Genre

Being a Better Writer: Oversharing

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Welcome, writers! It’s Monday, it’s spring (conceivably, anyway), and it’s time for another installment of Being a Better Writer!

Which, I should note, is fourth in line before the end of Topic List #29. So if there are writing topics you’d like to see covered in the future, let us know in the comments! It’s time to start filling out the next list, and honestly? I’d appreciate requests. Being a Better Writer has been running for something like 13 years now, and that’s … a lot of weekly posts and topics I’ve had to come up with. There have even been moments when I’ve considered putting BaBW on a biweekly schedule, with the off week just a link to a past article from over a decade ago. It would free up my schedule to work a bit more on books, and reintroduce BaBW from years’ past to new eyes.

Anyway, before we dive into today’s topic, I do wish to once again draw your attention to last week’s news post, which chronicles a very rare occurrence I’ve never seen actually occurring! Plus, you know, it’s the news. What’s coming up with new releases and the like.

Also, again if you’re a regular (or even new) please support on Patreon or purchase a book. The site is kept ad-free by this kind of support, and as the talons of AI scrapers do their best to make all my hard-earned profits theirs, things have gotten tighter than normal. Support the site!

So, moving on to today’s topic, what do I mean by “oversharing?” This is one of those titles that almost certainly saw multiple readers thinking of multiple different potential “answers” to the question of what this topic would be addressing. And to one degree or another, most are probably correct. And there are a number of ways this topic can be taken, so if the direction I take it today wasn’t what you presumed or desired it to be, then by all means leave a comment so that we can potentially toss it on the topic list for the future.

But with that said, what am I talking about? Well, I’m talking about a rule of storytelling that serves as a … well, let’s just call it a rule of thumb. One that unfortunately does get abused by some and given a little too much power in the wrong way, but also sometimes is very applicable.

What am I talking about? Well, there’s no “official” definition (like I’ve said it’s a rule of thumb) so we’re just going to have to approach it with a layman’s description: the words of a story should be there to further said story.

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Being a Better Writer: What Drives the Reader?

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Welcome back writers, to the AI-free oasis! It’s Monday, and that means that once again it’s time for your weekly installment of Being a Better Writer, a series that any explanation of becomes a tautology. And, if I understand the term correctly, an analytic statement.

But you’re not here to discuss semantics. You’re here to talk writing! And talk writing we shall!

Though if you’d like to catch up on last week’s news, as well as understand more why I referred to the site as an “oasis” above, I’d recommend checking out last week’s news post. We talk about some other stuff to, so if you weren’t aware that there’s a project underway to get an Axtara – Banking and Finance audiobook made, well …

But no, that news is for those news posts. We’re here for Being a Better Writer, and we’ve got an interesting topic to discuss today. It’s … a bit of an odd one, yes. But it’s also a complicated one.

See, here’s the thing: If I were to go to reddit and post this question on a writing or reading sub, it almost instantly would dissolve into disagreement. I know this because I’ve seen it happen organically without anyone even asking. I’ve watched as people dismissively tell other posters that because they liked something but didn’t like something else that they were reading for “all the wrong reasons” because “real readers know that ____ is what you should really care about.”

Uh-huh. Obviously this is getting into a topic we’ve discussed heavily in the past (so heavily that it has a dedicated tag), IE audience. And yes, we’re touching on that, but I don’t want to dwell on it. Additionally, I’m not speaking of genre here, because any genre can focus on these “blanks” to one degree or another (nothing demonstrates this better than a suitably varied Sci-Fi anthology).

But I can’t avoid that yes, today’s topic does touch on audience a bit. And we’re going to discuss it, but only briefly. Because while audience matters, what matters more for our discussion today is this question: what do you want the reader to be driven by?

Hit the jump, and let’s see if we can find you an answer.

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Being a Better Writer: Pacing – A General Overview

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Welcome back, writers, to another installment of Being a Better Writer!

