The grammarians and readers of fandom_grammar know that there are readers who don't notice misspellings, wrong verb tenses, or sentence structure errors-and then there are readers for whom those things are like nails on a chalkboard. Other errors can be just as annoying to people: the policewoman watching a cop show in which the heroes are shooting off several ( Read more... )

The English language is full of quite a few foul words, but few are as foul as one most nefarious nine-letter word: criticism. (Quick! Walk outside, turn around three times, and spit over your shoulder!)

Receiving criticism is one of the hardest parts of writing-harder, perhaps, than finishing that first draft. But before we get into it and what ( Read more... )

Before Track Changes or other electronic methods for indicating problems in an article or story came to be, there were proofreader's marks.
( Featuring material from the historical novel Frontier Wolf by Rosemary Sutcliff … )

With examples from The Hunger Games, Stargate: SG-1, and Harry Potter.The narration is (arguably) the most important part of a story. The plot, the characters, and the setting are all important, of course, but the narrative is how you execute those elements, tie them together, and craft your story. So, how do you make your narrative as strong as ( Read more... )

Tips for Writing Flashbacks

With examples from Stargate SG-1 and Sarah Connor Chronicles

( Flashback )

The sentence is the basis of any writing. How you form sentences and how they flow together not only reflect your skill and style as a writer, but also can be used to relay the general tone of your story (in descriptive writing) or a speaker's mood (in dialogue).

( Lots of information, with examples from Neil Gaiman, Cormac McCarthy, and Alan Moore... )

Sometimes, you're writing nothing but a blistering hot love scene, or a character study, or a drabble. In those cases, your canon is all you'll want or need. But there are other times - Yuletide, a Big Bang, your own original novel-in-progress, that sprawling AU epic that's been taking up all your spare imagination for weeks - when you're going ( Read more... )

A fair number of you are probably thinking "Huh? FG is going to tell us about calling people names?" In fact, we're going to do exactly that!

However, we don't mean "hurling epithets," as Ichigo and Renji are doing here:

"You jerk!" shouted Ichigo. "Whose idea was this, anyway?"

"Yours, you idiot," growled Renji.

This is actually a secondary ( Read more... )

The plot's worked out, you have the ending at last, your characters' voices are coming through clearly, and you feel quite positive about your latest piece of fanfiction/original fiction. There's only one problem.

You have not the slightest idea of what to call your work.
( Cut for some thoughts on titles and methods for selecting one )

Dialogue is one of several tools that an author uses to establish characters and make them distinct from one another. If you're writing fanfiction (or parody, or pastiche), getting the voices of your borrowed characters to match the author's original renditions can be as important as making their physical descriptions accurate. Still, it's likely ( Read more... )