look all around the platter for any other clues but there are none. The mirror had also returned to normal.

It had become a whole piece again like it’s brand new. The clock has stopped ticking and it’s 7 o’clock right now

After eating. I looked in the mirror to see only my reflection. I still don’t know what’s going on here. No idea how I got here, who that little boy was, or how these things keep getting in here. There has to be a door somewhere in here. I’ve looked everywhere but there is no door anywhere in here. Not even a window or a mail slot…

Day 7?

Today, if I can call it “today” since time has no meaning here at this point I don’t know what day, month or year it is. I don’t think it even matters at this point. The only thing I care about now is my escape.

Upon doing my usual routine checking the room I go to look in the mirror. In the mirror, I see something in writing behind me that says “darkness is light, light is doom”.

I turned around to look behind me. I see nothing and when I turn back to look in the mirror again it’s gone! What the hell does that even mean?!

I looked all over the room and I can’t find it anywhere now. I have one of two options at this point. Find some way to break that light bulb above me, or go to sleep again and see if anything new happens “tomorrow”.

At this point you, the reader get to chose. Should I break the light? Or should I sleep until tomorrow and see what comes from my “abductors”?

If you broke the light this happens:

I can’t stay in this place any longer and the only clue to my escape is to break that light above me! I looked around the room for something to throw at it. I remember… I still have that dining tray from earlier.

I picked up the tray and hurled it as hard as I could against the ceiling above shattering the light. The room is in complete darkness now. I can’t see anything in front of me.

Was this some kind of trick? I thought I would find relief from not having that horrendous light shining so bright on me. Yet, deep down I wish it was still here.

I looked around the room to find glow in the dark writing. It says “Go Home… Thank you for freeing me from here… “

It must have been from the little boy that I saw earlier in the mirror!

I walked up to the wall and touched it. The wall felt like it was made out of paper….

I tore through the paper to see only darkness. As I walked in unsure of what would happen to me I knew it would be better than what would have happened if I stayed in there.

I walked through this dark hallway what felt like forever only to find another black wall.

I pounded on it screaming for help, but nobody returned my screams. The only option I have now is to try and go back to sleep and hope for something to come better for me “tomorrow”

The End

You chose “Go To Sleep”

Day 8?

I woke up feeling refreshed… As refreshed as one can be in such a predicament. If I break out that light above me then it’ll be total darkness in here. Then what good will that do?

Today I did my usual routine scouting the room to find a note written in red on the floor. It read “I’m afraid of the dark… thank you for not turning the lights off”

I turned around to look in the mirror seeing the little boy again smiling at me. He waved, and I waved back. I went to the mirror to speak to him and he said “goodbye” as he disappeared into a puff of smoke again.

What the hell is going on here? Who is he and why does he keep disappearing like that?

I scouted the room again to find the letter “Q” on the wall in green. It was a very large upper case R. I wonder what that stands for…

Day 9?

Another plate of food arrived upon waking up. Same meal as before. I ate and proceeded with the usual routine. This time I found that the R had turned into a blue “B”.

Hmmm…. “R” “B” what does that mean… Many options raced through my head but none of them meant anything related to this predicament.

I looked in the mirror again and only saw my reflection today. Even though I never knew that little boy he at least was another human I could see and hear… now there’s nothing there except myself.

Day 10?

There’s a book in here! It’s a blue book…. It has a beautiful golden etching on the outside of the book. A hardcover which looked very expensive. It had the letter B on the front. That must mean something. I am afraid to open the book… what if it tells me I’m dead? What if this is the book of life they speak of in the bible? If I open it and I see my name that means I’m stuck here forever.

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Published on June 15, 2018 22:06

Second Sight Cut Content #1