Fiction A Writer's Guide- By Drew Wagar

[drew]

Folks,

By no means am I wanting to teach people to suck eggs, but having pushed a few books through the publishing process I thought other novel writers might be interested in some of the things I’ve come across during the experience. Some of these are not immediately obvious, so I’ve dropped them into this post. I hope some of them are useful for you. If you spend time getting familiar with them before writing, it may save you some reworking on the way through. I’ll add more as I think of them. Hope it helps. Good luck.

Cheers,

Drew.



General stuff

Backup, backup, backup! Have 3 backups as a minimum and not on the same computer! Do not trust usb sticks - they are the evil spawn of Satan and take great delight in dying when you need them to work. You will lose something if you don’t backup religiously and much swearing will ensue. You’ve been warned.

Use Microsoft Word for your document. Feel free to have a rant about open source and <insert your favourite word processor here> or <insert funky productivity tool> if you need to. Once you’ve had a good vent, starting use Word. I’ve been there – trust me on the final conclusion. All the conversion tools and websites out there want .doc or .docx files. Nothing else produces them like MS Word. No matter how 100% compatible they claim to be, nothing else is. You will save yourself a world of pain.

Likewise, Calibre is the best ebook conversion tool there is. In Word, save your document as an html webpage and Calibre will convert that very well indeed. It just… ahem… works.

Ebooks get to market via Amazon and Smashwords. The rest are just window dressing.

If you’re intending to publish your ebook via Smashwords do not use a table of contents inside your word processor. You will have to do it manually. It’s a faff I know. Infact, do not insert any ‘clever’ or ‘active’ content in your document. Ebooks use a variant of html. Most clever stuff doesn’t translate well at all.

Make sure your set your word processor to UK English dictionary before you start writing.

Do not trust or believe the grammar checker. It is the errant son of the spawn of Satan.

Never ever use find and ‘replace all’. You have been warned. This is like doing needlework with an axe.

Do not insert graphics into your text document.

Do not insert tables into your text document.

Do not muck about with different font sizes in your text document.

Do not muck about with different fonts in your text document.

Set your text between 10 to 14 point font size, and use something traditional like Times New Roman or Helvetica. Use at least 1 ½ or 2 line spacing. Indents are optional. Stick with this throughout. Anybody using Comic Sans will be pushed out of the airlock without trial.

Left justify only.

Don’t splash ‘Copyright Firstname Lastname’ all over your manuscript. Nothing screams ‘amateur’ more loudly than this. You automatically gain copyright by having written the thing.

DO NOT (and I cannot stress how important this is!) use tabs, or extra spaces, returns or page breaks to format text in your document. You will hate yourself come formatting for ebook time. Use styles on your word processor only! If you want a Word template, ask me and I’ll send you one that works. This is another good reason for using Word if you’re still unconvinced. Smashwords will not except ebook submissions containing tabs, spaces, returns and page breaks.

Don’t proofread your own work. It’s pointless.

Don’t use close friends and family to critique. It’s pointless and more dangerous than Riedquat late on a Saturday evening after closing time.

You need to spend as long on editing and proofreading as you do on writing. Plan accordingly. If you hate your story and never want to read it again by the end of the process then you’ve probably just about done enough.



Good writing

Avoid clichés. Rang like a bell. Went off like a rocket. Think of something new under the sun.

Never use the word ‘suddenly’ unless it’s in dialogue.

Don’t begin, just happen.
Justin began to cough. Is weak
Justin coughed. Is strong.

Obliterate weak adjectives wherever you find them. They’re almost always redundant and naff. Use the opportunity to describe better.
The ship was slightly damaged.
Becomes
The ship was damaged, suffering minor hull leaks. It was nothing that the spacedock engineers wouldn’t be able to fix.

Likewise, go easy with dialogue, when you’re modifying the verb.
‘So this is it, we’re going to die,’ she said, grimly.
Obviously she’s going to be grim! It should be either:
‘So this is it, we’re going to die,’ she said.
Or Just
‘So this is it, we’re going to die.’

Other examples are ‘clearly’, ‘eventually’, ‘actually’ and ‘enthusiastically’. Be suspicious of words ending in ‘ly’. Do you really need them?