Now, before we begin, I have a small request of you. I know many of you have been coming to this site for years. I have the metrics. Hundreds of you receive email updates of new posts. Hundreds of you (sometimes thousands) use the site daily, mostly for the writing advice from posts like this one. I have the numbers, and I see you guys.

Please consider supporting via our Patreon, or by purchasing a book (and if you’ve already purchased a book, please leave a rating on Amazon, as the algorithm demands those for a book not to be hidden). Being a Better Writer has run now for over ten years, and in that time we have never allowed advertisements on the site, nor have we collected user data for our own ends, nor have we paywalled any of the articles here on the site (there are some Patreon Supporter-exclusive short story previews for unpublished shorts and previews of books, but that’s it). Though our host, wordpress, would desperately prefer that we did, judging by the number of ads we get for it recommending that we paylock our most popular posts.

Look, it’s no secret that things right now have gotten pretty bad. The US economy is in shambles and contracting fast. It seems like a week can’t go by without another small business or company closing its doors. Record profits for the 1%, cake made of sawdust at a 200% markup for the remaining 99%.

I know it’s bad out there, because this site is one of those places struggling not to close the doors. Things have gotten so bad that with eleven books out for sale in the world, and a 4.35 review average on Goodreads (phenomenal for that many titles and reviews), I’m seeing sales numbers that reflect the world over a decade ago, when I had 3-4 books to my name and was a relative nobody.

So please: Consider supporting the Patreon. If you can’t afford that, or buying a book, but have bought a book in the past, leave a rating. And if things are so tight that a $4 book or a $1 support tip is out of the question? Share the posts you’re reading from the site. That’s free, and better yet helps other people who are looking for writing advice and solutions find it. And if one of them can help support the site, so much the better!

Look, I know some of you are probably tired of posts like these (“Oh boo-hoo, do people really need to eat?”) but with the state of things being what they are, we’re just trying to survive. And something as simple as a share helps us fight that.

Now, one last bit of news, which feels a little related. We spoke of it in last week’s news post, but currently a groundwork look is being done at the feasibility of producing an Axtara – Banking and Finance audiobook through Kickstarter. For that to happen, however, the Kickstarter would need to be a success (and despite what some might think, you do still spend money if your Kickstarter does not succeed, so it’s not a case of “there’s literally no reason not to”).

If a Kickstarter for an audibook version of Axtara – Banking and Finance appeared, would you back it? If so, why, and if not, also why? Please leave a comment and let us know, because I would like to make this happen.

Okay, with all that said (and hopefully, acted upon), let’s talk about writing.

Now today isn’t going to be a more esoteric topic. No, as many of you have noted, we’re going back to a basic principle of storytelling. One we’ve discussed here on the site so many times that it has its own tag. But even though we’ve talked about it enough to have dozens of entries with that aforementioned tag, it has been a few years by our reckoning since we just talked about it in its own post.

So today, we’re going to talk about pacing again. And no, we’re not looking at a specific angle here. We’re doing a general overview of pacing itself. The basics .. but as with most things in writing, even the basics can be pretty hard to get a handle on. We’ve covered it before, but as with many of our repeat topics, the hope is that if we come at it from a new angle, it’ll be more approachable to those who perhaps didn’t find the last one as easy to parse.

So hit that jump, because today we’re talking about pacing. And to do that, I need to talk to you about pizza.

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Being a Better Writer: Pacing Your Plot

Max Being a Better Writer , , , , ,

Welcome back, writers! Monday is here, and with it another installment of Being a Better Writer! As usual, there’s last week’s news post to check out, so if you’d like to do that (and I recommend it, obviously), that link is here. Unfortunately for you, if Monday is the only time you see these, then you missed out on an event this last weekend.

