Saibler
New member
- Joined
- May 8, 2023
- Messages
- 3
- Points
- 3
As it turns out, writing a story isn't so hard, it's writing a good story that's hard. So before I go into the topic above and hammer down the questions I have, I will tell you a little bit about myself so you can better understand my situation.
I'm from Germany, so English is my second language, and while I'm confident in it, that doesn't mean it's perfect.
I'm 26 years old, have a full-time job and have only recently (June this year) started writing as a hobby. Since I have no previous experience as a writer, I don't have any guidelines, tips, etc., so I'm freestyling the whole thing so far.
My workflow at the moment is as follows (I started with three chapters a week, but currently it's only one a week):
I write a chapter in Word (~1.2k words), proofread it using deepl write, and then upload it here on scribblehub.
Yesterday I published my 20th chapter, and while my story currently has three ratings (3x 5 stars), which shows me that I'm not completely shitty at writing, I'm sure there's a lot of potential that I don't know about yet, simply because of my inexperience as a writer. Or maybe it's just my slight inferiority complex that makes me think my writing is a lot worse than it actually is.
Now back to the questions I have for you guys.
Let's start with the elephant in the room. How did you get better at writing? Are there any sites/courses or videos you can recommend?
When you want to write a new story, how do you go about it and how much planning do you do in advance?
In terms of word count per chapter, how long would it be if your goal was 1-3 chapters per week?
What about formatting, paragraphs, and especially when there's a conversation between characters?
How do I "fluff up" a scene in the right way without it getting out of hand?
What does a character need to have a good outline that I can use? How many traits are OK or too many?
What counts as good yet noticeable character development? How many chapters should this process go over or should it be the whole story?
I read somewhere that it's OK to introduce a new character after ~50k words. In my story, I'm just over 25k words in and the flow of what I've written so far is kind of forcing me to introduce the next planned character in chapter 21 or the one after that. How do I deal with this situation? Should I wait until I'm 100k words in for the third character and use the space I have up to that point to develop both characters at the same time, or should I flesh out the first character first and then the second?
Before I forget, any tips or constructive criticism would be greatly appreciated (native and non-native english speakers alike are warmly welcome).
I'm from Germany, so English is my second language, and while I'm confident in it, that doesn't mean it's perfect.
I'm 26 years old, have a full-time job and have only recently (June this year) started writing as a hobby. Since I have no previous experience as a writer, I don't have any guidelines, tips, etc., so I'm freestyling the whole thing so far.
My workflow at the moment is as follows (I started with three chapters a week, but currently it's only one a week):
I write a chapter in Word (~1.2k words), proofread it using deepl write, and then upload it here on scribblehub.
Yesterday I published my 20th chapter, and while my story currently has three ratings (3x 5 stars), which shows me that I'm not completely shitty at writing, I'm sure there's a lot of potential that I don't know about yet, simply because of my inexperience as a writer. Or maybe it's just my slight inferiority complex that makes me think my writing is a lot worse than it actually is.
Now back to the questions I have for you guys.
Let's start with the elephant in the room. How did you get better at writing? Are there any sites/courses or videos you can recommend?
When you want to write a new story, how do you go about it and how much planning do you do in advance?
In terms of word count per chapter, how long would it be if your goal was 1-3 chapters per week?
What about formatting, paragraphs, and especially when there's a conversation between characters?
How do I "fluff up" a scene in the right way without it getting out of hand?
What does a character need to have a good outline that I can use? How many traits are OK or too many?
What counts as good yet noticeable character development? How many chapters should this process go over or should it be the whole story?
I read somewhere that it's OK to introduce a new character after ~50k words. In my story, I'm just over 25k words in and the flow of what I've written so far is kind of forcing me to introduce the next planned character in chapter 21 or the one after that. How do I deal with this situation? Should I wait until I'm 100k words in for the third character and use the space I have up to that point to develop both characters at the same time, or should I flesh out the first character first and then the second?
Before I forget, any tips or constructive criticism would be greatly appreciated (native and non-native english speakers alike are warmly welcome).