1. Chekhov's Armory: When you show a bunch of stuff to set the reader up for later on but don't follow up 2. The Everything but the Kitchen Sink Syndrome: Trying to cram too many ideas into a book (This is okay for the first draft but should be fixed in revision) 3. Worldbuilding Vertigo: so much worldbuilding information it's overwhelming and confusing 4. Inspiration Indigestion: Being too similar to a specific book or too heavily influenced to the point of being a copycat 5. The Aesthetics over Ethics Trap: Creating situations for shock values without contributing to the actual story 6. Dialogue Ventriloquism: Every character sounding the same 7. Metaphor overdose: Too many metaphors/similes that you lose sight of the story 8. Lack of Character Motivation: No justifications/motivations for character actions 9. Temporally Shortsighted: So fixated on the present moment that it's hard to picture the character with a life before or after the book takes place 10. The "Gotcha" Spiral: Relies so much on plot twists, that the reader feels manipulated. The plot twists aren't properly earned/built up. 11. Checklist Character Development: Feels like created by an algorithm/AI making them feel fake. To avoid this, try finding contradicting/surprising traits for your characters. 12. "Subtext is Everything" Syndrome: Your story is too subtle that it's impenetrable to the reader. When they're so subtle, the reader can't tell what they're alluding to or the reader begins to feels confused.
A simile uses the words "like" or "as" to compare two things, while a metaphor directly compares two things without using "like" or "as." For instance, "a failed metaphor is a cat." A failed attempt at a decent simile would be the joke above! Still super funny though and totally something im gonna use
@@tantanthespaceman1923 Does word "similar" fit to a "metaphor"? It`s translation of non-english phrase and i`m not sure that the best one, Does it fit good "An unsuccessful metaphor is similar to a kitten with a tiny door?"
If you recognise yourself in any of these points, don't despair. Notice that with each point, he's giving examples of published work, some of them worldwide phenomenons. Nobody's work is perfect. Just learn and do your best.
Yeah, everything created by human and presented to human couldn't run from flaws. Even the "perfect" book that majority of people in internet find as pinnacle of literary still get criticism. I mean, look at Dune. I thought no one would dislike that book, but Reddit once again prove me wrong. I think artists or writers shouldn't avoid being flawed, because it's UNAVOIDABLE, but instead they need focusing on trying their *BEST.* I know it's hard in this anti-mindfullness internet era where people like to give unthoughtful "criticism" because hating is fun and they will cook even the minor mistake on everything as a big problem.
And some of them can be actually what you are going for.Writing a whole story solely with metaphors? Challenge accepted! (I did other challenges. Writing a story, but you are only allowed sentences which are exactly five words long. Not four. Not six. Writing a story, where each sentence starts with the last word of the first sentence.)
Your writing advice is always so helpful. As a person with autism, I get overwhelmed easily by "writing advice," but you always explain things in a very calm and easy to understand way. Thank you for taking the time to teaching writing.
I agree, but not on some of his examples. Especially his critique on Saw and A Clockwork Orange. It seems like he doesn’t really understand (the role of horror/ violence in) these movies.
Or have the idea stolen. What worse? They actually did it better than your ORIGINAL one. And released it earlier than you. Then you become the lesser copycat wannabe author. Like cooking scrambled egg, they heard of it, they added little more condiments on top of it, and it become way better than just scrambled egg.
I hate making promises, making a big announcement about stuff is basically like making a promise. "I'm writing this cool story with [this and that]" Translates to "I WILL finish and release that story with those elements included" I may or may not have made that mistake and it kinda hurts cause i hate disapointing people.
Pacing and clarity (subtext) are two things best learned from reader feedback. The two main questions I ask from readers are, "where was it boring" and "where was it confusing?"
@@mradan2093 Was exactly what I was gonna say. Bounce stuff off other people. You'll always know exactly what will happen and what it's leading to, so you can't experience the work how it's meant to
The problem I have with a lot stories that people refer to as "subtle" is that they are not so much subtle as just lacking explanation at all. Subtlety is when there are answers to find but they take effort to see, where things are not explicitly stated but are implicitly stated. Too often i just find that writers leave things "open to interpretation" just as an excuse for lazy writing. I am not saying that everything always needs to have an explanation but leaving things unexplained and being indecisive about what is actually going on in the story is not subtlety.
Harry Potter is great with unique dialogue. Almost every character has their own way of speaking. My favorite example comes from book 7 where Harry is retrieving the sword of Gryffindor from the icy lake, but the cursed locket strangles him. A mysterious figure saves him and pulls him and the sword from the icy depths. We don't yet know who it is, but we get one line of dialogue from them. "Are you MENTAL?" We immediately know it was Ron. Fabulous moment. Of course, the main reason it is a great moment is because Ron abandoned them a couple chapters ago, so him showing up to save the day was exactly what the reader was hoping for.
This dude is so professional in the way he handles what he says. A lot of writers/editors in the trad industry with UA-cam channels have a terrible snarky bitchiness about them when it comes to harsh advice. This dude tells you the problem and how to fix it. Like a doctor. No ego and no shitty attitude. You can tell he cares a lot about the craft.
Even the Terrible Writing Advice UA-camr also write their own books and still makes mistakes in writing their work. I mean this dude's work is probably not perfect but at least he's nice in giving advises.
I immediately noticed this. I feel a strange sense of condescension when watching other writers’ advice videos but this guy feels like he actually wants to help you.
My mom’s ex did screenwriting as a hobby and my mom tagged along to his club sometimes. My mom, despite not being a writer herself, has given me some useful advice over the years. One of the main things is to not let your character have more than one superpower. Or more broadly, don’t overload your audience with a laundry list of traits. I’ve heard it called the “limp or an eyepatch” method. Choose one or two traits and make those the most important.
Programmers and the like sometimes use overload. They redefine a command to mean something extra, until they have done that so many times that nobody knows what the code does. Like "He was the limp eyepatch of the midnight gorgonzola". cheers! / CS
It occurred to me that this is why Mary Sue/Gary Stu characters are reviled; they are noteworthy about everything. It would be more effective if they were noteworthy in one. Plus, it allows for more creative writing to work around limitations. Sure, they're good at X, but if a problem requires skill Y and they don't have it, how will they resolve it?