Don’t worry about replacing ‘said’ with lots of different words. Either don’t use it at all or just use it. Don’t expectorate, rejoin, exclaim, interject, snarl, whisper, shout, blare, chortle, hiss etc. It just looks contrived. Concentrate on the dialogue itself; that will give the colour to the character’s outburst.

Do not use the exclamation mark ! unless you really, really mean it. Rule of thumb is one for every ten thousand words. Do not use them all the time! It gets really irritating for the reader! Really quickly! Because you keep jolting them! It’s horrible isn’t it! SAME APPLIES TO CAPITALS! STOP SHOUTING AT ME!

Don’t info dump. Remember your characters live on a spaceship, you absolutely mustn’t explain how things work. Would you explain how your car engine works if you were narrating a trip to the shops?

Find subtle ways to tease information into your story. Don’t do this.
Jake looked out of the viewport. There was a long queue of ships. The queue was due to all the new rules and regulations enforced by Galcop to ensure all commanders had the necessary permits to travel to and dock at the Lave Orbital.
Rather do this
Jake cursed as he looked out of the viewpoint. Damn Galcop and their regulations. It looked like they were in for a long wait before docking at the Lave Orbital.

“Show, don’t tell”. This is classic piece of advice. What does it mean?
Nicola was really nervous and worried as she stepped into the spaceport. > This is telling.
Nicola’s hands were sweaty; she clumsily dropped her ident pass as she stepped into the spaceport. > This is showing.
BIG difference. Get this one right if you don’t get anything else right! Show, don’t tell.

Read dialogue out loud in front of a mirror. If it’s rubbish you’ll know instantly. In real life people never make long speeches, never call each other by name and they half-complete and interrupt all the time. Check your dialogue a lot. Make it real.

Describe the effect, not the mechanics
The ship took a missile to the lower flank. The shields were drained. The pilot banked to the left.
Is dull, instead do this
The missile slammed home, vaporising the feeble shields and sending the ship into a brain-jarring spin. The pilot wrestled with the controls in a desperate attempt to regain his course.



Grammar and all that

Know your plurals, ownership and contractions. Don’t confuse its with it’s; there, their and they’re, or where, were and we’re. Don’t use ‘of’ instead of ‘have’. ‘Can’ when you mean ‘may’ etc. If you haven’t already, read Lynne Truss’ book “Eats, shoots and leaves.” It’s fab. Grammar matters, get over it.

Dialogue, for UK published books, should use a single quote ‘ to open the dialogue and a single quote ‘ to close it. Do not use the “ doublequotes. Why? Don’t know. It’s one of those publisher things.

Don’t, over use, commas. Otherwise, you’ll just, sound rather like, Captain Kirk.

You should never need to use brackets (in a fictional book).

If you decide to use italics to indicate something, like a sense of urgency or thought process, use them consistently throughout.

Quotes do not affect sentence punctuation. A lot of people do things like this:
‘Fire the military laser.’ The Captain said.
The first full-stop is incorrect – ‘The Captain said’ is clearly not a proper sentence. It should be:
‘Fire the military laser,’ the Captain said.
Note the quotes are outside the punctuation. Don’t do this:
‘Fire the military laser’, the Captain said.

Don’t use the ‘oxford’ comma.
‘One thing, another, and another.’ > Is wrong.
‘One thing, another and another.’ > Is correct.

Use semi-colons appropriately. They join two related sentences together and make things more powerful.
The laser blasted into the hull, warning lights flickered on the controls. (Connected but weak)
Or
The laser blasted into the hull. Warning lights flickered on the controls. (Strong, but disconnected)
Becomes
The laser blasted into the hull; warning lights flickered on the controls. (Strong and connected)

Colons precede lists.
There were three ships: a Cobra, a Fer-de-lance and a Viper.

Use the Ellipsis sparingly, otherwise it appears… you just can’t… make up your mind… as to whether… your sentence… is ever going to end…

 

[Allen Stroud]

Some fantastic suggestions there Drew. I've suggested a few things to people who've asked me which come from my years of teaching writing and critiquing submissions for literary agents.

Don't feel anything here below is a cardinal rule,the idea is to use, break, follow and abuse all advice, but know you're doing it.

