User blog:Zathronas/Author's advice: first blog

Hello and welcome to my new blog, author's advice. Before I explain what I intend to do with this blog, I need to get a disclaimer out of the way.

This is not about fan fiction. Yes, I will talk about stories but I will not create or post any stories here, just talking about how to create one.

Over the weeks, several people have asked me to review their fan fiction which I did. Most of what I read had glaring story structure mistakes that was difficult to explain to the author through a chat because it would take too long. So I tried to give examples instead which wasn't very helpful in the long run. With these blogs I intend to remedy that. It will be much easier to give a link to a page that will give the full details then having to explain several times. If I can help someone create better stories then I'll be happy. If you have questions put it in the comments below. If you want my advice about a fan fiction. Put a link to your story in the comments and if it's five page or less, i'll take a look at it. I don't really have time for more because I have my own self imposed deadline to meet on my next novel.

So for this first blog,  i'll give you general advice that helped me greatly over the years.

1. THERE IS NO BAD STORY IDEAS

You want to write about Ruben? Ruby's male alter ego? Go ahead. Wanna kill every good guys and have the bad guys win? Cool! Want to do a love story between Roman and Ozpin? Good for you!

Do the subject you want to write about. There is no bad subject, just bad execution. That's the difference between a good and bad story. Believe me, you'll find someone who will like your story... if it is properly written.

2. GRAMMAR IS IMPORTANT... BUT NOT THE END OF THE WORLD

I make grammar mistakes, often. It's even worst in chat. My grammar is horrible because I don't take time to revise what I write and because I have a wonky keyboard... in that order. That's why we have proofreaders and editors. For my last published book, I had one proofreader and two editors, add to that another editor from my publisher. Even then, a lot of mistakes passes through the net, even in publication. We're human and flawed, so as long as you tried your best to find them, don't worry about it. That being said do try and find them, no one likes to see grammatical errors every two words. If someone calls you out on a grammar mistake, thank them but don't be embarrassed. There are bigger problems out there like...

3. STORY STRUCTURE WILL DEFINE IF YOUR STORY IS GOOD OR NOT

Most problems I found in fan fiction, short story, and novel on the net is story structure. That's usually what someone is referring to when they say "badly written". Story structure will define your style, your success as an author and the enjoyment of your readers. That being said there's some rules that is mainly followed and I would suggest to follow them. Once you've mastered them, then you can try to break them.

4. ORIGINALITY IS IMPOSSIBLE.

If I told you that I just read a tale about a kid who learns he's a wizard by a giant and goes to school to learn wizardry? Be honest here, you would have thought Harry Potter. I'm talking about Ambrosius Aurelianus, a book from the 6th century. Oh, want to know the name of the kid? Merlin. When I started writing seriously 25 years ago, I discarded some great ideas because I felt someone has done it before. What I realised later on is that EVERYTHING was written previously. The subject cannot be original but the way you write is. So if someone tells you your story is not original and that they've seen something similar, tell them they're right.

5. READ YOUR TEXT OUT LOUD

This one comes from famous actor and author John Cleese. I'm writing this blog in my local Mc Donalds and have been reading it out loud. I'm not screaming but I'm loud enough so I can hear myself. I get some looks from time to time but I found it was the best way to see if a sentence makes sense. If it sounds wrong then it is not written properly.

6. DESCRIPTION IS THE NAME OF THE GAME

What is common to every author? We see the scene we're writing in our head. But here's a common rookie mistake, some writers fail to understand that the readers doesn't see it. It's your job to show it to them with your words. You want them to see what you see in your head? Then you need to describe it as much as possible. Let me give you an example:

Jake realised he needed to run or he'll be late for school. By the halfway mark, he notices a cute girl jogging. He was so entranced by the girl the he never saw the tree in his way and slammed right into it.

As you can see it's not bad but it doesn't really tell you what I see in my mind's eye. Let's try this again

Jake looked at his watch and started to panic, he only had 10 minutes to get to school or he would be late again. He grabs his school backpack and waves at his mom before passing the front door and running towards school. He turned on Johnson street and ran at full speed before turning right on crescent. He was halfway there but his strength was starting to flag. He was taking bigger and bigger gulps of air, his sweat trickling in his eyes. He was removing the sweat on his brow with his forearm when he saw a vision of beauty jogging in front of him. She had blond hair attached in a pony tail. She was wearing a flower print joggers outfit that was so form fitting that it left little to the imagination. He passed the beautiful jogger without tearing his eyes off her. He smiled at her first then frowned when he saw her eyes get big. WHAM!!! Jake ran right into a tree.

Now I know it's longer but it describes very well the scene I see in my minds eye. If you want the reader to see what you see, you have to give details. The scene in your head may invoke some feelings and if you describe it properly, those feelings will be transmitted. So don't be frugal in details, you can reduce the length of the story some other way...

7. BUILD AN OUTLINE

What is an outline? Say you want to write a story about Ruby getting caught in a time warp and getting thrown into the past where she meets her mom at the same age as she is. Before starting you might want to build an outline.

An outline can be as small as a paragraph or as big as a novel. It has all the relevant information you will need to write your story. In this case it won't have to be much since its an established world with characters created by another. Start with basics, who will be in your story? Where will it be set? What is your intent with the story?

Why would you want to do an outline for a fan fiction or a short story? To keep you focused on what is necessary and to keep you from forgetting some details you want. True that it's not obligatory in this case but it helps keeping you on the right path and avoiding tangents. If your creating your own world then it becomes necessary. Frank Herbert the author of Dune, wrote an outline 4 novels long explaining how everything worked and even had a timeline of the last 10,000 years. He made 6 bestsellers out of it. His son wrote 6 more when Frank died. That should tell you something.

That it for the first blog. I'll try to be shorter next time ;)