Also, before we dive into today’s topic, I want to remind everyone that this site—and my income—depend on support through Patreon or sales of my books in order to keep things going. AI bots scraping this site, stealing these posts and repackaging them for resale have really hurt my traffic and my income, so if you’ve got some money to spare and are looking for a good read, please consider picking up one of my books and giving it a read. And if you accessed this content through an AI, please stop doing so. These AI companies rely on making money by stealing my content and my work, which hurts me financially. Please check out the site: Maxonwriting.com. There are no ads, no pop-ups, none of that, and all this material you just gave an AI advertising clicks or even direct money for is FREE there. This AI bubble is eventually going to pop (when your entire business model is “steal and resell someone else’s work …”) but until then it’s hurting creators, and badly. Please, stop using the AI, and give your attention back to creators.

Appeal to humanity over. Let’s talk about writing. Today, as you might have gathered by the title, we’re talking about pacing.

Now, this won’t be the first time we’ve talked about pacing. Or the second, or the third. We’ve talked about pacing so much, in fact, that there’s even a tag for it.

And yet we keep coming back to it. This is a topic that endlessly circles in writing groups, classes, editing circles … pretty much anywhere writing is discussed, really. Pacing is a key part of any writing process.

Yet one reason it’s brought up so often is because for many, especially for new writers, pacing is a difficult concept. Time and time again I’ve seen new writers, younger writers, first-timers, and everything in-between (that’s actually a surprising range, and either you know or you don’t) query writing circles asking about pacing, confused about pacing, arguing about pacing …

What can I say? Pacing is the writing concept that’s launched a thousand ships. Unfortunately, none of them are in the same fleet, and they’re all crashing into one another as they try to arrive at a conclusion.

So today, we’re revisiting this subject. Today we’re going to talk about pacing: What it is, why it matters, and then with that groundwork laid, how to figure it out in your work. Which is … harder than it sounds, and we’ll go into why that is and why so many new writers have such struggle with figuring it out.

Hit that jump, and let’s talk writing.

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Being a Better Writer: Romance – Not Just A Genre, and Not Just Necking

Max Being a Better Writer , , , , ,

Welcome back writers! Today we’re clocking in on a pretty interesting topic, and so I’m both excited to see your reactions as well as to share it. Oh, and it’s probably not what you think.

But, as usual, before I do I’d like to point you toward last Friday’s news post, which was a double-feature. Not only was it the usual collection of news, it also was the first OP-ED I’ve written in a while. Oh, and it concerns AI. But perhaps not quite in the way you might think. Go give it a look, because I’d love to hear your thoughts on the subject there. Though if you’re just there to be nasty and mocking without actually contributing, I am under no obligation to post said comment.

Yeah, you can tell I’ve dealt with the AI bros before.

Oh, one thing from that news post I’ll reshare here: After being made curious by a conversation in a writing thread, I went and tallied the last ten years of writing wordcount, from 2015 to this week, from my little .txt file that I keep track of my writing in. You ready for this number?

In the last 10 years, writing for this site and my books, I have written 7.868 million words. Yeah, that’s 7,868,000 words. I wonder if at least a million of those are Being a Better Writer? Definitely over half by now, I’d guess.

All right, enough chitty chitty chat chat! On with today’s topic. Which, as I said, probably isn’t what you were thinking. So hit that jump, and let’s talk about romance.

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Being a Better Writer: Choosing a Genre

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Welcome back, writers, from our one-week hiatus! We’re back again now, as normal, and with another Being a Better Writer post for you to dig into on the nuts and bolts of writing! And today we’re leading with an interesting topic that online and among writing groups can be the subject of contention among many, to the point that I’ve seen it crop up again and again and even give rise to a sort of … Well, that’d be getting ahead of myself. But today’s topic is definitely worth a look. Even if you’re the experienced type, as you never know when you might run into it and it could be useful to have some words to share on the subject.