"One of the main things is to not let your character have more than one superpower." You don't give them 20 obviously, but 2 or 3 should be fine, so long as you can make them interact in interesting ways. Both for literal superpowers, as well as regular things they're good at.
The showrunners of Lost wanted to end it after three seasons while the network wanted it to run indefinitely. It sucks when conflicts between creatives and executives negatively affect projects.
This same problem affected comedy hit "How I Met Your Mother". Originally it was intended to be about 2-3 seasons, but it turned into a big hit and they kept adding more and more - and this makes the ending, which was planned from the beginning, something of a mess. All the characters have changed over the interim. They've become far more complex and their relationships have become a lot more complicated. We can buy Ted falling in love with Robin, then rekindling that later, if they haven't spent about seven seasons in the middle almost hooking up. The stuff with Robin and Barney just makes it weirder.
This is why I consume film rather than television. With film, the final product is reviewed on day one. With these series, all the glowing initial reviews are provisional. Your emotional investment is ultimately exposed to Hollywood dysfunction. I guess if you get your thrills from having your own emotional skin in the game, as a totally passive bystander, fill your boots. Not for me. I like film, and hardly any sequels or prequels, either, to mitigate this entire channel of BS. There isn't much left in the film bucket these days. I've watched close to 1000 great films in my life. It was fabulous while it lasted. Mission accomplished.
Look, I'm not saying people shouldn't have wanted satisfying answers to Lost's mysteries, but the show's biggest thematic throughline was faith vs. reason. Faith is not about having answers, it's about believing despite not having the answers. Everybody, including The Joker is like "Why'd it end in a church?" And I'm like "Do you need to watch it again?"
@@futurestoryteller Finale is terrible even for viewers like me who were exasterpated, but still watched the show and understood what it was doing. It's not about the finale, or just the finale, or a theme, it's about stringing people along while doing half-assed writers tricks to try to emotionally engage for the sake of emotional engagement, and not respecting your won show enough to give good answers to most of your myusteries, and merely "meh" ones. The finale is a cherry on the top, it undermines everything that happened. There's a reason why it's a plot point that was used is, say, classic ballet, and wasn't since, and everyone who knows and loves ballet would say that the dancing is spectacular, but the story is hilariously naive
@@Iron-Bridge my wife and I particularly appreciate that his advice is less about establishing RuLeS for writing and more about reframing how you think about your own fiction and that of others. It grants a refreshing sense of freedom to experiment without surrendering what makes you unique.
Tbh, why I struggle with fantasy books is #3. Too much new jargon to learn about a world I'll never be a part of, but I struggle a lot less with this in video games, particularly open world games, because you interact with a lot of the new terminology directly.
I enjoy the world building in The Murderbot Diaries. There are lots of things in the world that the main character doesn't know or doesn't care about, so we don't know a lot about them either. Then things happen, and we get to discover more of the world along with the character. All the different characters have good unique voices as well.
I just like creating the world first with all its details as much as possible and just let the story exist there within it. Everything the readers and the characters experience are what they experience in that time. There's plenty of things about our world all of us will never experience or understand but we all know it's all still out there and it makes the world much more amazing and full and exciting. It might feel like a waste if you never use even a large majority of what you create but if it becomes successful it can become added content posted for free on your website.
That's why I like worldbuilding leaning on our real world, as I feel it is done in the Discworld series (well, the Disc is basically our world in a distorting mirror) or the Witcher saga.
I loved the video. What I'd like to add is to always remember what readers don't know. That's why my first draft turned out to be a disaster. I immerse myself in characters, trying to understand their fears, motivations, and insecurities, often staying in their heads for hours or days. At this point, there are so many "obvious" things that I don't mention in the narration that it turns into chaos. I mean, it makes sense for me, who knows everything, but it's utter gibberish for everyone else. It doesn't matter how great your story is if nobody can understand it.
@kuhpunkt they didn't halt production they gave the scripts to freelancers or interns instead, basically people that would have no clue how the plot is supposed to continue. It wasn't just lost that suffered from that, shows like prison break and heroes turned to garbage because the people originally wrote it were on strike.
@@wolvekrome2475 Where are you getting this nonsense from? That's not what happened... like you could just easily check the credits at least. Lost 4x08 was the last episode written before the strike. 4x09 was after the strike. Who wrote it?
My gran who was a teacher always told me growing up that the biggest problem with modern books is they under-edited and a lot of stories would be magnitudes better if the editor could put their foot down. Some publishers don’t have editors or they’re very hand off and compliant. It’s kind of like George Lucas syndrome. The more one individual gets success for a collaborative effort the less the collaborators get to shut down aspects than just don’t work. If you read the script to the first star wars film it contains most of the issues the prequels later had.
This was super helpful for me. I have been racking my brain trying to figure out why my plot wasn't jiving the way I wanted it to. Now I realize I had too many subplots, too many twists, and too much going on in general. Side note: I love all my ideas so I'm now realizing I'll just have to write more books to use them all 😂
Jackie Chan: Now I realize I have too many stances, too many twists, and too much going on in general. Side note: I love all my jabs so I'm now realizing I'll just have to film more movies to use them all. What actually makes martial arts appealing is the iconic economy of motion. Less is better, when perfectly orchestrated.
This is a very strong guide, but I have to take issue with one (very minor, almost unimportant) point: The Saw franchise very much has a message - to the point that it feels completely unsubtle about it. The story is about a dying man trying to force people who are throwing their lives away to actually treasure it (hence "Live or die, make your choice"). As the story goes on, the various chapters also focus on more specific issues such as calling out a health care industry that is more interested in profit and policy than it is in actually saving lives. I know that doesn't change your point, but I wanted to defend a franchise that delivers a message of saving yourself from negative spirals without coming off as too preachy.
Idk about the lisp/regional accent/drawl. Those tend to be viewed as "bad writing" by a lot of people. It's your book so do whatever you want, but these have been used as lazy cop-outs to actually differentiating between characters' dialogue or even to reinforce racist stereotypes, so just be cognizant of that.
Totally agree here. I'd say if someone is going to have a unique way of speaking, you have to keep it simple. Don't make it an eyesore like "Yeahr ey, ah wuz wolkin' down the stree' and 'eard sumin." That's just pretentious af. But something like "I bet ya they done got caught." Would be way less of a problem. Also, if you really want a regional dialect, then actually do your homework and try to use words or phrases unique to that dialect. Don't rely on broken spelling. Instead of making Aussies say "naur mate," make them say "yeah nah, mate." (Might not be obvious, but "yeah nah" is an Aussie thing.)
