Your Flaw(s) as a Writer

You're reading the wrong books then, my friend. I agree that overly descriptive first-person narrators are jarring and unbelievable, but that's because people don't know how to use first-person narration. It's for introspection and reflection, not A-to-B prose.

edited 15th Nov '11 6:50:25 PM by kashchei

Say, what's your thoughts of 1st person present tense? That's an advancing trend in YA.

Also, The Help. Two of the three POVs deviate from the "novelist" voice with their own quirks, and since the whole book's about creating a book...

I'm not sure - I mean, can you think of any first-person writing where conversations don't get given word-for-word? That's a big part of what I'm talking about. Yes, a first-person narrator can definitely have their own voice and not just a generic "novelist", but you still get these little things that just make it hard for me to beleive that this is "really" someone telling a story to someone else. Or writing it down, for that matter.

This is just a subjective thing, mind you - I'm not attacking first-person POV in general.

Honest answer? I think it's obnoxious.

edited 15th Nov '11 6:52:28 PM by nrjxll

Personally, I don't get the "looking back mindset" for past tense if the Framing Device isn't used. In most cases, I see it as if the narrator is saying what just happened "a few seconds ago", so memory lost doesn't happen. Also, narrators tend to fill in the blanks.

That how I approach my 1st person, anyways, and that's why I struggle with the "past tense actions, present tense thoughts" format.

The problem with present tense that plenty of people hate it, so I'm unsure of going all the way into it. So that why I use past tense.

edited 15th Nov '11 6:55:08 PM by chihuahua0

"I'm not sure - I mean, can you think of any first-person writing where conversations don't get given word-for-word?"

I've been thinking about that, actually. When I write in first person, I do not use quotation marks for dialogue because I want it implied that these are not meant to be verbatim renditions of the conversation.

"Say, what's your thoughts of 1st person present tense?"

It has its time and place. I think it works when used for emphasis, juxtaposed against the past tense of the rest of the narrative.

"Personally, I don't get the "looking back mindset" for past tense if the Framing Device isn't used. In most cases, I see it as if the narrator is saying what just happened "a few seconds ago", so memory lost doesn't happen."

That works too, at least for me.

edited 15th Nov '11 6:58:57 PM by kashchei

I've read works that used first-person and conversation was handled without quotations, which gives it a more organic feel. I've also read works where actions were described in present tense, which puts me more into the action. If a character is in danger of dying, it works better to have it in present tense (usually past tense indicates that such a character didn't die, which spoils the surprise).

Some people hate first person, but I hate dialogueless dialogue. Without a proper voice, most characters feel shallow and half-developed to me. It's a lot of character establishment and potential for development, gone. Then you have to resort to a lot of clunky facial expressions and such that doesn't necessarily work as well in print as it does in visual media.

Not at all. Firstly, plugging in cues about gestures and expressions is a terrible way to "develop" a character. Secondly, the narrator's opinions about and interactions with a character go a long way.

I just spent an hour padding my Na No Wri Mo draft instead of writing new things, which is important because I am still a day behind. And now I kick myself off to rite moar.

I can not for the life of me describe anything in good detail.

Or write actions...

Basically, I can only write dialogue. So script-writing, ho!

Biggest flaw? I'm impatient. My pacing is horrible: I rush through the story, and when I notice there's a lack of buildup, I lazily write lots of fluff. When I try from the start to stretch the story it ends up meandering rather than dramatic.

There's also the fact that I have horrible project management skills, but that's a lesser evil than writing something of poor quality (in my opinion).

I thought of another flaw: when I get critiques from multiple people, I try to please them all, even though they might give contradictory suggestions.

Like, if one said, "Put in more description" and another said, "The description needs to go," I'll try to put in more description, but I'll try to hide it in the action. For example, if the original sentence involved a character walking into a room and taking in his surroundings (which would be the description part) before going in, I'd change it so he doesn't stop to take in the setting and it would go something like, "Joey opened the stained particleboard door and marched in. The tile under his feet was as yellow as his hair, due to the bar's patrons."

It tends to lead to a build-up of adjectives, which I don't really like in prose, but I figure if someone's going to be put off by something, other people might not like it either.

edited 2nd Dec '11 1:47:22 PM by BlackElephant

My style is short, almost brusque, because of fighting word limits in too many essays in college.

I only write convincing gay male characters. Girls I can sorta do.

Everything else is so unconvincing I want to cry. It's either flat or

ARE YOU SURE HE ISN'T GOING TO COME OUT.

I need to get better at that.

edited 3rd Dec '11 1:09:51 PM by Aqueos

My main issue with writing is I tend to rush endings.

I also have a small problem with writing dialogue. In reality I tend to be obnoxiously verbose and use lots of big words and this tends to slip in to my writing making what should be a normal sentence an example of sudden expository prose.

I honestly wouldn't worry about it too much. People are going to read romance into any close relationship between any combination of characters of any gender basically no matter what you do. So go on, write the practically-subtext!

I judge as equal priority:

• A novel which I have been researching and hammering out the world-building for two years and is half-finished at 50K words
• A novel which I have done perhaps a few weeks of research on, has only a first chapter and will need a fight to get published as it is a contemporary Western, but it is ridiculously fun to write and was received rather warmly
• A vaguely defined idea which consists of three words: The two-word premise, and a really lame wordsmash title which I am dying to use

So many I had given up on it for years, only to come back at it because when it finally does click, it's such an awesome feeling.

• Many situations I see in movies or read in books, just never occur to me, and I'm unable to write them, because I just cannot imagine how people can be that way - e.g. a father who is seriously mad at his son for having failed some math test
• Working out the details takes weeks, months, years for me; ideas don't flow easily.
• My language is often poor and unimaginative
• Once I've written something one way, it gets extremely hard to change it
• I tend to think on a rather abstract level, so creating images with words is kinda hard sometimes
• Humorous comments hardly ever occur to me (which is kind of odd, given that I'm a total sucker for stupid remarks IRL)
• I do not self-define as a writer, so I tend to give up too quickly

edited 5th Dec '11 6:59:22 AM by vijeno

You wouldn't believe how finding the right software can help you with that - for me, it was a mindmapping tool and an online tasklist manager. And the Mac Book air. I wouldn't have thought so myself, but having something that I can easily take out of the bag and scribble something down in the subway or at the coffee shop really changed my way of working.

Pacing. Small events take forever to go through, and large events go by in an instant.

^ I could actually see that as a virtue, in some contexts.

Really? How so?

In that it is unusual and might put things into unexpected and therefore refreshing perspective.

Add to my list:

• I often don't know when to show and when to tell.

Perhaps.

Sure, you'd have to play it right, which you might still be about to learn.