What is the best writing advice you’ve ever come across and take it to heart?

[BlackKnightX]

For me it’s this; “Don’t bore the reader. Writing must not be boring. It must not bore the reader, the writer. It must not bore anybody.”—Charles Bukowski

Oh, and also; “Forget about the sentences, just tell the damn story!”—James Patterson

What about you? Do you have a writing advice that you always take it to heart? Please share it with me~

 

[K5Rakitan]

Also, you can't be everyone's cup of tea, so be someone's shot of whiskey.
In other words: write what you love, and someone else will also love it!

 

[BlackKnightX]

View attachment 9718
Also, you can't be everyone's cup of tea, so be someone's shot of whiskey.
In other words: write what you love, and someone else will also love it!

Wow, this one is good. Just write what you love. Let’s all be drunk in this madness and greet the glory when we‘re sober! Cheers!

 

[Biggest-Kusa-Out-There]

"Write about futas. Always futas. There is no being more perfect than a futa. Futas are love. Futas are life." - Me.

 

[Tropic_Panda]

Write to express your heart, not to impress someone else heart.

(Just found it from google.)

 

[BlackKnightX]

"Write about futas. Always futas. There is no being more perfect than a futa. Futas are love. Futas are life." - Me.

Bravo~

Write to express your heart, not to impress someone else heart.

(Just found it from google.)

Nice~

 

[Anon_Y_Mousse]

"Always write with an ending in mind." -Some dude on facebook.
Whenever I think of something to write, I don't think of how it begins, I think of how it ends. If it has an interesting premise and and ending I can be satisfied with, then I can start writing. it's best to plan out everything but the bare minimum should be knowing how a story/arc is supposed to end, imo its the best way to avoid poor execution and writer's block due to not knowing where things are gonna go.

Edit: I must add more to this post. i realized that people are gonna go here and think that these are some of the best advice for everyone on the internet and they should follow them. This is not what will work best for you, it is what worked best for me. A lot of successful authors like George R. Martin didn't write with an ending in mind and still did great. If you know your characters and the setting well enough, the ending will write itself.

 

[Jemini]

A good writer does not just sit down and write a great piece of written material. A good writer writes a bad piece of writing, and then they proof read and edit it. Then, they look it over and edit it again. Then, they get another set of eyes on it to point out problems and then edit it again. And then, they find more problems and edit it again.

This continues until they have finally produced a good piece of writing.

(I have seriously taken this to heart. I have rebooted my entire series once already, and I am still making less drastic changes to the previous chapters on a fairly regular basis. In fact, I just had an editor look over my stuff and will be replacing the earlier chapters in my series with these revised chapters fairly soon.)

 

[A.P.R.L.]

Write what you like. Accepting the advice from readers is important and will help you with improving the quality of your story, but always follow your own path. Otherwise you'll end up hating your work, and there's nothing sadder than that.

No one told me that, but I got it from one story I really liked that the author suddenly abandoned. It turns out, the story started deviating a lot from what the author wanted to write in the first place. This is because they kept making changes based on what the readers wanted to read. "Write this", "change that", "I don't like this character so kill them", "if X doesn't happen I'll drop your story". Things like that. In the end, the author ended hating their own story, that they started writing with excitement, and abandoned it. That hit me hard. And I never forgot that. For that reason, even though I get a lot of similar comments with my own story, I keep writing what I want to write, not making changes to the plot just to satisfy some.

Because in the end we're all writing for ourselves as well, no?

 

[BlackKnightX]

Write what you like. Accepting the advice from readers is important and will help you with improving the quality of your story, but always follow your own path. Otherwise you'll end up hating your work, and there's nothing sadder than that.

No one told me that, but I got it from one story I really liked that the author suddenly abandoned. It turns out, the story started deviating a lot from what the author wanted to write in the first place. This is because they kept making changes based on what the readers wanted to read. "Write this", "change that", "I don't like this character so kill them", "if X doesn't happen I'll drop your story". Things like that. In the end, the author ended hating their own story, that they started writing with excitement, and abandoned it. That hit me hard. And I never forgot that. For that reason, even though I get a lot of similar comments with my own story, I keep writing what I want to write, not making changes to the plot just to satisfy some.

Because in the end we're all writing for ourselves as well, no?

What a sad story.

My story also got these kind of comments as well. Though, I’m kind of evil, so I always play my readers like a puppets~ Give them surprises, twists and turns, and bring them on a roller coaster!

 

[SailusGebel]

There are no rules in writing.

 

[TheTrinary]

There are no rules in writing.

Isn't that a rule about writing?

 

[PrincessFelicie]

Also, you can't be everyone's cup of tea, so be someone's shot of whiskey.
In other words: write what you love, and someone else will also love it!

The way I heard that one was "It is better to be one person's most favorite than five people's fifth-most favorite", but the drinks allegory works too :p

 

[SakeVision]

I sometimes forget about sentences, but it doesn't make me immune to bitches pming me with lines like "ooo how could you not fix this grammar mistake don't you care about your work you must not" just fuck off bitch, I'm producing a chapter a day, ain't have time for pointless revisions

 

[HyperiousTheSun]

Have you ever heard the miniskirt theory? Not the one in stocks. The one about writing. You haven't. Allow me to tell you.

The miniskirt theory is about how you should write. Like a miniskirt you keep your writing short enough to make things interesting but long enough to cover the essentials.

 

[Moonpearl]

You must first learn the rules - then you can learn how to break them.
Also, take all writing advice with a heavy dose of salt. Many authors don't know what they're doing either and will just say whatever to assure themselves that they do and that they're very smart.

So, considering how many newcomer authors write weak story openings using wake-up routines, the advice "don't open a story with a wake-up/morning routine scene - start it in the action" is fair as a soft "rule".
It encourages less confident writers to try other things and learn how to craft a more relevant and gripping opening.

But anyone who insists you can NEVER write wake-up openings and they're all drivel is a complete idiot, and very possibly an awful writer themselves.

Another good bit of advice I received is that writing is mostly editing, and that anything can be edited - therefore, there's no need to be afraid of a bad first draft.
The published books we're used to have undergone extensive editing and rewriting, often by multiple people. Their first drafts didn't look like that either.
So comparing your drafts to them and beating yourself up about it is as pointless as comparing your fresh-out-of-bed self to a celebrity on the red carpet.

 

[LostLibrarian]

"Writing is not an art, it's a craft."

A lot of early writers wait for their inspiration, for the moment everything clicks into place and flows. But 95% of writing ist just hard work. Learning the rules, learning story structure and tropes, writing as blue collar job without any artsy creativity.
And in turn, this is something you can train and work on...

 

[TotallyHuman]

You better write it someday instead of talking about it
-my friend

 

[BenJepheneT]

There's not one lesson out there that have truly shaped my writing experience but I can tell you this: people here give more advice than they actually apply to their stories. Every second you spend telling people how to write here is a second wasted not writing yourself. No one here knows how to write. They only know how to reassure themselves that they can, indeed, write.

So my advice to you is this: write. You fucks spend way too much time talking about writing and not actually doing it.

In other news, I am also a hypocrite.

 

[gaylolis]

Take your time and write at your own pace.

That's the advice that works best for me, I guess.