It's only bad writing if it's pointless or unrealistic. Giving a character from the South a drawl makes sense; lots of people from that region talk that way. An uneducated character should use more bad grammar than a genius. Children should use simpler sentences than adults. The key is to make the traits fit the characters naturally.
One of my favorite metaphors in a recent book is in Everybody Knows, by Jordan Harper. He describes a character who’s been “the muscle” for bad people as “a fist on someone else’s arm”
God watching this made me feel, immeasurably more confident in my novel. I always watch videos like this with tips and worry so much I’m falling into bad writing holes or patterns, and then I watch the video and am assured that I’m doing just fine. I could do with some more subtext for sure though, thank you for the great video.
Excellent, glad you were encouraged by this! Overall, that's my goal to encourage. Hopefully authors, even when they realize they have some revision to do, don't get depressed about it.
I watched a helpful video on subtext recently-from 'the eternal english major' on YT-she said to take a character's arc, their struggles and mistakes, and make a comparison, then take that metphore and figure out ways you can allude to it without saying it directly. (for example if your character is feeling like a weak link in Team Save The World: have their necklace break, have them walk by a ship where the anchor chain broke. Expand it to them noticing how fragile things are in general-their pie crust crumbles to bits at the slightest touch.) The events of the story aren't just the Happening of The Plot, reactive scenes should include theme relevant feelings. Especially if your character is clammed up, the things they take notice of become subtextually a measure of their inner world. Also notable when what they think and say are in opposition.
Well, those issues are addressed, it's just that they tend to be dead ends (not the right solution to the mystery). It's more like they attempt to fire the gun and it malfunctions.
Very interesting! Sometimes I feel like I struggle with giving my characters unique voices and/or personalities. But I feel like I'm getting better at it.
I actually find it very fun to give them different voices! But I do struggle with personalities, they all sort of default to my own lol. Do you have that problem? Any tips?
@@PartlyCloudy00 Yeah, their personalities tend to be a little similar for me, too. Maybe try giving them personality traits that are things you would not do? Like maybe they like something you don't, or they're the opposite of your personality.
@@josephrowlee yeah that’s a good idea, I’ll put more effort and shake things up when it comes to personality next time I write :) good luck on your writing journey!
Harry Potter look-a-likes may also be that Harry Potter used a ton of really standard tropes. Everything you mentioned (the special orphan at magic school, etc) is found in A Wizard of Earthsea By Ursula Leguin published in 1968, and quite probably before that too. Harry Potter is just the currently most visible of these, but is in not the source archetype.
Totally agreed - when I read it first (knowing Earthsea and other similar stories), I was wondering what people found so original about Harry Potter. My explanation was that they had not read much before and that the successful mass marketing for Potter got them into reading.
@@guidopahlberg9413 I think it's a generational thing- those of us who grew up reading fantasy BEFORE the advent of Harry Potter will have read one or more versions of the theme to know that it wasn't particularly original, nor in fact the best example of the kind. There are a lot better examples, better written with better plot and characters that came before. However Harry Potter is the series that captured the imagination of an entire generation globally- so the books did something right.
Inspiration Indigestion and Dialogue Ventriloquism are the exact problems i have been searching to fix for myself and how i probably got recommended your channel. great advice, fantastic video!
I have to disagree with your aesthetics over ethics point. You're comparing a horror movie(saw) to a work of avantgarde literary fiction(clockwork orange). Those are different genres and can't be judged by the same standards. Horror doesn't need deep messages, character development, emotional depth or anything like that. Can do, but it isn't necessary because the core of the horror genre is something different. Horror is about primal, intestinal fear, not about deep messages.
Steins;Gate uses chekovs gun perfectly. Literally EVERYTHING comes back up, so much so that when you watch it a second time you go “wow I didn’t even notice that detail”
The whole thing just fits together. That said, I can see why people might find the opening slow, pacing-wise. My brother asked me, after the first episode, "what just happened?" Makes sense in the end, and the confusion makes the whole thing much better at the end (and on a rewatch), but I can see why it could confuse people lol
@@klop4228 yeah. the "what just happened" feeling is what made me want to get further into the series, far enough to when it picks up. i have had friends that didn't think it started slow, and i've had some that did.
All great points for making a mainstream hit. Very glad that people ignore your advice with frequency. If people followed these rules we wouldn’t have an amazing Dune series but also most of the Tolkien books.
Well, I just started making videos in March ... and I kind of took the summer off and went on a two month vacation. Ha ha. So I'll get there. Thanks for the kind words!
Had to chuckle at the metaphors, because I love using them a little too much. But I know this and so I have a certain character using most of them, making for a nice, individual voice. 😊
You mentioning Twilight's dialogue issues reminded me of how the author Stephanie Meyer straight up forgot that the character Renesmee's name was unorthodox, and had all the other characters act like it was some beautiful, perfect name and not acknowledge how weird it is.
This was an amazing video and awesome advice. Thank you! I knew these things as basic ideas, based on what I enjoy and hate in books/film but never cohesively thought about them before. When writing, simply trying to nail what I enjoy reading - with a vague idea of what to aim for / steer away from. I just started the editing / re-reading / re-writing process of a rough draft and it's been weeks and I'm still on chapter 1 - apparently, google realized what I needed help with before I did - because your video was magically recommended to me days after starting the refining process.
I LOVED THE SUMERIAN LANGUAGE PART OF SNOW CRASH THE MOST! I wanted the whole book to be like that and instead got tired of the vehicles and driving around.
Hey man I love your channel I am here just to ask you to make more videos like the Hemingway video because I really loved that one. Giving tips and talking about famous authors I thought it was really cool . Plus I am a Hemingway fan so I was really glad you posted a Hemingway video. Keep doing what you are doing because it’s really cool and I if you read this please consider more videos about authors thank you!
You could argue that the first Saw had a point to its ultraviolence and that there's artistic value behind it, though I'd agree with you for every other entry in the series.
