have a number of different modes, I've found. There are certain characters who just click -- I don't know why; they really have no pattern as far as I can see -- and I can spit out hundreds of words in one sitting and they just feel right. And then there are others that take laborious drafts and constant staring at the computer screen wondering why the words aren't doing what I want them to do.
Yeah, everything you've said here really resonates. I find that I can write Remus in a wide variety of situations, and give me a Remus-Harry dialogue and I ould probably turn out something as long as DH. And then some stories just have to be hacked out of the living rock inch by blood-spattered inch, and I know they're in there!
Thankfully I have a number of lovely people who are willing to beta-read for me, which is probably a particularly annoying chore since I'm liable to make edits and send them about twelve drafts before I'm happy enough with what I've written to have them even read it!
I usually go through the twelve drafts privately first! But I need the beta process to explain to me gently that the great story in my head has sadly not made it on to the page: as kennahijja has said on one memorable occasion, 'It would be nice if you told the reader something about what is going on.' Not a verbatim quote. She phrased it much better than that!
And then some stories just have to be hacked out of the living rock inch by blood-spattered inch, and I know they're in there!
That sounds like my dissertation...but also certain characters. I actually had more trouble writing Remus than, for instance, Sirius. Mostly because Remus for some reason was always a bit occluded for me -- I was never entirely sure what was going on inside his head.
'It would be nice if you told the reader something about what is going on.'
Hee! A fairly consistent piece of criticism I get is that I spend too much time on dialogue and too little on plot. But dialogue is how I figure characters out, I've found.
Yeah, everything you've said here really resonates. I find that I can write Remus in a wide variety of situations, and give me a Remus-Harry dialogue and I ould probably turn out something as long as DH. And then some stories just have to be hacked out of the living rock inch by blood-spattered inch, and I know they're in there!
Thankfully I have a number of lovely people who are willing to beta-read for me, which is probably a particularly annoying chore since I'm liable to make edits and send them about twelve drafts before I'm happy enough with what I've written to have them even read it!
I usually go through the twelve drafts privately first! But I need the beta process to explain to me gently that the great story in my head has sadly not made it on to the page: as kennahijja has said on one memorable occasion, 'It would be nice if you told the reader something about what is going on.' Not a verbatim quote. She phrased it much better than that!
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That sounds like my dissertation...but also certain characters. I actually had more trouble writing Remus than, for instance, Sirius. Mostly because Remus for some reason was always a bit occluded for me -- I was never entirely sure what was going on inside his head.
'It would be nice if you told the reader something about what is going on.'
Hee! A fairly consistent piece of criticism I get is that I spend too much time on dialogue and too little on plot. But dialogue is how I figure characters out, I've found.
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