Writing Advice

 My friend recently mentioned this over on her blog, and it’s something I agree with and it was brought to my attention again as I was looking over my twitterfeed and found a piece of writing advice posted, along with a link to a longer article which explained the advice further.

As a young writer – and when I say young, I don’t mean in age – there is this subconscious need to find the rules set out by other writers who have come before you. I know, because I did it. Not so much in my early, early days where I didn’t really care about what I was writing because no-one else would see it but me. But when I started to share my work, I also started searching out advice on how to become a better writer. I wanted reassurances that I was doing it right...

And you know what the one thing I learned is? Just keep writing.

I sucked! I sucked to the point where I can’t even look at my old pieces of work without cringing. Nowadays though, there’s much less cringing (though it still happens too often because I’m a perfectionist in my writing), and as my friend pointed out – that shows growth.

Did this growth come from all that advice I read? The pieces that said avoid first person? The ones that said to avoid using adverbs? Or how about this latest piece of advice in which they say to write how you write, not how you speak?

No. Because those aren’t tips or bits of advice. They’re preferences. Preferences that vary from mine.


I love first person, both when writing and reading. I've never had a problem with adverbs when reading, unless they're seriously abused and used twice in every sentence. As for writing how I write and not how I speak, I like to write conversationally. And I enjoy reading pieces written like this too.

So what is the purpose of this blog post? It’s to say that not all writing advice is good for everyone. In fact, sometimes you have to break the rules. Sometimes you have to ignore the advice (unless it’s from Neil Gaiman, he often has some bloody good advice – such as write, write and write!).

The first step to becoming a better writer is to write, and read. It’s like learning to play the piano, when you begin, you’ll hit the wrong keys sometimes, but eventually, if you practise enough, your fingers will automatically reach for the next key without you even having to think about it.

When your confidence starts growing, and when your writing does too, you’ll learn what works best for you and what doesn’t. Just bear in mind that you can’t please everyone, so start by pleasing yourself.

The Bad Guy: Loki

I have this thing about bad guys, the antagonist of a piece. I just love a good bad guy. I love the truly evil and twisted bad guys that you love to hate, and I love the damaged and emotionally challenged bad guys where your heart goes out to them because you can see what made them the way they are. I think these are the bad guys that really stick with me.

Note: Beware of spoilers in this piece, as I do talk about the movie Thor. So if you haven’t seen it yet... then, here’s your warning.

Loki is one of these bad guys. Throughout many different mediums and stories, the character of Loki often comes across to me as one of those misunderstood antagonists that you want to take to the side and give them a huge hug and say ‘please, don’t go down that path’. Only, if they didn’t go down that path, there would be no story, would there?

In Thor, the movie that is because I haven’t read the comics, Loki is not a villain as such, as he is just a person trying to fit in. He was brought up in a world and with a family that wasn’t truly his. He was trapped, trying to find his place. And in the middle of all that, there was his relationship with Thor.

Thor, to Loki, was his brother. But he was more than that. He was his rival. Only, rival isn’t really the right word. Rival gives the impression of equality. That’s where the problem lies. Loki never felt like Thor was his equal. It wasn’t that he felt superior to Thor, if anything, he felt like he wasn’t good enough to be placed beside Thor. So Loki was jealous. He was the jealous in the same way any little brother would be jealous of their older brother who seemed to get everything.

It only makes sense that Loki wanted to prove himself. He wanted to be given the same chance that Thor had been given. He wanted to be his equal. Thus, the antagonist was born.

This also extends into actual Norse mythology.

In mythology, Loki was a trickster. He loved pranks and he loved stirring up trouble. There were antagonistic traits to him in early stories, but no more than any of the other gods. He was no worse than any of them, and yet he was never really an equal.

Depending on which source you read, some class Loki as one of the giants in Norse myths, one who spent a lot of time with the gods. In other sources, he is credited as a god himself. But whichever way you choose to look at it, whether he was a god or giant, he was never really an equal amongst the other gods. He was never given that.

Often, he is the scapegoat. When something goes wrong, it was Loki’s job to fix it or it would be his head on the chopping block. Sometimes, he caused the problems in the first place, like a young child acting out for attention.

Even his children were branded as dangerous and not just cast out, but punished for sins they hadn’t yet committed. But it had been foretold of what would happen, and so out of fear, the gods reacted to the extreme. When everything did come to a head, was that because what the gods had been told was true, or was it because of the whole idea of self-fulfilling prophecy? By reacting to what they feared would happen, had they caused it to happen?

I mean, I’m not an expert on Norse mythology. I haven’t read all the stories or researched them deeply, but of the ones I have read, these are the impressions I have formed.

But, I’m getting away from my main focus. Loki.

Stories need bad guys like fire needs oxygen. Sometimes, if the story had gone another path, if something had gone differently, the bad guy, the antagonist, could so easily change roles and instead become the protagonist. Sometimes, he truly believes he is the good guy. And sometimes, he gets thrust into the role of being the antagonist because someone has to do it. Somebody has to keep the balance.