As someone who couldn't possibly make it through a single scene of that franchise, but married somebody who loves it, I'd say the only point is "violence begets violence", or something similar, like "misery loves company" 😅
@@anamazing2297 It's a little more like a rollercoaster ride, the entire point of watching it is the "point" the killer is trying to make. You compare the situations the characters find themselves in, and their sins, to your problems. And you experience, vicariously the thrill of trying to survive against impossible odds, but in a safe environment, while being reminded to try not to take your life for granted.
Saw is the worst example he could have chosen. It's the one series where the antagonist sees himself as a teacher and uses his methods to impart his lessons that he explains to the other characters very dramatically.
I just love your videos. I can always pick out at least one gem, usually more, and you don't deal with political agendas within the writing community, which I appreciate. Thank you.
12:25 Not that it detracts from the point, but the angel did it to gather the additional souls of the passengers descendants that could be born, since they survived for the war in Heaven. He made that Celine Dion excuse to hide the truth and to mess with the Winchesters. This works, because he is introduced as a petty and selfish character and the Winchesters only know him as such.
8:33 Oh my god, finally I know the right term for what's wrong with Marvel productions. They are insanely guilty of Dialogue Ventriloquism, most exchanges are just constant snarky quips and one-liners that feel like people in a writer's room scribbled it all on a whiteboard for later and just chucked the lines into the script whenever they couldn't think of anything to write. Snark worked well for Iron Man, because Tony is the kind of self-absorbed shallow guy to throw snark out to avoid real conversation, and quips worked for Spider-Man because Peter uses humor to keep from losing himself to stress or introspection, or to throw an enemy off-balance by frustrating them. Other heros are **not** like them, and it's frustrating to see their unique personalities run through a quirky snark filter courtesy of the hacks making the scripts. Captain America and Bruce Banner are really smart, well-balanced men that would want an engaging dialogue, but would be frustrated by dealing with someone like Tony, they wouldn't be constantly jabbing back. Banter is not just snark and quips, and it's really hard to watch.
A counter to the Kitchen Sink is Alita Battle Angel, which had so much crammed into the movie but it was amazingly done and one of my favorite movies from that year.
Really solid video. I just got back into writing in my spare time, and I notice that it's hard to not fall for all of these traps. So far, the best test I've come up with isbto ask myself "if somebody was reading this aloud to me, would I be bored?".
I am currently working on a novella, it will be my first published work. I was expecting this to be a checklist of things I messed up, but instead, it made me feel better. 😀
12:49 That was a lie to Sam and Dean. The real motivation was to get more souls for the civil war in heaven by harvesting all the people saved and their descendants
Great list! Informative and helpful. I will say, the only one I seem to struggle with is "Everything but the kitchen sink syndrome". I am an ideas and characters person and I love cultivating ideas and fashioning characters. The struggle for me is that I get excited about so many of them that I want to try to fit everything (and everyone) in, and if I can't, then I get frustrated because I am impatient. I don't want to *wait* to use those characters and ideas. I definitely need to work on this impulse.
Not the TikTok reference at 16:48 lol Jokes aside, this is probably the most engaging, to-the-point, and easily memorable video on novel writing I've ever watched. Will be referring to this again in 2-4 business days when my characters have stopped listening to me, I've been stuck on the same sentence for three hours, and I've completely lost the plot in a literary and mental context. Thanks!
I just now discovered you and, after watching, subscribed. Excellent insights! When you introduced the section on metaphors, my mind went straight to Raymond Chandler.
I am good for a lot of these, but I always have to check myself with the Checkov's Armory and "Everything but the Kitchen Sink' traits. I vomit all these potentially cool ideas and realize quickly I need to pull back and look at it all again from a simple lens; 'what do I want the reader to take away from this story? What elements are truly important in order to accomplish this?" And then I will remove characters, remove unnecessary reltionships or world building and plot points and save those cool ideas for another day. There are times where I accidently lose track of plot holes, or places where something cool is introduced but never touched on again. I recently remembered that there was a magical tracker that a character had on them but it is never really mentioned again; so I have a really cool plan for how it will be used, and making sure that it is mentioned a couple times as a reminder to the audience it still exists before it is used for a very important plot point. Keeping track of things and bringing them back is important!
Okay, so I honestly believe they were supposed to be throwing that football in an alley, but because Wiseau had every set built in a studio (like Hollywood films of old) it looked like it was inside. That's also why the rooftop scene looks so obviously green screened, because it was.
Ventriloquism is definitely a problem that I fear happening in my own writing, and it’s so hard to recognize. That’s why there’s such value in having a trusted and honest friend to read your writing and point things out.
Supposedly, author said he didn't like the Kubrick movie because Alex isn't reformed by the end, so it doesn't _sound_ like it's much more complicated than that. tbh
@@futurestoryteller it's been a long time since I've read the book but if I remember correctly, he doesn't give up his violent ways due to the punishment. I think the punishment/brainwashing doesn't work as intended, but he ends up basically just maturing and being better on his own later basically just by growing up and reflecting on how crappy he was as a teenager
@@futurestoryteller Perhaps, but what if you didn't have Burgess to tell you what "he" thought of Alex, his character? How will you know Mr. Henchard's real sense of guilt, or lack thereof, if Thomas Hardy is not there to tell you how to interpret his novel? What are Prospero's motivations if Shakespeare never told us, in writing, how to really view The Tempest? There is a slippery slope here. Authors write (and publish) their work. We interpret that work. Whatever Burgess may have thought about his character is fine and dandy, but should not influence readers in their own embrace and attempt at understanding Burgess' novel. I happen to agree with luthor24127 that A Clockwork Orange goes much deeper than the simplistic approach luthor is criticizing, and I mean the book, not the film. If Burgess disagrees with me, that's too bad, but the man left plenty of clues (whether intentionally or not I don't know) that point towards a far more complicated interpretation, one that goes beyond the "he was punished, he is good now" approach to which luther takes exception.
"How will you know Mr. Henchard's real sense of guilt, or lack thereof, if Thomas Hardy is not there to tell you how to interpret his novel?" And how will alien androids who don't speak English, and know no guilt interpret it, in a billion years, when the meaning of the text itself is long since indecipherable? The death of the author is simply transference of ego from author to audience. I'm not defending the point itself, I'm not even completely sure he said it at all, feel free to take it with a massive pinch of salt. But Art is a form of communication. It happens to be the only form of communication where we allow the listener to disregard the intent of the speaker because "art is ambiguous." Communication is always ambiguous. Hell. History is ambiguous. The fact that something might need more context to be fully understood is the very nature of reality and of understanding. Treating fiction differently because it's not real is just another part of the ego trip. If the author's not around to tell us something, they're not around, but if they are around to tell us something, or they've already said it, "what if it _didn't_ exist though?" Is not gonna fly with me.
