Writing Tips

General Writing Techniques

As I said in the introduction, it's always the little things we don't find tutorials on how to do, because we don't know we are looking for them. These are tools you can use to what effect you want, when you are writing:

1: Consider your sentence length.
We probably all know the teacher scolding us for either making all too short or all too long sentences, but sentence length is actually something you can use to your advantage when expressing a character's voice, or setting a mood.

- Character: Characters that overthink or are prone to scheming will likely think in long sentences. On the other hand, short and concise or happy go lucky characters would likely cut most of these excessive words short and use something simpler. Changing the way you write to the character speaking or thinking, can help you get these personality traits across in a different manner than saying it out loud or setting up scenes to show it.

- Mood: People read faster when there is a bunch of short sentences. They don't have to keep as much in mind, so it takes less time. Compare this to a movie scene. Action scenes are fast paced with rapid movement and camera change. Drama is slow and with pauses in speech to gaze at each other. You can set the mood in a similar way using sentence length. Keep the sentences short for action, and longer for intrigue and drama, to let people think through what you've written.

2: Body-language Is Detailing
Without body language you often get a rough or simple feel. If you think of it as a picture, then abstract or simplistic images would fall into this category. They can still be brilliant, of course, but if you want something more detailed, then body language is a big factor in making it so.

We can express much with words, but actions can at times give far more detail than words, especially about characters. This is often simple things, such as giving expressions or shifting poses during conversations, but they're things that make the image more full. For examples of detailing with body language think of this:

"He fell to the ground in pain"
Vs
"He fell to the ground with a gasp, clasping his chest tightly as he twitched and squirmed."

Is the same scene, but it paints the situation more clearly. Just like an image, details can add depth.

"Arrrrgh hurts- my chest" he said as he fell to the ground in pain.

Is still passable, but at least to me, it doesn't get the pain across the same way, and can seem shallow if the other sentences in the paragraph don't support it.

3: Choose Details In Scenes With Purpose
This is most important with key chapters such as the very first one, but it's a good thing to keep in mind.

When you start a scene you should generally a purpose. That purpose can fall into multiple categories like:
- Showing something about a character
- Showing an interaction
- Hinting at/showing plot

The details in a scene such as location, environment, time, actors and interactions can all provide back up these goals.

For example, take a 'conversation' in an 'alley' 'in the middle of the night' or a 'dance' in an 'alley' 'in the middle of the night'. The main purpose of both scenes is to show an interaction, but said dance or conversation could have been done at any time of day, but since it's done in the middle of the night it adds the detail, that this might be a secret meeting.

These small extra details can say a lot between the lines, and in thus give a lot of information in a very short time, as you'd prefer for introducing characters.

You can also use this to add little details relating to past and future event, such as using a location that is used in the future or the past, to create a connection between the two events.

4: Exposition Is Heavy
And at times boring. A persons entire background story lumped together in one chapter without breaks, can cause people to skip it, as many details tend to be unimportant. The same with describing a character's daily routine.

'Show don't tell' as it's called is a method of how to make an internal monologue appear more like a movie scene, with the character being in the moment. I'm not going to write about it here, instead google it or check out Nathaniel Wilhem's tutorial on it. It's one of the things new writers struggle with most, and it can give a lot of light on how to write non-exposition scenes in general or turn exposition into lively and colorful scenes that are more easy and fun to read.

If you need further exposition (which will likely happen) there are still things you can do to make it a little more light weight:

- Make it an interaction between characters. A talk can get characters' opinions on a matter involved, and it can give short breaks by briefly bringing up something else.
- Add a character's personal opinion into the exposition. It uses the exposition to additionally show some personal opinions and personality traits of a character.
- Describe it, or add things that can make people smile, laugh or wince. This could be something small like: "He was bullied when he was young." becoming "He was bullied when he was young, and this one time they accidentally got his leg broken, causing his leg to splinter open." Or "The thugs attack those less well off." Just adding something like "Their knuckles are always bright red and bruised," can add that little spice you need to make it more colorful than a non-fiction book.
- Cut it into bits. If there's no need to add everything at once, then it's often better to spread it out a bit.