Writing a novel is about telling a story. That means the priority is to hook the reader in.You do that by making them interested in something (provoking a question) and then delivering an answer that draws them in further. What writing a novel isn't about is describing the scenes in your head, its about engaging the imagination of the reader to picture the scene for themselves and that picture won't be the same as yours. Accept it and embrace it. Modern writers economise to get the story moving. Think about how you read. If an author gives you large chunks of description, quite often you(I) skip them. If that's the case, why write them? Being a good descriptive writer (which you are) helps, but you have to be sparing. Description is like chocolate cake.

Writing fantasy or science fiction does not mean you have to explain loads of things. What you have to do is obtain the trust of your reader that you will explain what they need and want to know. The reason people remain fascinated with Asimov, Tolkien, Rowling, etc... is because the writer DIDN'T explain everything. You need that mystery in the short term (see point 1) and in the long term to sell sequels.

If you've never heard of the website Autocrit (http://www.autocrit.com), go take a look. It'll help no end. I put everything I write through it. Doesn't mean I agree with everything it tells me though!

Archetypes can be your enemies or your friends. If you write a Vampire story, or have Elves in your world, readers will picture them from the fiction they have already read (Tolkien discusses this in a book called Tree and Leaf). The advantage can be that you can get a lot of ideas over quickly by using them, the disadvantage is that they can appear unbelieveable. The trick to using them is to twist them slightly in the writing to make the archetype yours. A Tavern wench with broken teeth, greasy hair and bad breath is much more interesting, than without...

Making characters identifiable. Joss Whedon is an absolute master of dialogue and poking fun at the accepted 'way the story will go'. In the first episode of Firefly he puts characters in situations we can relate to to help us identify with them. Kaylee turning the power off and being stuck in the dark is a great example of this.

Ending chapters. I picture my reader reading my story at night. When I get to the end of a chapter it is my mission to make the ending so moreish they have to read another chapter and stay up another half hour. Devices like that keep you thinking about delivering what readers want to read.

Youwriteon is very good for getting criticism on drafts (http://www.youwriteon.com).

Show not tell as much as you can. Said a lot, not often explained. 'Tom was frightened' - 'Tom's looked at his hands, they wouldn't stop shaking.' The former tells, the latter shows. Using the latter means that the reader decides what Tom is actually feeling and so invests in the character a touch more.

Finally, go over your writing and look for every occasion where you have used the following words: 'had' 'that' and 'was'. Delete the word in each sentence and read it again. Does it still make sense? If so, bin these words wherever you can. They slow down the pace and get in the way of us identifying with characters.

EDIT; Regarding backups. I use Sugarsync and Dropbox. That means I can write on my laptop,desktop, phone, tablet, mediacentre, or anywhere I can log into my account online.It also means there are at least five copies of my work around for me to check.

Re: Ebooks. I put three up this Christmas (and revised four more). Couldn't agree more about Callibre it's fantastic. Sigil is also really good for sorting the table of contents out.

 

[Ryatta]

Thanks for this Drew, It's very helpful to read through and I'll suggest it on the Elite Chronicles forums later on as it's certainly worth any potential writers giving it a read (took me back to my old days of English Lit seminars).

Also thanks Allen for expanding further, even though I've been writing frequently over the last year I've fallen foul of a number of those at some point or another. I spend a lot of time working of getting the flow or words correct for what I'm describing.

 

[Darren Grey]

Lovely set of advice. Thanks, Drew and Allen I'm quite an experienced writer but have little formal teaching. The most shocking thing for me is using single quotes instead of double for dialogue - how strange! The links are very handy too.

Backup, backup, backup!

Use Microsoft Word for your document.

I prefer Google Docs It doesn't screw up regular characters like quotes and dashes and muck with my formatting overmuch, it auto backs up, can be accessed anywhere at any time and can easily be shared. And if I want a .doc or .docx copying into Word is quite painless.

For converting into an e-reader I usually copy text into Notepad++ (to ensure plain text) before copying into Sigil, breaking into chapters, highlighting headings with h2 tags and using its auto-generation of Table of Contents. Then into Calibre for meta-data, front cover image and multiple format conversion. I don't trust Word's HTML conversion very well :/ And like I said, weird auto-corrects and symbol conversions...

However I've never done anything official - this is just for easy files for myself and my few fans. Submitting to Amazon or Smashwords likely needs a touch more polish.

Quick question: What's the best way to do new paragraphs in eBooks? I tend to use just blank lines, as I find that easier to read in electronic books, and it's less faff than indents, but is that acceptable?

