Ari Bach's Blog

This is also true of most story structure and character “rules” you learn after they tell you there…

terapsina:

I’ve noticed a lot of people advise writers to read their stories aloud. And I absolutely agree. But I’ve also mostly seen people mention it in like a ’you’ll better notice where there are little mistakes, and where the phrasing is awkward’ way. Which, again, is absolutely true.

But that’s a ‘read the story aloud to see what’s wrong with it’ advice.

And I think there’s maybe an even more important reason to read your fic aloud.

It will show you all the things that are RIGHT about your story.

Because there inevitably comes a point where you’ve read your own story in your head so many times that all the words are a bland mush that will leave you convinced that there’s absolutely nothing interesting or good in your writing.

And if you go back to it many months later, you might realize… oh, this is a pretty interesting fic. And that’s because the brain has had time to forget every tiny detail of phrasing you came up with, and you can actually read it like a reader, not the author.

But that road takes months, and until then, you might be inherently convinced that the story is literally the absolute worst thing you’ve ever written.

But… WHEN YOU READ ALOUD, you automatically start giving the words inflection, inflection that, when you’re reading something that you haven’t written yourself, you kind of hear even when reading quietly. But for your own story, all that inflection and weight has been sucked out by way too many rereads while you were looking for grammatical errors. The fastest way to be able to see it again? To hear it.

Anyway, read aloud to defeat the monster on your shoulder telling you your writing sucks.

This is also true of most story structure and character “rules” you learn after they tell you there are no rules. There’s not much need to make sure you have Plot Point A or Midpoint Reversal or Character Change at Act 3 etc when you write (unless you’re doing a very specific kind of mainstream script or story), but if you look over all that stuff and see if you happened to match up to the conventional wisdom, it can give you hints about what you nailed in a way most readers might resonate with.

Don’t be obedient to such rules, but note when you happen to have mastered them accidentally. It will not only help you see why some people swear by them, but know when to break them and why.

free-and-to-none-accountable:https://iww.org/membership/

free-and-to-none-accountable:

https://iww.org/membership/

Frank Herbert commented on the Butlerian Jihad that he did not think computers were evil, but that…

enki2:

Frank Herbert commented on the Butlerian Jihad that he did not think computers were evil, but that they made it too easy for humans to do evil with laziness.

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rhaenyrathecool:

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From a writer friend. We’re all in this together.

From a writer friend. We’re all in this together.

I am very sad report that this typo is not in my copy of The Bachman Books (3rd printing NAL…

I am very sad report that this typo is not in my copy of The Bachman Books (3rd printing NAL hardcover, in chapter five of The Long Walk):

From “Consider This” by Chuck Palahniuk

From “Consider This” by Chuck Palahniuk

Stephenie The Nameless: I suppose I’m just aroused by danger.Kay Slizz: Are you? Well, you know,…

Stephenie The Nameless: I suppose I’m just aroused by danger.
Kay Slizz: Are you? Well, you know, I’ve been declared a danger to myself and others…

-My next novel maybe

The longest single paragraph in Machen’s “The White People” is over 5,600 words long. The ones…

striving-artist:

This isn’t really coherent, I’m just annoyed.

ALTALTALT

First image is a very processed screengrab of a fic, which got under my skin. The next is a somewhat infamous paragraph from Hemmingway. Then there is a part of Dickens’ Bleak House.

I live in a glass house made of compound-complex sentences. But these reach a point, for me, of illegibility. I did a quick count of clauses in these, both dependent and independent. (I am certain my count is wrong bc I haven’t done this since seventh grade, but It’s closeish)

One paragraph from the fic has about 58 in 17 sentences, Hemmingway has 67 in 40 sentences, and Dickens has 56 in 5 fucking sentences. jfc Dickens. They’re all over 400 words.

Melville has a notorious paragraph that is a single sentence and is 471 words long. Machen has a paragraph (412 words) that is 15 sentences and 61 clauses, with 56 in just 12 of them. I just checked one from Austen cause we think of her as verbose, and it was 25 clauses in a 4 sentence paragraph, but… it didn’t feel oppressive to me.

The point, which I sort of lost track of as I stared at grammar rules, is that Paragraphs Matter and also Please Use Them. It doesn’t make you seem like a more mature writer to writer walls of text. Normally we talk about wall of text issues bc there isn’t an indent or a line after a paragraph to help your eye separate it, but its definitely this too.

I have always despised Hemmingway despite writing in a not-dissimilar style. He mixes sentence lengths, and intercuts with more casual commentary. I don’t enjoy his subject matter, but if the man ever used the return key, I’d have given him leeway. Since I had the text for Hemmingway, I went in and hit enter wherever I would tone shift or pause if I was reading it aloud. It became 11 paragraphs. I hate this section less now.

The longest single paragraph in Machen’s “The White People” is over 5,600 words long. The ones before and after it are also in the thousands. I have ‘read’ that book but I skimmed the fuck out of parts and feel NO guilt.

Nona the Ninth is the sort of book Robert Heinlein could’ve written if he’d just quit whining and…

fyrasha:

natalieironside:

Nona the Ninth is the sort of book Robert Heinlein could’ve written if he’d just quit whining and taken the estrogen

galaxy-brained take, honestly