But before we dive in, I do want to offer a follow-up to last Thursday’s news post. I am pleased to report that several people got into contact with me about Beta Reading, and have begun reading through Blood Less Vile. I will also report, with a little frustration, that at least one of these was a previous Beta Reader who apparently hadn’t at all received their invite sent a week earlier. Thus confirming my theory that Google is literally having so much trouble policing spam from its own sources that my legitimate emails are ending up as casualties.

Which sucks, but … that’s the way things are. I’ll have to look into better methods of contacting the Alpha and Beta Readers in the future then, though as always, this site and the Discord remain solid tools for seeing what’s going on.

Oh, a little bit on that second option. As some of you may know, Discord is preparing to go public. That’s right, to stop being a regular company and start being one who’s only goal is “Burn the platform to the ground for as much money as possible short term.”

Yes, I know technically that’s not what “going public” means … but by virtue of the action of American companies, that’s what it most certainly is. So, in other words (and just so we’re clear, I’m far from the only voice calling warning on this one) Discord is probably going to start to undergo “enshitification” (it’s a real word, and I encourage you to look it up) before long.

So then, where will that leave The Makalay Camp? Well … I like the little community there. So I have an alternative to propose: An internet forum. What forum and where, you might ask? Well, here, actually. I know it’s possible, though I haven’t looked into all the details. But, if the worst happens and Discord is lost to us, I’ll see about getting a forum set up here on the site. We’ll take things here back to the late 90s, when forums were king and ads hadn’t taken over. We’ll be a bastion of calm on the web!

Well, you know, for fans and readers and the like. Still, I’ve checked on the possibility, and it’s something that can happen.

Okay, last bit of news: A Pirate Planet is rolling along, having passed 60,000 words, over a quarter of the way complete. Blood Less Vile is in Beta 1 (and I’m working on getting a cover figured out), and The Phoenix is nearing the end of Alpha 1 and will likely get an Alpha 2 to track some changes. Three books being worked on at once, yeesh.

Oh, and I recently played through Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, and at some point I do want to share my thoughts on a narrative bit I ran into during the state of the game. Which is excellent, by the way, and you should absolutely play it if you desire some Indiana Jones shenanigans.

Okay, that’s all I’m saying there. Let’s hit the jump and talk about choosing a genre.

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Being a Better Writer: Exploratory Writing

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Welcome back, writers! I hope you all had a fantastic weekend, and hopefully didn’t miss out on grabbing a free copy of Axtara – Banking and Finance when you could! If you missed it because your checking of the site is front-loaded in the week, well … Sorry. You should be checking things out throughout the week as well. At least on Fridays, when the news post tends to drop or has dropped.

Now, as I’m writing this Friday, I’ve actually got the weekend ahead of me, so I don’t actually know how things went for Axtara. But I’m hoping they will go well.

By the way, today’s post marks the first topic from out new Topic List #27! There’s still time (and physical space on the list) to get a topic you’d like to see on there! Post in the comments and let us all know what you’d like to see discussed in a future installment!

With that said, it’s time to get down to today’s topic. Which … Well, this one’s odd. See, for some, this post is going to be a giant statement affirming what they already assumed was common knowledge. I expect there will be a number of you that read this and think “Well, yeah. Duh. Who wasn’t doing this?”

But then by the same token, there are going to be a number of you who read this and even after all the convincing I’ve attempted in trying to sway you, are going to think “Yeah, but really? I don’t know …”

Yeah, today’s topic is an area where I see a pretty strong split across young-writers, but even some with experience under their belt. To some, this just feels like a foreign concept, or a scary leap off of a cliff that they don’t wish to ever make, and are baffled that others would.

So kick back, hit that jump, and let’s talk about exploratory writing.

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Being a Better Writer: Too Much or Too Little Dialogue?

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Welcome back, writers! We’re here once again with another installment of Being a Better Writer, talking about writing advice, tricks, and tools of the trade.

