can't get there from here

[flambeau]

Back while I was writing my sesa and yuletide stories, I really wanted to do an lj post about writing habits and writing techniques. Now I don't have to be secret any more, I'll try to make this post be that post

Comments

[nopseud]

I would have suspected it would be (even) more dialogue

A bunch of the lines I cut out to make it down to 14 were dialogue :-) They were all very torch, but I was trying to get a selection in. There's also the broader things, like the lack on internal dialogue and instead conveying mood etc with actions, which is really characteristic of your popslash.

Hmm. Probably I shouldn't have left the hobbit line in the list, because I wouldn't necessarily be able to peg that as you just from it sitting there on its own. It's just really, really funny :-) In context, though, it's very you, with the great punchline at the end of a scene.

By the way, I don't remember if I mentioned in the fb how much I loved the AJ/Lance stuff. I actually noticed even more of it this time through, from the pair of them being missing from the beginning scenes, right through to AJ not going with the others BSB boys to the elevator at the end. Nifty.

What would you say that your most characteristic writing tics are?

Huh. Wow, that's difficult to think about. I guess it's something that's tricky to see from too close up. There are things I do too much and try to cut out when I notice them, like usually going for lists of three separated with 'and' when I talking about something, (as in 'the whatever and the thing and the other thing') even when two or one would be fine, or giving characters too-large chunks of dialogue. I like one-liners too much. But I find it really hard to pull up things which are characteristic *and* I don't want to stop doing them.

I usually write very close third person, so maybe people would notice that. I think I write more dialogue than description, by quite a way, and people seem to spend a lot of time not finishing setences or interrupting each other, but I think that might count as one of the things I should do less. That's a very vague stuff anyway, which could apply to a lot of people. I honestly don't think I could go through a story and pick out bits which would make anyone say, yep, that's nopseud.

Although, a couple of people managed to guess my DWNOGA stories this year and last year, so I guess there must be other stuff *I* don't know I do, either. :-)

[flambeau]

I saw that someone... hmm. melymbrosia, it was, had made a poll in her lj asking people if they had identified her yuletide stories, and if so, by what. Maybe that's an idea for you. I seem to have an idea in my head about what your stories feel like, for want of a better phrase, but I'm not sure I could put it in particularly technical terms, or even pick out sections that demonstrate it. And since I never made it through the sesa before the reveal, there was no attempt at practical application.

So glad to hear, re Lance/AJ! They kind of sneaked up on me. *g*