@@futurestoryteller Perfectly valid way to deal with reading fiction. I used to do it like that. I still do it from time to time, when I'm not paying attention. Happy readings
This motivated me to stop procrastinating. Gotta stop dragging my feet. Think im afraid of failure or even success. Afraid of what happens when im done.
15:40 There are so many cop shows when you know that hey, this is the 15min suspect, so it's not him and nope, not the 25min suspect either... Once you recognize the recipe, those first suspect reveals become less fulfilling.
For a while I had a theory that Game of Thrones ended extremely similar to what he had in mind and that the negative reaction had startled him into quietly shelving it. But another video I watched last month persuaded me otherwise- he's just struggling to get the writing both complete and up to his own standards.
I appreciate your use of movies as examples because you instantly restrict the field to what is possible to do well in a limited time. When I argue about movies, one of my fundamental arguments is that novellas make better movies -- because a novella tends to have the right amount of characters, plots and subplots (if any subplots), etc, to make a 90-180 minute movie and still get pretty much full treatment. An example using two of my favorite movies: 1984 Dune. Too much. Still love it. Shawshank Redemption. Perfect. In fact, I bet one or two people would call it a short story. In the words of old world corporate auditing, "all and only all" is what you want in a movie or a written work.
With the dialogue thing. just making a character curse a lot does not work. A lot of romances do this with their men, and it's just the woman's dialogue with a lot more 'fucks' thrown in.
Excellent video, thank you so much! You've really reassured me of being on the right path with third draft of the novel I just spent the last several years on. George R.R. Martin's "gardener" style falls deep into Everything-But-the-Kitchen-Sink-Syndrome and Worldbuilding Vertigo by ASOIAF books 4 and 5. While he was a big inspiration as far as even my major characters having thin plot armor, I consciously avoided his trap of name dropping "So-and-So from This-or-There" on every other page. The only people I mention who are already long dead have some point to the current narrative.
@@rickmel-q7m Do you mean her being fireproof when her dragons were born? George explained that as being basically a one-time thing of Targaryen magic.
@@TurquoiseStar17 no, i mean how she always ends up profiting despite making bad choices because she has the magical dragons thanks to her magical powers
Thank you for this! I was dreading the idea of having an editor. Not knowing what to expect. But now that I've seen this video, I'm convinced I should never have one.
Ending up with a bad editor is of course a destiny worse than death. But a good editor is worth hes (his or hers) weight in gold. And then you can end up with an oldfashioned editor saying "This whole manuscript is crap. But the last sentence is good. Take that one and write a new novel, and I might publish that." Authorship is often a case of "life is hard, but I'm harder". cheers! / CS
_Laughs in Legend of Galactic Heroes_ I personally think that, watching videos like this leads to death of creativity. You get stuck in " _You shouldn't do this, you shouldn't do that_ " then you see or read examples of people who didn't give a shit, did what they wanted to do, and succeeded. So the moral of my comment is: Just, write. Just do it. Stop watching videos like this and just write what it is you want to write!
Great video. I might go further on the example of Moby Dick where you say “… there is a section that goes on and on about …” My experience was that there was one section that didn’t drone on and on: the last 25 of 481 pages that was the actual chase and final battle. I felt the Hero’s Journey was finishing the book; I was exhausted
@@Cocc0nuttt0 took me about 5 episodes then spent the rest of the run and indeed the rest of jj's career raging that we hadn't grabbed up our pitchforks and chased them into the sea. And what sticks in my craw is that it didn't cause lost or JJ to fail.
I bet you're one of these people who think the characters were dead all along, died on the plane crash and the island is purgatory. I know it must come as a shock, but that's not what happened in the final episode. And every question can be answered by analysing the plot, the show never spoon-feeds you information.
Only if you completely misunderstood it, lol. Let me guess - you think they were dead the whole time or that none of the questions were answered. Neither of these tired complaints are true, they're just exhausting.
regarding number 9: When you have so much exciting backstory, that the present actions feel boring in comparison, then your story should play in the past.
Thank you! I'm pretty broke right now, but I might be able to ask for your course for Christmas. I'm going to write the bulk of my novel in November, but I think your course would help with the revision process :)
I would be strongly cautious about using specific accents and dialects in writing. If you write them out... it can become hard to read, and annoy the reader. There's also the risk of accidentally stereotyping certain groups of people, or making them look bad. Which can piss of a lot of readers. Writing normally, and saying "he drawled" as a tag is different, and works just fine. But going: I vas very varm" the german said. Could have more backlash. See the difference? :) Using different vocabulary for different characters, and making one longwinded and another short spoken, giving them different triggers and tempers, etc is way more interesting and makes a bigger difference in the story.
1. Chekhov's Armory: When you show a bunch of stuff to set the reader up for later on but don't follow up
2. The Everything but the Kitchen Sink Syndrome: Trying to cram too many ideas into a book (This is okay for the first draft but should be fixed in revision)
3. Worldbuilding Vertigo: so much worldbuilding information it's overwhelming and confusing
4. Inspiration Indigestion: Being too similar to a specific book or too heavily influenced to the point of being a copycat
5. The Aesthetics over Ethics Trap: Creating situations for shock values without contributing to the actual story
6. Dialogue Ventriloquism: Every character sounding the same
7. Metaphor overdose: Too many metaphors/similes that you lose sight of the story
8. Lack of Character Motivation: No justifications/motivations for character actions
9. Temporally Shortsighted: So fixated on the present moment that it's hard to picture the character with a life before or after the book takes place
10. The "Gotcha" Spiral: Relies so much on plot twists, that the reader feels manipulated. The plot twists aren't properly earned/built up.
11. Checklist Character Development: Feels like created by an algorithm/AI making them feel fake. To avoid this, try finding contradicting/surprising traits for your characters.
12. "Subtext is Everything" Syndrome: Your story is too subtle that it's impenetrable to the reader. When they're so subtle, the reader can't tell what they're alluding to or the reader begins to feels confused.
Some things don't need to be 20 minute videos... thank you.
Excellent. Thank you.
