The Great Write Meme

[findmeakor]

Ok, so I thought it would be fun to do a little informal critique on each other's fiction. The idea stemmed from blessed_beast's The Icon Truth Meme, for icon makers.

THE GREAT WRITE MEME- Comment with your username, and those willing shall reply with thoughts on any fiction, fandom or original, that you compose. That means it does not make a difference what

Comments

[amireal]

Amireal, most of my fic can be found under amific my site www.amireal.com which has some of the same as the LJ and all the earlier stuff that I'm avoiding.

[amireal]

*giggle* You make me laugh, and also very happy.

[amireal]

Thanks so much. *tips hat*

[amireal]

Your stories have great ideas, but the obvious rushing is a very real detriment to your writing. Posting a lot and posting big stories is great, readers really love it; discriminating readers will also love to read through a polished story.

It's not just about typing errors and wandering apostrophes, it's about stepping away from your work long enough to give it an honest revision. I don't know who your regular betas are, but work with them longer, or get more than one revision; it's frustrating and time-consuming, but in the end it's worth it. When something's crafted with care it always shows.

The alternative is something jarring and uncomfortable that pulls a reader out of the flow of text; multiply that by several hundred magnification and order when it's plot and dialogue.

[amireal]

Oh I agree. Absolutely. I tend to be horribly impatient, but it's slowly wearing off, though possibly not in ways the reader can yet see.

With my current projects I've actually made a real note to slow down, we'll see if that sticks.

[amireal]

I think your greatest strength is characterisation. In the moment-by-moment dialogue sense, but also in a broader across-the-story sense. In the way in which your stories progress - the building relationships etc - you never lose your grip on the complexities of each individual character. It makes every story feel rough, in the best possible sense, real - even where there's a clear arc, it's never so smooth that it doesn't feel true, in a really visceral way. I'm thinking in particular of Scenes from a Lesser War, here. Great fic. I think the same is true of Close Encounters as well, which I also really enjoyed.

I think where there are weaknesses in your work, at root, they come down to the nuts-and-bolts of writing. The phrasing is sometimes quite awkward. One thing I notice is tonal shifts, where weirdly formal words intrude into what's otherwise quite a casual, colloquial POV. I find that jarring. There's some off imagery in places - one that made me wince was dicks waving in the wind from Scenes - but, generally, what I notice

[amireal]

*nods* re: Characterization, that's what I've heard, sometimes even in gushing replies and sometimes I'm just-- but this is how they'd act. But while I seem to have a handle on that, there are other things I'm having a hard time dealing with, I suppose we've all got our faults.

As to the nuts and bolts: Yes. OMG yes. I try and pick up one or two basic things with each story, get my beta to pound some basic principle into my head. Or to get down the cease fire terms with my beta, telling her what she should and shouldn't comment on, etc.

And then there are the days I'm sabotaged by my fingers. Damn them and the fact that they like their apostrophes.

[amireal]

I just realized that I didn't comment on the whole 'lack of spark' thing. And you're right and it's something that I've always worried about in some ways, that and repatative word syndrome, especially in the sex scenes. But now that it's been articulated I hope I'll keep it in mind for the next editing process.

[amireal]

I think you have genuine talent and a way with turns of phrase, but you need to re-read more closely and find a couple strong beta readers. You seem to understand the rules of grammar and punctuation, you just need to apply them to *every sentence* in your stories, or find a beta reader who can pick up the slack for you.

And until that time, I think you should stop making posts like this one. The hypocrisy is overwhelming, my dear.

[amireal]

That post? Wasn't about fiction writing at all, and I suppose I should have added a caveat that said I don't expect perfection -- just not to get a headache while reading your reply or email.

I was talking about basic communication on the internet. Which I thought I'd made fairly clear, but I suppose I was wrong.

I was refering to emails I get where the author uses "ur" instead of "your", or "i" instead of "I" or never capitializes at all, or just writes in one long block of text that involes so many ideas it's hard to seperate it all out.

[amireal]

Reading your story is like sitting on a beach sipping a drink, listening to the ocean and watching the sun set. There's an inevitable conclusion but you just can't help but hold your breath a little at how beautiful it can be and sigh at how soothing it is.

It's hot and wonderful and I get a bit tipsy on the slow, easy realization of love between the characters. You never leave out the humor and I never have a problem seeing your characters doing exactly what you're describing.

Thank you so much:)

[amireal]

Thank you! *grins* That makes me feel all warm and fuzzy.

[amireal]

You are so blinded by what you see as your own genius that you refuse to acknowledge the weaknesses or mistakes in your writing. Your stories feel like you post them as soon as you finish, without reading them over and correcting flaws. You cut corners, use sloppy metaphors, dialog, and description, and have so many cheap and common errors that it is hard to take your writing seriously. Length does not equal brilliance. All of your stories need to be at least a third shorter

[amireal]

I-- I had to think hard about how to reply to this one. I'm not sure where the hostility comes from, or even if it's on purpose, but it sort of makes me step back in a very surprised manner.

I don't want everyone to worship at my feet. I really, really don't. I guess you just don't hear about the concrit I agree with, because well-- I agree with it. And there's a lot.

I agree with a lot of what's been said tonight, I also disagree with a small section of it, I guess my LJ has been my venting point and it just gets more of the angry than the good.

[amireal]

I have to agree with what many others are saying. And because so many others have already said this I would generally pass on by and assume you'd get the message, except that I was just paging through your LJ and noticed a post you made (not the one from the past couple of days) where you were really annoyed that people had been suggesting that you should give the beta process more attention. Now I understand that you might not want to hear that, but I was really surprised to see you saying you didn't think the criticism was warranted. Because we aren't just talking about a random comma here and there throwing people out of a story. I very nearly stopped reading your latest SGA fic midway through the first section because I was appalled by how many obvious errors there were. So much of it was stuff that a single pass through spellcheck would have caught. I understand that you write some really long stories and that it takes a lot of time and effort, but posting something with as many errors as I saw in your most recent fic

[amireal]

So much of it was stuff that a single pass through spellcheck would have caught.

This is what confuses me, because I spellcheck. Constantly. I think maybe what I keep missing are the homonymns, either that or my dictionary got corrupted somewhere along the line.

Some stories get multiple pass throughs, and still look like they were unbeta'd. And beleive me that's very-- disconcerting.

As I said above, I have patience issues which I'm trying to work on, my current fics are coming along far more slowly for several reasons, one of which is my own purposeful slow down. It's not that I give up on it, it's that I-- well I honestly think (especially with the last one) that there are possibly a handful of errors left and that the fresh eyes of readers will catch them far more quickly.

As for the LJ post. I agree with the sentiment, just not the expression of thought.