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1500 questions
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8 answers

How do you mix dialogue with actions of a character?

I'm not talking about if it's right to go like: "See you later, Mom!" Sierra grabbed an apple and ran out of the front door. I'm more concerned with something I remember seeing but can't remember how to do. It's where words in the character's…
Alaerth
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Resources about different people types?

I'm native German, but trying to write in English for various reasons. One of the big points in a story is to keep the characters very distinct from each other, and that requires some knowledge about the culture. As said, I'm native German, so it's…
Michael Stum
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For Fantasy Stories, Should You Include a Map At the Beginning of the Book?

If you're writing a fantasy novel, would it be best to include a map of the geography that the story takes place in at the beginning of the book? I've seen quite a lot of fantasy books (Redwall series, Swordbird, ...) while other fantasy books omit…
JFW
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How to know the reason for rejection?

Just out of curiousity, how do people figure out the reason their work is not accepted? I tried submitting my work to a newspaper but the editor rejected it with a brief message. How do people get feedback on their work besides friends and family? I…
Jeffrey04
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8 answers

What can I do if I hate my own protagonist?

So I'm writing a fantasy novel, and I have my plot fairly fleshed out, and I have my main players, my world is built, and now I've started to really flesh out my characters more. The only problem is, I've already fleshed out about 5 of my secondary…
circepix
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9 answers

I have 97 pages in my book draft. Is it too late to swap to third person from first?

I've been writing a One Piece fan fiction to improve my writing. I foolishly decided to write it in first person and now I kinda want to change it to third person - but I'm already 97 pages into the book. Should I do it? This is the first piece of…
Seann Powell
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How realistic should dialogue and character voices be?

I've heard a lot of conflicting suggestions in the past regarding dialogue, so I'm hoping I can get a solid answer here. Some people have told me that the best way to go about dialogue is to make it as compact and to-the-point as possible. Good…
Summer
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How to decide whether a story is worth writing?

Sometimes I have inspiration for a story. In random pieces of spare time I daydream more and more details until I am satisfied with the concept and then I don't take it any farther. In my head, the story is finished and I am satisfied. If I have the…
DoubleDouble
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How does one go about publishing erotica, and how far is too far?

I write erotica, it started out as an amusement to see how far I could go, but it became a real passion after three or four stories. I have even published a few online and those stories have become favorites of many. A few friends have tried to…
Evil Spork
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How should I introduce my characters?

I'm pretty good at creating compelling characters with decent personalities and motivations. I like the comradery vibe, so they're generally already part of a posse of some sort at the beginning of my stories. However, I can only really think of two…
ArchitectofAges
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8 answers

Is it so bad to end up with a "done before" plot?

I'm not delusional about the nature of the science fiction novel I'm (very) slowly working on. A brief run down might be as follows: Set 10's of millennia in Human's future but in a neighbouring galaxy Discovery of ancient artifact Artifact turns…
Nick Bedford
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Can Readers Relate to a Book without Humans?

I've been working on a story idea for a few years now, during which I designed a world (fantasy-based) in which it would take place. The thing is that because this is a different planet, I thought it would be cool to create a world without any…
Bullfrog
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9 answers

Time measures in fantasy worlds

I wonder, what could be a good way to provide time measures in a fantasy universe. I don't mean the calendar which is covered in the question: Out of this world... Giving it time?, but measures like hours, quarters and minutes. When it's obvious for…
Darek Wędrychowski
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7 answers

Must every piece of speech get its own paragraph?

I've had a few people read pieces of narrative writing I've done, and they seem to take issue with the fact that I sometimes put a piece of speech inline with the rest of a non-dialogue paragraph, like so: Jill found a box of mints she liked and…
Joe Z.
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avoiding making all your characters sound the same

We surely all have little quirks to our speech. Like my daughter once criticized my writing for using the word "surely" too much. (See, I used it on this post.) So how do you keep all your characters from sounding the same in dialog? That is, how do…
Jay
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