Without darkness, how would we know light? Without sadness, how could we know happiness? Without someone to stand against, how could the hero prove himself?

So here’s to Loki, and all the other great bad guys out there.

Seven

It's 1:40AM and my eyes are getting bleary. My mind is fuzzy and I swear, right now, it's full of fluff. So please forgive any errors.

This is a writing meme of sorts. I was tagged by my good friend (who also happens to be an awesome writer, so please check out her blog: http://thawriterzsoundtrack.blogspot.co.uk/ ).

Da Rules:

• Go to page 7 or 77 in your current manuscript
• Go to line 7
• Post on your blog the next 7 lines, or sentences, as they are – no cheating
• Tag 7 other authors to do the same

 I really like the idea behind this because it's basically like picking a random piece of a novel you're working on rather than giving you the full choice of which lines you want to choose. Originally, I was going to post a snippet from The Occultus (the novel I'm currently sending queries out for), but I thought it would be a good idea to post something a little different - a small snippet from another piece of work.

So here it is, 7 lines from page 77 of Soul of Fire (one of the stories I'm trying to finish). This is a snippet from the first draft:

Tobias swallowed and tried to understand the solemn look that had fallen onto the professor’s face, a slightly nervous edge to his eyes.

            “Now, I need you to hear me out. This is going to be a lot to take in and more than a little hard to believe but promise me you’ll let me get to the end before you make a run for it?”

            Now Tobias was getting worried. What could possibly be any more mental than dragons and their crystallised tears? “I’ll try.”

Now... for the tagging:

A double tag for Gen as I know she was already tagged by Miss Schelz :P

Another to Bambers

And because it's late (now 2:07AM, and my brain is officially fried) and I don't actually know many other blog writers personally, I'm gonna just tag everyone else who reads this. So, if you're reading this, consider yourself tagged. And also, if you do this, please post a comment with a link to your post - I would love to check it (and your blog) out.

I would end with some epic and inspiring good bye, but the more truthful one would be 'beeeed... zzzzz'. Good night bloggers and blog readers!

RHETORICAL DEVICES IN CREATIVE WRITING

It’s been a little while since I last posted anything so I thought I would dedicate this post to writing and a few writing techniques.

RHETORICAL DEVICES IN CREATIVE WRITING

Whilst studying psychology, one of the courses inside of that included a topic on verbal and written communication. It was a topic that I found particularly interesting, especially when we covered the persuasive techniques that are often used in political speeches or in debates. However, upon going onto rhetorical devices, I realised that not only did these persuasive forms of writing appear in speeches and debates but they also often made an appearance in fiction. After all, it makes sense that a writer would use such techniques that enable them to not only draw in the listeners and the readers but the keep their attention too. The list of techniques is plentiful so here is a quick look at just a couple of them:

Personification

Personification. I remember learning about it in primary school and it is a concept and technique that has always stuck with me.

According to my trusty dictionary (because it always comes in handy to have one near you – whether it be a book, phone app or internet link) to personify is “to give human characteristics to (a thing or abstraction)”.

As a writing tool, this can really make your writing come alive.

The darkness can loom and stalk. The wind can caress and whisper. Destiny can mock and tease.

The options are endless and depending on which way you take it, you can change and alter the mood of a story or scene.

Irony

In life and in writing, irony can bring a smile to your face. Generally it is the use of a word or a phrase that whilst meaning one thing, in the context of the story the opposite ends up true. The first example I can think of is one I saw in motion awhile back. Irony in this case was in the form of a small red van being overtaken by lorries on a motorway because it was going so slow and yet the name of the company on the side of the van was ‘Speedy’.

As well as being used in short scenarios and for comic relief, irony can also be used in the wider context of the story. An example would be in the case of character development – that useless, good for nothing farm boy eventually turning out to be the hero of the tale or the innocent, kindly character proving to be the true villain of the piece.

Irony also, can be used to foreshadow events. A twist of words met only in jest early on in the story can end up coming true.

Lists of three

I can be quite bad for this one. Usually it’s a subconscious thing, when listing something, three examples just seems right. There’s something about the beat of three things being listed that has an effect. You can see that I used this when giving examples of personification.

Sometimes two examples will do, sometimes more are needed, but often, three concise examples can have an impact, and mostly, in my opinion, this is to do with rhythm. Whether writing a story or a poem, rhythm can have a big impact on a reader. If it lacks rhythm, the reader may feel it’s awkward. So lists of three is one way to give a sense of rhythm.

And I’m going to end this blog post on that note, after giving my list of three rhetorical devices that can be used as writing devices.

If you look over your work or work of others, you may see these being used, and sometimes the writer doesn’t even realise they’re using them. They’ve subconsciously picked up these techniques by writing and through reading. The subconscious can be an amazing thing and a brilliant tool for the writer.