One of the biggest problems I've always had with writing, or maybe it's just my perception, is consistency throughout a piece. It usually start out strong, with beautiful language and imagery to match the tone as the characters begin their epic journey through...Then a few chapters later the heroes are going on a trip. There's some stuff they see along the way. Yeah, it's great.
But then I become aware of this and ocassionally punch it up...so in the middle of their boring trip...All of a sudden, the heroes are thwarted by the evil-doer who puts the story in the iron-grip of tension and once again the beautiful language accompanies the tone until once again the author is swept away by...a need to stop going so overboard and just say what happened.
Anyone else have this problem or is it just me?
Posted by whiteboy (Member # 2652) on :
I too have this problem. I start out strong, but by the middle, its starting to go downhill. Then, it picks up again at the end. Rewriting usually helps this. Though I often find the same thing happening the second time through. Sometimes what helps me is to actually start in the middle of the story, or wherever I want to change. The key is really striking that balance between the two. If you don't get on with the story, the audience will lose interest. But you don't want it simply to be going from Point A to Point B.
Posted by pixydust (Member # 2311) on :
I go okay until I need to end it gracefully. Then I stumble around looking for poetry and umph and find the cliche and the droll. It's very sad, actually.
Posted by JmariC (Member # 2698) on :
I go the other direction. I start off abit bland usually, and the farther I go into the story the more I can feel/taste/hear/smell it. All of a sudden I'm possessed by prose and in the mood, until I reach the end (aka climax). Then there's some snuggling and I walk away, only to be wracked by "What was I thinking!" the morning after.
[This message has been edited by JmariC (edited July 21, 2005).]
Posted by dee_boncci (Member # 2733) on :
Happens to me too. Usually for one of two reasons:
1. I haven't thought through the plot enough to get from where I was to where I want to go, so I'm staggtering along without a vision.
2. I'm writing unneeded connecting material to bridge scenes/events where the best solution seems to be just allowing a time gap.
Posted by MaryRobinette (Member # 1680) on :
I have the same thing happen, Christine. I fix it in the editing if it needs it, but most of the time, the sections that I skim over are the ones that would be dull if I took longer with them. I think it's an unconcious self-editing brain thing.
Don't stress about it unless it bugs you when you edit.
Posted by Elan (Member # 2442) on :
I have a bad habit of writing the way I talk... long multi-syllable words. The Flesch-Kincaid on my verbal speech would give me a high fog index. (My daughter was highly annoyed when she accidently used the word "ludicrous" at school, emulating me. Her friends thought she was a dork.)
I have to work at it to write in a more common and clear manner. I admire OSC deeply for his ability to use clean and clear dialog. He sounds like the common man when he writes, and it helps the reader connect with his characters.
One of my characters is a scholar, so I don't mind being more verbose when I write for him. But it's a struggle to remember that the street urchin won't speak in the same manner, nor will his observations be as flowery and grandiose. (grandiose? aaghh... there I go again!)
Posted by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (Member # 59) on :
One of the beauties of English is that there is at least one multisyllabic (Latinate) word for something and at least one single syllable (Anglo-Saxon) word for that same thing, and usually there are more than that.
So when you do your rewrites, you can look at the "tone" of what you've written and decide if you want it to be multisyllabic or if you want to keep the words to single syllables.
This is especially useful in dialog, where using Latin-derived words can make a character sound educated and/or arrogant and using Anglo-Saxon words can make a character sound dumb (ignorant) and/or crude (vulgar, brutish).
OSC surely understands this and therefore, in order to sound more like the common man, finds ways to tell his stories using as few syllables as necessary.
I think Christine is talking about more than just word choice, though. And I second Mary Robinette's suggestion to skim over (also known as summarize or "tell") the stuff that will make the story lag in the middle.
This is one reason why I like to recommend that, for novels, at least, writers consider writing "the good parts" first. You may find, once you've done them, that you don't really need to add much to bring them all together to make a complete story.
Just as a movie isn't necessarily filmed in the order in which the scenes will be shown, a book doesn't have to be written in the order in which it will be read.
Posted by Elan (Member # 2442) on :
I agree with your observation that once the highlights have been written, the connection between may not require a lot of detail. I've noticed several times when I'vwe been bouncing my head against the wall dealing with writer's block that if I just skip over the part that is giving me fits and go on to the next section, I often come back to the "missing" piece to edit in the details and discover, to my surprise, that it is just fine and dandy as it is.
I tend to over-describe things, and am having to learn to KISS it... (Keep It Simple, Sweetie). This is my bad habit I'm trying to break.
I am reminded of my aunt who used to write 14 page letters describing what she ate for breakfast, what she ate for lunch, her doctor visits, her phone calls.... Frankly, no one CARES about having each and every detail outlined. Not for a relative. Not for a fictional character.
*sigh* I need to put my prose on a diet.
Posted by Survivor (Member # 213) on :
On the other hand, I think that a general outlining process could help with this sort of problem.
Don't you think?
Posted by Shendülféa (Member # 2408) on :
My problem is that my writing style tends to change depending on what author I'm reading at the time. If I'm not reading anything, then it takes on a whole entire different style. One chapter will sound like Frank Peretti wrote it, the next like something out of LOTR, and so on and so forth. As for my own style, I don't seem to have one...unless you can count the combination of many authors' style into one a style.
Posted by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (Member # 59) on :
So when you do your rewrites, be sure you reread whatever it was you were reading when you wrote the parts you like the best.