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I'd like to become a professional writer in the next decade.

7 (29.2%)

Less than videogames.

6 (25%)

I am a professional writer.

3 (12.5%)

More than my health.

2 (8.3%)

I'm not sure.

5 (20.8%)

More than videogames.

0 (0%)

Not at all.

1 (4.2%)

Total Members Voted: 24

Voting closed: April 23, 2012, 11:42:36 pm

[Supermikhail]

Welp, on the topic of writing prompts. I thought I'd be up like a lark, then suddenly I feel like I couldn't describe something even if it was the most colorful thing right in front of me. Anybody got any motivational advice to spare? (Like "we won't laugh even if it sucks balls")

[Fishbreath]

We won't laugh. We'll certainly *tell* you if it sucks balls, but we'll also try to tell you why.

[Supermikhail]

But what if you are subjective, used to a different style, aren't in the right mood? And what if you say it's good?

[Fishbreath]

That's why there are more people here than just me, and why you are able to identify criticism you can use to make yourself better.

The second part my presumption, anyway; one of the most important qualities of an artist of any sort is the ability to tease useful criticism out of the seething morass of everyone who doesn't like your work.

[lordnincompoop]

Best advice I can give?

Just write, for Christ's sake.

[Supermikhail]

I put 2 hours into this, turns out. You probably shouldn't critique this. Why can't I write something reasonable?
From the escheresque depths of intertwined wiry squares, golden circles, sharp angles, clockworks and spires, an echelon of shining eyes rushed at him. The tap-tapping of their feet sent him into tired trance, as their sharp tongues pinned him to the metal frame of his bed.

He was in Mandelbox. He was Mandelbox. His arms circled around him in an endless clockwork spiral, intersected by his square-cross-section-prism legs. His bronze ribs sprayed out into the void away from his barbwire spine twisted into triangular fly-trap knots. His twin-black-hole eyes lusted for the rich womb of the black cosmos around him, but his reinforced steel heart oscillated in a screeching cacophony of dying metal.

He sloped his concrete guts into the road for an army of robot drummers marching to the walls of elder gods and dilapidated pyramids. But as the trenches submerged into infrasound, he put a drill to his temple and took over the altar of his mind in a single calculated strike.
Even though on some level I like it.

[JoshuaFH]

I cannot tell what is going on there, but it sounds significant and cool.

Good job.

[Fishbreath]

escheresque

Very. Nor am I convinced this is necessarily a good thing. It's mostly confusing.

square-cross-section-prism legs

This detail struck me as very oddly stated. I don't really have any ideas for a way to change it, beyond just leaving it out.

I'm not sure how to express my overall impression, beyond maybe to say that it seems as if you're trying too hard to work in the ten-dollar words. There's a time and place for that, but I'm not sure that description all by itself is it.

In favor of this snippet, though, it does have a soul to it that the last thing you linked (with the guy and the government agents and such) did not. Even if I can't really puzzle out exactly what's going on, I can get a sense for the world.

[Supermikhail]

In favor of this snippet, though, it does have a soul to it that the last thing you linked (with the guy and the government agents and such) did not. Even if I can't really puzzle out exactly what's going on, I can get a sense for the world.

Oh. You *. Why couldn't you just say so while I was writing it? I'm majorly cross with you, mister. I'm going to blame my lack of confidence on you, alright? I'm here, all sweating over my English non-nativeness, while the problem is with the lack of emotionally tinted and sexually themed descriptions.

Although, on the other hand I do seem to have a problem with descriptions. Usually, there's either too much of them, or hardly any. I'm not so sure that writing descriptions only is a good solution.

I cannot tell what is going on there, but it sounds significant and cool.

Good job.

Feel free to join in! While the sounds might be significant, people here are quite casual. How's your 20 minutes doing today?

[JoshuaFH]

I cannot tell what is going on there, but it sounds significant and cool.

Good job.

Feel free to join in! While the sounds might be significant, people here are quite casual. How's your 20 minutes doing today?

I think I'm doing fairly well. I have a little over 2 pages already, and there's still a bit left to go for my short story. It might round out at maybe 4 - 4 1/2 pages when it's done. I might post what I have so far, but I don't want to jump the gun.

