Tell Us About the Writing

In preparation to start this journey I did some thinking about what I want to do with this space. I’m involved in a writing group which I helped foster initially when my wife and I owned a tea shop. We met every Thursday afternoon, and the group fluctuated in size, and people dropped in and out, but what I found was it turned into more of a salon, where we talked about all sorts of things, some very esoteric and some quite deep, loosely related to writing.

After the shop closed, we moved the spot to a new location where one of our members had a membership at a coworking studio. The group now is pretty stable, and we stilltalk about writing, and life, more than actually write, but I wouldn’t trade that time and friendship for anything. They are spectacular people, who all have incredible life experiences, and they are all exceedingly well-educated, not that it’s a prerequisite to being interesting, and bonus, they are all kind. But I wish I had kept notes on what we talked about over the course of two years, because it often reminded me that I had something valuable to offer. All that education and life experience had coalesced into something useful. People sought out my advice on various topics and when I started thinking about what to write about here, I desperately wished I had those nonexistent notes. So many good things to share, but alas, they are gone into the ephemera. My memory is like a large colander, and things drop through the holes regularly. Note taking is a survival mechanism at this point.

When I thought about what to write, it made me laugh to think, “Tell us about the writing.” Which is of course ridiculous. Can I talk about it with some sense of knowledge? Yes. But I could also talk about flying airplanes the same way. What do you want to know? That would be my first question. Are you stuck on something specific?

So, we will start off with the first thing you need to know about the rules for writing.

There are no rules.

There are guidelines.

Suggestions.

Expectations. Especially in genre.

Will you ever know all there is to writing? Probably not. I learn new tricks and techniques all the time. A lot of the tools become more natural over time, as with anything, “the more you do it the better you get. tm” There is a common thought in the writing community that there is something magical that happens at the million-word mark. I will say that I felt like I had some better idea of what I was doing at that point. But it is just a reframing of “the more you do it the better you get. tm”

If you write, you are a writer. That’s the second not rule.

There are lots of these non rules. But generally speaking, it’s a good idea to follow convention, unless of course you are deliberately trying to break convention. That falls under “you need to know the rules to break the rules. tm” Even though they’re not really rules.

Let’s see if I can list a bunch (some of these are almost cliché):

Show don’t tell

Write what you know

Use proper grammar

Stay in the same tense (I don’t count dialogue here)

Start in the middle “in media res”

Get in late as possible and out early as possible

Infodumps should be kept to a minimum

Use active voice

Minimize the use of strange language (I would add names to this also)

Describe only what the POV character would notice

If you get all the plot arcs to be answered as close as possible to each other and near the climax it is much more effective

It’s more important to tell a good story than to write well (I guess that’s not even a rule really)

Actually, I have a better idea. Let’s look at some famous writer’s rules for writing:

Elmore Leonard, a master of crime fiction, laid out these rules to keep writing tight and engaging:

Never open a book with weather.Avoid prologues.Never use a verb other than “said” to carry dialogue.Never use an adverb to modify “said.”Keep exclamation points under control.Never use “suddenly” or “all hell broke loose.”Use regional dialect sparingly.Avoid detailed descriptions of characters.Don’t go into great detail describing places and things.Try to leave out the part that readers tend to skip.

George Orwell’s rules focus on clarity and precision:

Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech that you are used to seeing in print.Never use a long word where a short one will do.If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.Never use the passive voice when you can use the active.Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

Kurt Vonnegut’s advice applies broadly to storytelling:

Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that they will not feel the time was wasted.Give the reader at least one character they can root for.Every character should want something, even if it’s only a glass of water.Every sentence must do one of two things—reveal character or advance the action.Start as close to the end as possible.Be a sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your characters, make awful things happen to them.Write to please just one person.Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible.

Strunk & White’s “The Elements of Style“

This book outlines key principles of effective writing:

Omit needless words.Use active voice.Use parallel construction.(this means use proper grammar)Avoid fancy words.Place emphatic words at the end of sentences.

The Elements of Style was one of the first books I was told to get when I started on this craft. There are lots of great craft books out there, and I try to read one a couple of times a year. Although, if you look my stack of craft books you would call me out. I said try.

Basically, it really does help to know a lot of these concepts in order to subvert them. Or maybe just follow them? Just know that your reader will be the ultimate judge of your prose. It doesn’t matter what any “expert” says.

Ok, well that’s a lot of words. I hate long posts, don’t you?