@@ShadowOfTheSPQRyou'd think a writer would go for concision 😂
Thank you friend 🤝
"A failed metaphor is like a kitten with a door."
lol
A simile uses the words "like" or "as" to compare two things, while a metaphor directly compares two things without using "like" or "as." For instance, "a failed metaphor is a cat." A failed attempt at a decent simile would be the joke above! Still super funny though and totally something im gonna use
@@tantanthespaceman1923 Does word "similar" fit to a "metaphor"? It`s translation of non-english phrase and i`m not sure that the best one, Does it fit good "An unsuccessful metaphor is similar to a kitten with a tiny door?"
But it's also a successful rhyme.
What's a metaphor? To keep cows in
If you recognise yourself in any of these points, don't despair. Notice that with each point, he's giving examples of published work, some of them worldwide phenomenons. Nobody's work is perfect. Just learn and do your best.
Massive marketing campaigns are required. No exceptions. Without 'em, you ain't sheet.
Yeah, everything created by human and presented to human couldn't run from flaws. Even the "perfect" book that majority of people in internet find as pinnacle of literary still get criticism. I mean, look at Dune. I thought no one would dislike that book, but Reddit once again prove me wrong.
I think artists or writers shouldn't avoid being flawed, because it's UNAVOIDABLE, but instead they need focusing on trying their *BEST.*
I know it's hard in this anti-mindfullness internet era where people like to give unthoughtful "criticism" because hating is fun and they will cook even the minor mistake on everything as a big problem.
And some of them can be actually what you are going for.Writing a whole story solely with metaphors? Challenge accepted! (I did other challenges. Writing a story, but you are only allowed sentences which are exactly five words long. Not four. Not six. Writing a story, where each sentence starts with the last word of the first sentence.)
*phenomena
The Mardig Series by Anger. A convincing barbarian series with ancient aliens that checks all the boxes.
Your writing advice is always so helpful. As a person with autism, I get overwhelmed easily by "writing advice," but you always explain things in a very calm and easy to understand way. Thank you for taking the time to teaching writing.
Same here ♥. Some videos are just so overwhelming!
autistic writers riseeee!!!!!
I agree, but not on some of his examples. Especially his critique on Saw and A Clockwork Orange. It seems like he doesn’t really understand (the role of horror/ violence in) these movies.
Here's another one: Talking to everyone online about this "amazing book" you're working on. This will immediately doom it to never be completed.
Or have the idea stolen. What worse? They actually did it better than your ORIGINAL one. And released it earlier than you. Then you become the lesser copycat wannabe author.
Like cooking scrambled egg, they heard of it, they added little more condiments on top of it, and it become way better than just scrambled egg.
Telling people about a project you are working on can easily make the project harder to work as now you have to worry about people's expectations.
No real writer has this problem.
@@happymaskedguy1943 george rr martin
I hate making promises, making a big announcement about stuff is basically like making a promise.
"I'm writing this cool story with [this and that]" Translates to "I WILL finish and release that story with those elements included"
I may or may not have made that mistake and it kinda hurts cause i hate disapointing people.
The balance between subtlety and being too explicit with subtext is the one I feel is the hardest to even detect in your writing.
Pacing and clarity (subtext) are two things best learned from reader feedback. The two main questions I ask from readers are, "where was it boring" and "where was it confusing?"
@@mradan2093 a great way of thinking i havent thiught of.. id love to read something youve written
which is why a great editor is needed
@@mradan2093 Was exactly what I was gonna say. Bounce stuff off other people. You'll always know exactly what will happen and what it's leading to, so you can't experience the work how it's meant to
The problem I have with a lot stories that people refer to as "subtle" is that they are not so much subtle as just lacking explanation at all. Subtlety is when there are answers to find but they take effort to see, where things are not explicitly stated but are implicitly stated. Too often i just find that writers leave things "open to interpretation" just as an excuse for lazy writing. I am not saying that everything always needs to have an explanation but leaving things unexplained and being indecisive about what is actually going on in the story is not subtlety.
Harry Potter is great with unique dialogue. Almost every character has their own way of speaking.
My favorite example comes from book 7 where Harry is retrieving the sword of Gryffindor from the icy lake, but the cursed locket strangles him. A mysterious figure saves him and pulls him and the sword from the icy depths.
We don't yet know who it is, but we get one line of dialogue from them. "Are you MENTAL?"
We immediately know it was Ron. Fabulous moment.
Of course, the main reason it is a great moment is because Ron abandoned them a couple chapters ago, so him showing up to save the day was exactly what the reader was hoping for.
Great example!
I HAVEN'T READ PAST THE GOBLET OF FIRE BUT EVEN BEFORE READING THE REST OF YOUR COMMENT I HEARD THAT PHRASE IN RON'S VOICE!
I remember cheering as I read that! Good example
Honestly I felt the writing books 5-7 really dropped off
The Everything but the Kitchen Sink Syndrome: Write an entire series in which each theme gets its own book.
This dude is so professional in the way he handles what he says. A lot of writers/editors in the trad industry with UA-cam channels have a terrible snarky bitchiness about them when it comes to harsh advice. This dude tells you the problem and how to fix it. Like a doctor. No ego and no shitty attitude. You can tell he cares a lot about the craft.
He's mature and a strong man and not a manchild, that's the difference.
But he is snarky.
Even the Terrible Writing Advice UA-camr also write their own books and still makes mistakes in writing their work.
I mean this dude's work is probably not perfect but at least he's nice in giving advises.
@@jjhaya How is he nice when he's spouting overly dramatic nonsense and can't even back it up? He's deliberately ignoring simple questions.
I immediately noticed this. I feel a strange sense of condescension when watching other writers’ advice videos but this guy feels like he actually wants to help you.
My mom’s ex did screenwriting as a hobby and my mom tagged along to his club sometimes. My mom, despite not being a writer herself, has given me some useful advice over the years. One of the main things is to not let your character have more than one superpower. Or more broadly, don’t overload your audience with a laundry list of traits. I’ve heard it called the “limp or an eyepatch” method. Choose one or two traits and make those the most important.
Programmers and the like sometimes use overload. They redefine a command to mean something extra, until they have done that so many times that nobody knows what the code does. Like "He was the limp eyepatch of the midnight gorgonzola". cheers! / CS
It occurred to me that this is why Mary Sue/Gary Stu characters are reviled; they are noteworthy about everything. It would be more effective if they were noteworthy in one. Plus, it allows for more creative writing to work around limitations. Sure, they're good at X, but if a problem requires skill Y and they don't have it, how will they resolve it?
