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Everything. I mean everything that's been developed, everything in your head, your ideas. Then we'll pick it to bits and tell you whats good and whats not.

Everything means every thing Alie. We want it all.

 Mynameisalie wrote:
I meant the things I haven't yet revealed as well.

That can easily be evaluated as well.

Ahh. came back to see how this was doing and saw it was doing well.

As always. We're making progress though.

 Azariah Kyras wrote:
Apparently when one has written over 300,000 words, they are no longer allowed to give advice.

I don't put much stock in word count, and I think it is a mistake to use that as a justification. Its the same as developing a sense of seniority and supposed privileges because you have a high post count on a forum. Experience, anecdotes and second opinions are more important I think. We have editors for a reason. (well you do at least. I still have to proofread my own work)

EDIT.
That intro, Alie. Two words: PURPLE PROSE

Next to grammar, this is probably THE most common mistake starting writers make. Overuse and abuse of flowery dialogue that takes up space and wastes time. Take a look at this section:

Alyan trod on, his padded feet making hardly a sound as he trudged through an ankle-deep concoction of crimson blood and churned up earth, and the occasional severed body part. His snow white fur was stained a dirty red from falling face down into the sludge he was now treading through. A ceremonial blade, made of an admantium-silver alloy hung at his waist, along with a beautifully decorated and extensively modified Lance Pistol. Warrior Princes were usually equipped so. Not that they needed them, anyway. The ebony claws hidden in the soft pads of their hands were easily sharp enough to claw through Power Armour, but Alyan had always felt safer with a gun, even if it was a pistol. For that reason, he had his crafted by a specialist artisan and modified to fire monomolecular tipped Silvite Shard at a velocity approaching Mach 5. He hadn't met a single creature who wouldn't die from a single, quick headshot by that gun.

Look at it. Two thirds of this paragraph could be removed and it would make no difference. The descriptors drag the story to a halt in order to describe Alyan. I could explain the same scene in four sentences. See:

Alyan's feet made no sound as he waded through the ankle deep mud. His white fur was stained with blood, contrasting with his gleaming weapons. The Warrior Princes had little need for weapons, but Alyan felt safer with a gun. He hadn't met a single creature that had survived its shot.

Bip, bap, bam. There you go, editing 101. I could go even further, breaking down the paragraph to the bare minimum. That is usually the best way to go. Adjectives and adverbs have a much stronger punch when they are used sparingly. When set against mundane language like walk, talk, red, or blue, the occasional swagger, shout, crimson or aquamarine stands out that much more. It gives it more impact, draws attention to it. But when you are putting those in every single sentence, it just bogs things down, and makes for sloppy sentence structure.

I probably shouldn't have said that, you're right. But I was touching on the fact that experience is important. You aren't an expert in the beginning. You need to work a lot before you start to get good. There's a quote I heard once from an art school teacher. "You've got a million bad drawings in you, start getting them out now."

More importantly, when you've written a lot, good or bad, you can recognize common problems in all work. While a person that writes a lot may not be a great writer, they can be a very good editor.

Tomorrow morning. Check at whatever time, it may be up, or I may still be writing it. I have to go to bed now, so...

Great. I love being in a different timezone T_T

Ikr?
Argh, it actually annoys me.

 Arcsquad12 wrote:

 Azariah Kyras wrote:
Apparently when one has written over 300,000 words, they are no longer allowed to give advice.

I don't put much stock in word count, and I think it is a mistake to use that as a justification. Its the same as developing a sense of seniority and supposed privileges because you have a high post count on a forum. Experience, anecdotes and second opinions are more important I think. We have editors for a reason. (well you do at least. I still have to proofread my own work)

EDIT.
That intro, Alie. Two words: PURPLE PROSE

Next to grammar, this is probably THE most common mistake starting writers make. Overuse and abuse of flowery dialogue that takes up space and wastes time. Take a look at this section:

Alyan trod on, his padded feet making hardly a sound as he trudged through an ankle-deep concoction of crimson blood and churned up earth, and the occasional severed body part. His snow white fur was stained a dirty red from falling face down into the sludge he was now treading through. A ceremonial blade, made of an admantium-silver alloy hung at his waist, along with a beautifully decorated and extensively modified Lance Pistol. Warrior Princes were usually equipped so. Not that they needed them, anyway. The ebony claws hidden in the soft pads of their hands were easily sharp enough to claw through Power Armour, but Alyan had always felt safer with a gun, even if it was a pistol. For that reason, he had his crafted by a specialist artisan and modified to fire monomolecular tipped Silvite Shard at a velocity approaching Mach 5. He hadn't met a single creature who wouldn't die from a single, quick headshot by that gun.

Look at it. Two thirds of this paragraph could be removed and it would make no difference. The descriptors drag the story to a halt in order to describe Alyan. I could explain the same scene in four sentences. See:

Alyan's feet made no sound as he waded through the ankle deep mud. His white fur was stained with blood, contrasting with his gleaming weapons. The Warrior Princes had little need for weapons, but Alyan felt safer with a gun. He hadn't met a single creature that had survived its shot.