[Supermikhail]

It's your call, but I say post it when it's done. So you don't mix writing and editing based on our comments.

[Supermikhail]

Hey, how is everybody doing?

I recently signed up for NaNoWriMo, and the experience has been pretty great. I've learned about writing blindfolded. I've written a passage this way, and then got stuck.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

   Into the darkness a small drop of light descended. It lit up, first, rough leather boots, then linen trousers bandaged at the ankles, then a a leather jacket, crumpled and torn. Then muscular and scarred arms carrying a rusty saber and a torch - the source of the light. Finally, the face appeared - male, gaunt, with somewhat sickly large alert eyes and a stubble several days old.  The man descended a narrow stone stairs sticking to a solid rock wall, with a stooped posture of a fugitive expecting to be attacked at any moment. Carefully moving his feet from step to step he waved the torch from side to side trying to light up the interior of the room he was in. It wasn’t much use, for the room was quite large.  From the rectangular corner of the entrance where the man was it gradually sloped away into irregular shapes of stalactites and stalagmites, with deep dark tunnels between them defying the torch’s flame entirely.

   In the middle of his descent the man halted, peering and listening to any movement in the room. All was quiet. The man reached the uneven floor of the room and looked around once more. Avoiding his eyes until now, a small wooden chest stuck to the side of the stairs. The man, keeping his back to the wall, approached the chest. It was locked, but the wood was rotten, lined with cracks from age. The man crouched and stroked the lid of the chest. The palm of his hand came out covered with brown dust. He slapped his hands together to clean off the dust, while looking thoughtfully into one of the tunnel openings. After a moment, he got up and put the tip of his saber into the slit between the lock and the wood of the chest, and pushed. With a crack magnified by the walls of the room, the slit widened into a gap. The man removed the saber, and put it under the lock on the other side. After another effort, the lock hung on a couple of nails and its tongue. Glancing into the darkness over his shoulder, the man sheathed his weapon and grabbed the lock. Then, putting his back and legs into it,  he pulled the lock off together with the lid of the chest, to the accompaniment of a screech of the nails and crunching of the wood. The man bent down to examine the treasure. It wasn’t much - only a parchment scroll wrapped around a bronze rod. The man picked up the scroll and unwrapped it with interest. The parchment was covered with a string of runes, and the man seemed familiar with them, as he started to read the text, moving his lips. He finished and wrinkled his brow in confusion, as if the scroll presented him with a riddle. He didn’t have time to puzzle it out - one of the tunnels out of the room echoed with angry oinks and tapping of hooves indicating that the man’s struggle hadn’t gone unnoticed.

   Clutching the scroll and the torch in one hand, the man picked up his saber with the other, and faced the entrance of the tunnel. The tapping grew into click-clacking, bright red eyes flashed briefly, and moments later a six feet tall extremely hairy man with a pig’s head ran into the light of the torch. The monster staggered, phased by the flame.

Also I'm not sure it's a good writing style in general. Anybody up for a little feedback? I promise to respond constructively.

[Fishbreath]

Actually, I liked it a lot. Two categories of critique, though:

First, usage.
1. The word you're looking for is 'fazed'.
2. Some stairs vs. a stairway/staircase.
3. The stooped posture of a fugutive.
4. Having avoided his eyes until now (or perhaps having escaped his notice until now).

Some others, probably, but I'm low on time this morning.

Second, generally:
Your description occasionally is a bit clumsy: around "the rectangular corner of the entrance" jumped out at me as a little bit strange.

[Supermikhail]

Phew. Then there might be sense to it. I can't judge my own writing (and a lot of other things) at all - it just turns into a pile of words without any imaginative significance. That is, except dialog because I at least can try to read it aloud in character. Although even there I judge poorly as my 300 word fiasco has shown.

1. The word you're looking for is 'fazed'.

Is it... Eh, I don't know... Maybe it would have been better with just "blinded".

Clumsiness goes out in editing. I wish only to push over the visual limits right now. You might have noticed the excessive use of "man". That's what visuals do. Doesn't help that the character's name has no significance for the story. I wonder if I should try graphic novel finally.

Did you really like it a lot?

[JoshuaFH]

For a moment, I was sure that that was a Nethack fiction.