Gives Ichigo from Bleach a sideways glance.
"One of the main things is to not let your character have more than one superpower."
You don't give them 20 obviously, but 2 or 3 should be fine, so long as you can make them interact in interesting ways. Both for literal superpowers, as well as regular things they're good at.
@ I know there’s nuance to it but my mom reminds me by saying “only one superpower.” It’s more of an issue of being deliberate in character building.
I forgot which author said this, a twist should be surprising in the moment yet inevitable in retrospect
I agree amon 🧐🧐🧐🧐🧐
Love how you back up every point with relevant examples
I do my best.
The Everything but the Kitchen Sink Syndrome: Write an entire series in which each theme gets its own book.
Should be the standard for all art/media critique!
I disagree, Saw and A Clockwork Orange especially were bad examples imo, it’s not faults in the movies but more his misunderstanding imo.
The showrunners of Lost wanted to end it after three seasons while the network wanted it to run indefinitely. It sucks when conflicts between creatives and executives negatively affect projects.
This same problem affected comedy hit "How I Met Your Mother". Originally it was intended to be about 2-3 seasons, but it turned into a big hit and they kept adding more and more - and this makes the ending, which was planned from the beginning, something of a mess. All the characters have changed over the interim. They've become far more complex and their relationships have become a lot more complicated. We can buy Ted falling in love with Robin, then rekindling that later, if they haven't spent about seven seasons in the middle almost hooking up. The stuff with Robin and Barney just makes it weirder.
This is why I consume film rather than television. With film, the final product is reviewed on day one. With these series, all the glowing initial reviews are provisional. Your emotional investment is ultimately exposed to Hollywood dysfunction. I guess if you get your thrills from having your own emotional skin in the game, as a totally passive bystander, fill your boots. Not for me. I like film, and hardly any sequels or prequels, either, to mitigate this entire channel of BS. There isn't much left in the film bucket these days. I've watched close to 1000 great films in my life. It was fabulous while it lasted. Mission accomplished.
Look, I'm not saying people shouldn't have wanted satisfying answers to Lost's mysteries, but the show's biggest thematic throughline was faith vs. reason. Faith is not about having answers, it's about believing despite not having the answers. Everybody, including The Joker is like "Why'd it end in a church?" And I'm like "Do you need to watch it again?"
@@futurestoryteller Finale is terrible even for viewers like me who were exasterpated, but still watched the show and understood what it was doing. It's not about the finale, or just the finale, or a theme, it's about stringing people along while doing half-assed writers tricks to try to emotionally engage for the sake of emotional engagement, and not respecting your won show enough to give good answers to most of your myusteries, and merely "meh" ones.
The finale is a cherry on the top, it undermines everything that happened. There's a reason why it's a plot point that was used is, say, classic ballet, and wasn't since, and everyone who knows and loves ballet would say that the dancing is spectacular, but the story is hilariously naive
@@nathanliteroy9835 If you understood the show so much you can tell me why you think that ending "Undermines everything that happened."
You're probably the best writing guide channel on YT
No fat, no time wasting and just good stuff 😊
Thank you! Really appreciate that.
@@Iron-Bridge my wife and I particularly appreciate that his advice is less about establishing RuLeS for writing and more about reframing how you think about your own fiction and that of others. It grants a refreshing sense of freedom to experiment without surrendering what makes you unique.
Tbh, why I struggle with fantasy books is #3. Too much new jargon to learn about a world I'll never be a part of, but I struggle a lot less with this in video games, particularly open world games, because you interact with a lot of the new terminology directly.
I enjoy the world building in The Murderbot Diaries. There are lots of things in the world that the main character doesn't know or doesn't care about, so we don't know a lot about them either. Then things happen, and we get to discover more of the world along with the character. All the different characters have good unique voices as well.
I just like creating the world first with all its details as much as possible and just let the story exist there within it. Everything the readers and the characters experience are what they experience in that time.
There's plenty of things about our world all of us will never experience or understand but we all know it's all still out there and it makes the world much more amazing and full and exciting.
It might feel like a waste if you never use even a large majority of what you create but if it becomes successful it can become added content posted for free on your website.
That's why I like worldbuilding leaning on our real world, as I feel it is done in the Discworld series (well, the Disc is basically our world in a distorting mirror) or the Witcher saga.
There are so many characters too l lose track. The name might come back again in book X, and then I'm like, who is that again?
I loved the video. What I'd like to add is to always remember what readers don't know. That's why my first draft turned out to be a disaster.
I immerse myself in characters, trying to understand their fears, motivations, and insecurities, often staying in their heads for hours or days. At this point, there are so many "obvious" things that I don't mention in the narration that it turns into chaos. I mean, it makes sense for me, who knows everything, but it's utter gibberish for everyone else.
It doesn't matter how great your story is if nobody can understand it.
God, are you me? 😅
@@Cherrycreamsoda1 I sure hope so because you look delicious.
1:20 i think the writers strike is the reason for that. Many shows suffered because the studios thought they could do without the writers
That doesn't make sense. Nothing was written during the strike... so production halted.
@kuhpunkt they didn't halt production they gave the scripts to freelancers or interns instead, basically people that would have no clue how the plot is supposed to continue. It wasn't just lost that suffered from that, shows like prison break and heroes turned to garbage because the people originally wrote it were on strike.
@@wolvekrome2475 Where are you getting this nonsense from? That's not what happened... like you could just easily check the credits at least. Lost 4x08 was the last episode written before the strike. 4x09 was after the strike. Who wrote it?
My gran who was a teacher always told me growing up that the biggest problem with modern books is they under-edited and a lot of stories would be magnitudes better if the editor could put their foot down. Some publishers don’t have editors or they’re very hand off and compliant.
It’s kind of like George Lucas syndrome. The more one individual gets success for a collaborative effort the less the collaborators get to shut down aspects than just don’t work. If you read the script to the first star wars film it contains most of the issues the prequels later had.
His original Star Wars script had bad acting and Jar Jar Binks?