Don’t use close friends and family to critique. It’s pointless and more dangerous than Riedquat late on a Saturday evening after closing time.

DO use other Elite writers! We will be very honest And nitpicky, oh yes...

Avoid clichés.

And be sure to use the é character when it should be used. "Fiance" just looks wrong.

Don’t info dump. Remember your characters live on a spaceship, you absolutely mustn’t explain how things work. Would you explain how your car engine works if you were narrating a trip to the shops?

"Jason climbed into his silver Audi TT, which he named Roadslayer, and turned on the ignition for the petrol-powered internal combustion engine. It revved loudly as the chemical energy stored from millions of years of fossilied life ignited with oxygen in the combustion chamber, forcing steel pistons to oscillate and turbine blades to whir at thousands of revs per second. 'This time,' his deep voice murmured above the whistling noise of the platinum-infused catalytic exhaust system, 'I won't forget the milk.'"

Read dialogue out loud in front of a mirror. If it’s rubbish you’ll know instantly.

Or get someone else to read it back to you. Or use a speech synthesis program.

Will we all be using proper English English? That American stuff is much less colourful

 

[drew]

"Jason climbed into his silver Audi TT, which he named Roadslayer, and turned on the ignition for the petrol-powered internal combustion engine. It revved loudly as the chemical energy stored from millions of years of fossilied life ignited with oxygen in the combustion chamber, forcing steel pistons to oscillate and turbine blades to whir at thousands of revs per second. 'This time,' his deep voice murmured above the whistling noise of the platinum-infused catalytic exhaust system, 'I won't forget the milk.'"

That's so brilliantly wrong it's back to brilliant!

Cheers,

Drew.

 

[Andreas M]

Hi Drew,

that's an impressive mini how-to and it I am sure it will prove very helpful to many writers out there. However I feel the need to add some comments/additions:

Set your text between 10 to 14 point font size, and use something traditional like Times New Roman or Helvetica. Use at least 1 ½ or 2 line spacing. Indents are optional. Stick with this throughout. Anybody using Comic Sans will be pushed out of the airlock without trial.

Please don't use any font of the Helvetica family (e.g. Arial) for anything longer then one line of text. Go to your book shelf now and pick up randomly 10 books. How many of these use a sans serif typeface for the main text?
The use of sans serif comes mostly from designers (commercials often use it) and only became popular for longer text with computers and the lack of resolution on earlier displays, which rendered the serifs useless.

Dialogue, for UK published books, should use a single quote ‘ to open the dialogue and a single quote ‘ to close it. Do not use the “ doublequotes. Why? Don’t know. It’s one of those publisher things.

Quotes do not affect sentence punctuation. A lot of people do things like this:
‘Fire the military laser.’ The Captain said.
The first full-stop is incorrect – ‘The Captain said’ is clearly not a proper sentence. It should be:
‘Fire the military laser,’ the Captain said.
Note the quotes are outside the punctuation. Don’t do this:
‘Fire the military laser’, the Captain said.

Are you sure on that? I think it's more a style issue (at least in written English, in German the rules are quite restrictive). I see often referred to it as British style (roughly: most of the punctuation outside the quotes) and American style (most of it inside).

As to the use of quotation marks: You should know the difference between opening and closing quotes if you use typographical quotes, which you probably should if you want to have a printed version.
Oh and if you use dum quotes, there is a difference between a single quote and an accent over space or other characters like a prime or an apostrophe.

Sorry for being picky but I had to say this. I just saw so much non or semi professional books ruined by bad typesetting and/or inconsistent use of characters. Look's good on the screen, looks awful when it's printed.

 

[drew]

Please don't use any font of the Helvetica family (e.g. Arial) for anything longer then one line of text. Go to your book shelf now and pick up randomly 10 books. How many of these use a sans serif typeface for the main text?
The use of sans serif comes mostly from designers (commercials often use it) and only became popular for longer text with computers and the lack of resolution on earlier displays, which rendered the serifs useless.

Agreed. I was thinking about ebooks. For paperbacks, serif font like Times Roman is essential.

Are you sure on that? I think it's more a style issue (at least in written English, in German the rules are quite restrictive). I see often referred to it as British style (roughly: most of the punctuation outside the quotes) and American style (most of it inside).