Speaking of which, if you want to immerse yourself in three days of writing education, be sure to attend the Life, The Universe, and Everything writing symposium this Thursday through Friday! I’ve already posted my schedule for the event, but there’s a whole lot more going on, and it’s always a blast to attend. If you can’t make it this year, then plan ahead for next year. Because if you’re a writer, especially of Science-Fiction and/or Fantasy, this is the event to attend.

All right, I’ve talked a lot about LTUE over the last two weeks. It’s coming, you should know about it, and it’s awesome. With that said, let’s dive into today’s Being a Better Writer topic.

I’ll admit that I’m currently thinking over this topic myself with regards to a scene I quite literally just wrote in Axtara – Armies and Accounting. It’s not that it’s a bad scene. It has characters interacting as they make the final leg of a journey and talking with one another in order to keep their minds off of the pressure of the big plot elements they’re headed into.

But even as I finished that bit and the characters arrived, I couldn’t help but wonder if I really needed it. It was good dialogue, sure, and we learned some more about some characters and their place in the world, as well as the world at large, but … was it too much?

Now, I’ll probably leave that up to the pre-Alpha or the Alpha Readers, but it’s an example of what we’re talking about today in more ways than one. Today, as you hit that jump, we’re going to talk about the balancing of our dialogue. Is it too much? Too little? And is there more we need to include when two or more characters have a discussion?

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Being a Better Writer: Understanding Your Audience Doesn’t Mean Giving Them What They Want

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Welcome back writers! To a most deliciously attention-grabbing Being a Better Writer installment! As usual, don’t forget that there was a weekly news post last Friday, so if you haven’t seen that yet, you can check it out here. Oh, and of course, if you’ve come to the site via search looking for my books, hit that link there. Or the tab above. Or try the “Free Fiction” tab as well. I recommend A Trial For a Dragon as a great starter, but there’s plenty there to check out!

Yeah, that’s a pretty condensed opening paragraph, but can you blame me? We’ve got an interesting topic to discuss today, and I want to dive right into it. So here we go!

We talk a lot about audience here on Being a Better Writer. Enough, in fact, that it has its own tag. With good reason, too! “Audience” is who a book or story is for. The term is, in a rare case of simplicity, exactly what it sounds like.

As authors, we frequently say things like “Well, I knew my audience would like …” or “Well, when I thought of the audience …” When dispensing writing advice you’ll constantly hear cautions or guidelines like “Well, think of your audience” or “Make sure you know what your audience wants.” Even statements of warning, such as “Well, part of the problem was that the book was marketed toward the wrong audience.”

At it’s core, the concept is pretty simple. A story is written, and an audience is who it is written for. And if you can identify your audience, then you can identify what elements of storytelling they want and tailor a book just for them. Mystery audiences want a mystery, romance audiences a romance, etc!

Again, pretty straightforward.

Until it’s not. Hit the jump.

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Being a Better Writer: Crafting a Good Mystery

Max Being a Better Writer , , , , ,

Welcome back, writers! Ah, that never gets old to write out. It’s Monday here on Unusual Things, and that means that like many, you’re here for another installment of Being a Better Writer. Which today has an interesting topic that I can see ruffling some feathers. Why?

Well, because we’re talking about Mystery. As in the “the genre,” hence why that’s capitalized. But we’re going to be talking about what goes into a good mystery and … well, what does not. And some might take issue with that, mostly because they’ll look at it and go “Hey, but that would mean X story wasn’t a mystery! But I thought it was!”

See, that’s one reason I wanted to discuss this topic today: I’ve seen a lot of stories that claim to be works of “mystery” or a “tale full of mystery” that well … really aren’t.

Sands, some stories that flat out claim to be a Mystery (note that capitalization) aren’t in fact, really mysteries. Just stories where odd events are happening and then at a random point get plot exposition to connect some of them together.

In other words, they’re stories that want the feel of a mystery without doing the legwork. But that’s getting ahead of ourselves. For now, let’s start with the basics. Hit that jump, and let’s talk about mysteries.

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