Bip, bap, bam. There you go, editing 101. I could go even further, breaking down the paragraph to the bare minimum. That is usually the best way to go. Adjectives and adverbs have a much stronger punch when they are used sparingly. When set against mundane language like walk, talk, red, or blue, the occasional swagger, shout, crimson or aquamarine stands out that much more. It gives it more impact, draws attention to it. But when you are putting those in every single sentence, it just bogs things down, and makes for sloppy sentence structure.

It's just how I write. I tend to go into characters in great detail to describe their look and personality, and these path in which I do it shows how major the character is. Besides, I tend to be very over-descriptive on important details. The fact I am doing descriptive writing in GCSE doesn't help either.

But that's wrong, and that's why Stephanie Meyer is bad. Purple prose is telling and not showing. Its distracting and unnecessary. Describing how they look honestly doesn't matter unless there is a point to it.

But, I know what I could do. I could spread his character description out over several chapters, so you learn more and more about him and his past as the story progresses.

A prototype of chapter two involved him about 8 months later drinking himself into yet another stupor before his good friend, Ver'yassen gets him to reveal what happened prior to his career spiral. That's probably going to be scrapped, in favour of a more alternating sequence where it flicks between now and him conversing with the daemon.

Brevity is the soul of wit.

What?

 Arcsquad12 wrote:
Brevity is the soul of wit.

I can never take that phrase seriously after reading the three page monologue it precedes, even if it is meant to be ironic.

Will someone please explain what he meant by "Brevity is the soul of wit"?

Concise is good. Its better to say something in one sentence than twenty.

Its a quote from Hamlet. Very famous.

Brevity is wit. I can't break it down any further without breaking sentence structure.

What it means is that less is more. The more you tell with less words greatly enhances what you can tell. It allows for the reader to impose their own imagination on an event.

Bob shot Anne in the head. That is all I need to write. It tells you exactly what happened, no ifs ands or buts. Nothing else needs be said. The reader will visualize it themselves. You don't need to tell them about anything else, their mind does the rest.

 Azariah Kyras wrote:


I can never take that phrase seriously after reading the three page monologue it precedes, even if it is meant to be ironic.

It's a great tool for humor. A blunt response juxtaposed against a complex question can be hilarious. I love it.

*Groan

I may be slightly more intelligent than the average 14 year old, but this vocabulary is making my head hurt.

Doesn't seem to stop you from abusing vocabulary.

 Arcsquad12 wrote:


Bob shot Anne in the head. That is all I need to write. It tells you exactly what happened, no ifs ands or buts. Nothing else needs be said. The reader will visualize it themselves. You don't need to tell them about anything else, their mind does the rest.

That said, for very important things (the death of a main character, something incredibly shocking) it can be important to go into more depth. However, it is much better to start small and embellish from there. I guess I'm lucky that I'm bad at descriptions. I've never had to worry about purple prose.

I may be slightly more intelligent than the average 14 year old, but this vocabulary is making my head hurt.

I wish I still had copies of my 14 year old writing. That was a dark age indeed.

 Mynameisalie wrote:
Will someone please explain what he meant by "Brevity is the soul of wit"?

Effectively, in the words of Will Shakesman;

"Don't waste my time."

I'm tired, and I don't think logically when I'm tired. I once woke up at 3 in the morning, went downstairs and for some reason started to make beans on toast.

I fully woke up another 6 1/2 hours later.

 blood reaper wrote:

 Mynameisalie wrote:
Will someone please explain what he meant by "Brevity is the soul of wit"?

Effectively, in the words of Will Shakesman;

"Don't waste my time."

Never thought I'd see somebody quote Plinkett's reviews here. I read it in his voice.

Then I doubt you're that much smarter.

Dude, look at it like this: even Shakespeare is trying to help you.

Edit: I got fething multi-ninja'd. Damn...

I'm just a bit of an oddity really. I don't really fit in.

 Azariah Kyras wrote:

 Arcsquad12 wrote:


Bob shot Anne in the head. That is all I need to write. It tells you exactly what happened, no ifs ands or buts. Nothing else needs be said. The reader will visualize it themselves. You don't need to tell them about anything else, their mind does the rest.

That said, for very important things (the death of a main character, something incredibly shocking) it can be important to go into more depth. However, it is much better to start small and embellish from there. I guess I'm lucky that I'm bad at descriptions. I've never had to worry about purple prose.

Which goes back to me telling him to use embellishment sparingly. It can enhance as long as it is used in moderation.

 Mynameisalie wrote:
I'm just a bit of an oddity really. I don't really fit in.

interesting, not relevant to the topic at hand.

 liquidjoshi wrote:
Then I doubt you're that much smarter.

Dude, look at it like this: even Shakespeare is trying to help you.

I'm not quite sure how to explain the fact I got an IQ only 4 below Einstein's, in that case. But enough of me. Let's get back on the codex instead.