Yes I am sure. Punctuation always inside dialogue quotes, including ? And ! Editors make a point of this. Not sure where the idea of punctuation outside of quotes comes from, but it's not British. The 'british' thing is the single quotes, doublequotes for the US.

As to the use of quotation marks: You should know the difference between opening and closing quotes if you use typographical quotes, which you probably should if you want to have a printed version.
Oh and if you use dum quotes, there is a difference between a single quote and an accent over space or other characters like a prime or an apostrophe.

Sorry for being picky but I had to say this. I just saw so much non or semi professional books ruined by bad typesetting and/or inconsistent use of characters. Look's good on the screen, looks awful when it's printed.

Agreed. Typesetting of opening and closing quotes makes a big difference. Another reason for not swapping your word processor halfway through!

Cheers,

Drew.

 

[Susimetsa]

Excellent stuff, everyone!

Yes I am sure. Punctuation always inside dialogue quotes, including ? And ! Editors make a point of this. Not sure where the idea of punctuation outside of quotes comes from, but it's not British. The 'british' thing is the single quotes, doublequotes for the US.

Many other languages have the punctuation outside the quotes. That's the main reason I refuse to write prose in my native language these days - the rules are just too different.

That single and double quotes thing is new to me... I guess I'll have to break the "don't replace all" rule now...

 

[Darren Grey]

It"s still unwise to use replace all in anyone"s text

 

[Susimetsa]

Well, I do know what I'm doing - after a couple of decades of experience of using the function on long bodies of text. You'll just have to be extra careful when you make the search terms and think things through, before you click OK.

And always have backup copies available!

 

[Susimetsa]

Did a bit of searching, but I could not find definite proof of Brits only using single quotes. Seems to be dependent on the publisher/writer...

 

[Sir.Tj]

Hi Drew,

Excellent post, I've stickied it so people can read through and pick up some tips.

 

[Darren Grey]

Did a bit of searching, but I could not find definite proof of Brits only using single quotes. Seems to be dependent on the publisher/writer...

Well, I'm minded to suggest that in the Anthology we should use double-quotes. It's what we're all used to, it's what the audience themselves are used to, and we've no specific plans to approach a publisher with it.

 

[drew]

You'll find the guidelines in the "Writers' and Artists' Yearbook" (the title alone being an exercise in using apostrophes correctly ). They are quite specific on the use of single or double quotes dependent on market (uk/us). Also, have a look in any UK published book; you'll find it uses single quotes.

If you're not publishing it won't matter so much, but anthology writers should agree on the rules before writing if possible, if only to save the hassle of formatting it all together.

Cheers,

Drew.

 

[Allen Stroud]

I can confirm Drew's points on the use of speech marks and punctuation in speech.

I use double quote marks for speech, but that's because I sell via Amazon to the UK and the US. As long as you are consistent it isn't horrendously important, unless you are submitting to an agent or publisher.

 

[Ashley Barley]

Just modified the title, to make it clearer what the subject is. There's some great advice here so it'd be a shame for people to miss it, good job.

 

[drew]

Ashley,

Many thanks for that... Any chance you could spell my surname right? wagAr. (If I had a £ etc...)

Cheers,

Drew.

 

[Ashley Barley]

Ashley,

Many thanks for that... Any chance you could spell my surname right? wagAr. (If I had a £ etc...)

Cheers,

Drew.

woops! my bad.

 

[drew]

Cheers!

 

[Flowswithdrek]

Drew,

Thanks for starting this topic, and to everyone else that has chipped in. A few of the ideas suggested are new to me and a few I had read before but forgotten about, so I'm glad I found this thread before putting pen to paper. I have no doubt that I will turn to the advice in this thread as I write.

As one of the Anthology writers it does make sense to agree on style guidelines.

This kind of story telling is going to be a new experience for me. I have a few minor publishing credits in the pen and paper RPG industry. That is, I have been writing adventure scenarios for other people’s games. I know there has been mention of how a comma should be used in a list e.g. the colours were blue, black and green vs. the colours were blue, black, and green. The one piece of advice I do have to offer from experience is that if you find yourself writing for someone else then do check how they prefer commas to be used in lists. What you consider correct and what they consider correct, or simply what they prefer in their product, are often two different things and it’s better to get it right from the start.