Writing Advice I cannot Recommend

    

     

* Disclaimer, I am not a professional writer so take everything I say with a grain of salt.*

     I like the internet. It’s a pretty cool place despite it distracting me from my daily responsibilities every so often. However, I have made many valuable discoveries on the internet that have helped me, Apple Student Deals, Goodreads, Churchpop, Pintrest, etc. This article isn’t about those discovers. As much nice things nestled in the web there are some nasty things as well, especially bad writing advice. This can be even worse when many times this “advice” is treated as something good. 

1. Said is Dead 

    Said’s not dead it’s surely alive, living on the inside roaring like a lion!

    I used to be on board with this advice until about two years ago. I found this info graph on Pinterest when I was in high school. That infographic was consulted though many editing sessions, until I deleted it from my board. Why? Because I took a university level creative writing class where I learned “Said” is a fine word. The brain tends to ignore it, but that’s okay. The focus should be on the dialogue itself and the action surrounding it. 

      “Said is Dead” doesn’t have its roots in writing advice. It started as a way for primary school teaches to prepare their students’ vocabularies for standardized tests. Unique dialogue tags do not equal to good dialogue. Some of the examples of “fresh” words to use instead of said were very odd including, chortled, gurgled, babbled etc. It doesn't exactly make the dialogue itself pop. From my experiences, the best option is to mix dialogue with action, and then use said only where dialogue tags are needed. 

 (Dialogue with flashy tags)

    “I am the best swordsman on this side of the continent,” David boasted.

    “Which means, if I want the truly best swordsman, I’ll have to walk the thousand or so leagues.” Alexander teased. 

    David glared at his companion, “Why must you torment me so,” he lamented. 

(Dialogue mixed with action)

   David tossed his sword in the air, caught it in the opposite hand, “I am the best swordsman on this side of the continent.” 

    “Which means,” Alexander crossed his arms with a playful smile tracing his lips, “If I want the truly best swordsman, I’ll have to walk the thousand or so leagues.” 

    David glared at his companion as he threw his hand into the air, "Why must you torment me so?" 

2. Don’t Write what you Know

    Lately I have found that the internet has been bashing on this piece of advice, and frankly I do not know why.  If I don’t know something then I cannot write about it. If I was given a pen and paper and told to write about the trade routes in the Byzantine Empire, I wouldn’t get a single word down because I know nothing about the trade routes of the Byzantine Empire. However, I can research and expand what I know about the Byzantine Empire.  It’s impossible not to write what you know, but that doesn’t mean you have to only write about your personal experiences. (If that were the case then there would be no high fantasy stories). You can expand what you know by doing research or even going out and exploring. 

3. Write the Villain/Antagonist First

     (If it hasn't been made all that clear yet, I am very opinionated on this one) Unpopular opinion, I do not believe the villain is the most important character in the story, unless the story has a villain protagonist. I have heard that if there is no villain then there is no story except not all stories have villains. Some stories the main obstacle the protagonist has to face aren’t the actions of one person. A story surrounding a man stranded on an island or a community recovering from a hurricane will probably have enough stakes without an antagonist. 

   The reader isn’t following the villain for the majority of the book. My favorite TV series, Avatar the Last Airbender, doesn’t even show us the main villain on screen until the final season.  

Some stories doen’t even have villains. If I hate the villain, I can still love the book. If I hate the protagonist or whoever the POV character is, I cannot keep reading. 

     I know many of these could be considered personal preferences. That is probably true, but I still cannot get behind any of the above advice. However, I do understand people might disagree, and they are free to do so. If they weren't...then there would definitely be a problem there. :D 

Image Sources:

https://hiveminer.com/Tags/broken%2Ctypewriter

https://lindasclare.com/2012/10/the-dialogue-funeral-rip-said/

How Memes Motivated me to Write

     

      Memes are one of my favorite aspects of the internet. They give me a good laugh and let me know other people who have similar feelings about pop culture besides myself. In short, memes help me not takes things more seriously than it was meant to be thought about. However, memes aren’t all chuckles and clever jokes. I think some trivialize subjects that are very serious. For me, memes almost killed my creativity by normalizing writers’ block.

      

     When I made my Pinterest account, I was an aspiring writer. Actually, with no publishing deals coming up in the near future, I am still an aspiring writer, but back then I wasn't as disciplined. I was in high school and felt alone in my novel dreams. The vast majority of my classmates weren’t reading much less writing their own books so I turned to the internet community. It helped me realize I wasn’t alone and there was a lot of other people like me. Could I say it was relatable...?

      What I particularly enjoyed was the memes about how hard it was to write. However, I didn’t think it isn’t always done right. (See what I did there?) There is nothing wrong with admitting that it is easier to plan out a scene than actually writing it. There is nothing wrong with admitting that editing is a lot less fun than churning out a draft. However, I do not believe it is okay to act like  writers’ block is a perfectly justified excuse for not writing. I’m not saying writers’ block doesn’t happen. Anyone who had to hand in any sort of paper in for school will tell you it’s real, but it doesn’t make it oaky to be unproductive in every way shape and form. 

       It wasn’t until I started college when I realized a sloth could write faster than me, and I came to understand there was a difference between having a bad day heck a bad week where you don’t get much writing done to having a bad year, which is what happened to me quite often. What hurt me the most when I wasn’t writing was my skills not improving. The only practice I was getting was when I was writing for school, and those APA formatted-research papers aren’t the style I want to write my fiction in. I didn’t want those relatable memes to be so close to the truth anymore. 

      What did I do? I participated in NaNoWriMo in January because I missed it in November. I didn’t reach my goal, but I still wrote almost every day and it felt good. About a month after my self-imposed challenged I decided to start a blog to help myself improve at writing with deadlines. My non-fiction still takes me longer to finish than I would like, but it is because I’m writing very slowly not because I’m not writing at all. I don’t update my blog as often as I’d like to, but I managed to never let a month go by without completing at least one post. 

      I still have bad days, bad weeks, and sometimes bad months. I have a part time job and go to school full time, and I have a social life on top of that. I am not at the point where I can write full time. However, I can say I don’t go for over a year without touching my keyboard or notebook and telling myself it’s perfectly normal. My creative writing professor told me I cannot finish a novel draft by writing four pages and then stuffing it into a drawer.   

      I’ve had people in my personal life warn me that it will take years to finish my novel. It will take years for me to get my college degree and nobody warned me not to do that. I was told I couldn’t keep up with a blog and that it would die in a few months.  I have been blogging consistently for an entire year now. For every person who thought I was crazy I had a person who supported me which will always be better than relatable memes. Don’t let the internet keep you from fulfilling your dreams.