This was super helpful for me. I have been racking my brain trying to figure out why my plot wasn't jiving the way I wanted it to. Now I realize I had too many subplots, too many twists, and too much going on in general. Side note: I love all my ideas so I'm now realizing I'll just have to write more books to use them all 😂
Jackie Chan: Now I realize I have too many stances, too many twists, and too much going on in general. Side note: I love all my jabs so I'm now realizing I'll just have to film more movies to use them all.
What actually makes martial arts appealing is the iconic economy of motion. Less is better, when perfectly orchestrated.
0:34 Chekov’s Armory or “How to write Game of Thrones.”
This is a very strong guide, but I have to take issue with one (very minor, almost unimportant) point: The Saw franchise very much has a message - to the point that it feels completely unsubtle about it. The story is about a dying man trying to force people who are throwing their lives away to actually treasure it (hence "Live or die, make your choice"). As the story goes on, the various chapters also focus on more specific issues such as calling out a health care industry that is more interested in profit and policy than it is in actually saving lives.
I know that doesn't change your point, but I wanted to defend a franchise that delivers a message of saving yourself from negative spirals without coming off as too preachy.
"Everything but the kitchen sink"
Clearly the mistake was leaving the sink out. Let that sink in, as they say!
Idk about the lisp/regional accent/drawl. Those tend to be viewed as "bad writing" by a lot of people. It's your book so do whatever you want, but these have been used as lazy cop-outs to actually differentiating between characters' dialogue or even to reinforce racist stereotypes, so just be cognizant of that.
Totally agree here. I'd say if someone is going to have a unique way of speaking, you have to keep it simple. Don't make it an eyesore like
"Yeahr ey, ah wuz wolkin' down the stree' and 'eard sumin."
That's just pretentious af. But something like
"I bet ya they done got caught."
Would be way less of a problem. Also, if you really want a regional dialect, then actually do your homework and try to use words or phrases unique to that dialect. Don't rely on broken spelling. Instead of making Aussies say "naur mate," make them say "yeah nah, mate." (Might not be obvious, but "yeah nah" is an Aussie thing.)
It's only bad writing if it's pointless or unrealistic. Giving a character from the South a drawl makes sense; lots of people from that region talk that way. An uneducated character should use more bad grammar than a genius. Children should use simpler sentences than adults. The key is to make the traits fit the characters naturally.
One of my favorite metaphors in a recent book is in Everybody Knows, by Jordan Harper.
He describes a character who’s been “the muscle” for bad people as “a fist on someone else’s arm”
God watching this made me feel, immeasurably more confident in my novel. I always watch videos like this with tips and worry so much I’m falling into bad writing holes or patterns, and then I watch the video and am assured that I’m doing just fine. I could do with some more subtext for sure though, thank you for the great video.
Excellent, glad you were encouraged by this! Overall, that's my goal to encourage. Hopefully authors, even when they realize they have some revision to do, don't get depressed about it.
I watched a helpful video on subtext recently-from 'the eternal english major' on YT-she said to take a character's arc, their struggles and mistakes, and make a comparison, then take that metphore and figure out ways you can allude to it without saying it directly. (for example if your character is feeling like a weak link in Team Save The World: have their necklace break, have them walk by a ship where the anchor chain broke. Expand it to them noticing how fragile things are in general-their pie crust crumbles to bits at the slightest touch.) The events of the story aren't just the Happening of The Plot, reactive scenes should include theme relevant feelings. Especially if your character is clammed up, the things they take notice of become subtextually a measure of their inner world. Also notable when what they think and say are in opposition.
@@purpleghost106That's a fantastic idea / observation
0:40 In any detective story, most of Chekhov's guns never go off. So it's not always a bad thing.
Well, those issues are addressed, it's just that they tend to be dead ends (not the right solution to the mystery).
It's more like they attempt to fire the gun and it malfunctions.
@@BookfoxI love this simile
Isn't that called a red herring
That's just a red herring then.
what about a movie like eyes wide shut? each of Chekhov's guns are running their own plot that may or may not be apart of the main story
This channel is great. Writing tips, lists, it's the total package. Keep it up.
Very interesting!
Sometimes I feel like I struggle with giving my characters unique voices and/or personalities. But I feel like I'm getting better at it.
I actually find it very fun to give them different voices! But I do struggle with personalities, they all sort of default to my own lol. Do you have that problem? Any tips?
@@PartlyCloudy00 Yeah, their personalities tend to be a little similar for me, too. Maybe try giving them personality traits that are things you would not do? Like maybe they like something you don't, or they're the opposite of your personality.
@@josephrowlee yeah that’s a good idea, I’ll put more effort and shake things up when it comes to personality next time I write :) good luck on your writing journey!
@@PartlyCloudy00 Thank you! And good luck on your writing journey!
Harry Potter look-a-likes may also be that Harry Potter used a ton of really standard tropes. Everything you mentioned (the special orphan at magic school, etc) is found in A Wizard of Earthsea By Ursula Leguin published in 1968, and quite probably before that too. Harry Potter is just the currently most visible of these, but is in not the source archetype.
Totally agreed - when I read it first (knowing Earthsea and other similar stories), I was wondering what people found so original about Harry Potter. My explanation was that they had not read much before and that the successful mass marketing for Potter got them into reading.
@@guidopahlberg9413 I think it's a generational thing- those of us who grew up reading fantasy BEFORE the advent of Harry Potter will have read one or more versions of the theme to know that it wasn't particularly original, nor in fact the best example of the kind. There are a lot better examples, better written with better plot and characters that came before. However Harry Potter is the series that captured the imagination of an entire generation globally- so the books did something right.
Inspiration Indigestion and Dialogue Ventriloquism are the exact problems i have been searching to fix for myself and how i probably got recommended your channel. great advice, fantastic video!
I have to disagree with your aesthetics over ethics point. You're comparing a horror movie(saw) to a work of avantgarde literary fiction(clockwork orange). Those are different genres and can't be judged by the same standards. Horror doesn't need deep messages, character development, emotional depth or anything like that. Can do, but it isn't necessary because the core of the horror genre is something different. Horror is about primal, intestinal fear, not about deep messages.
I've actually picked up on a lot of these lessons from critiques of popular shows and movies. Especially when the good turns to bad.
I love how you put examples and also mentioned mistakes that arent as obvious aswell. Thanks! 🎉
The image quality, including the depth of field with the subtly blurred background, is amazing!
Imagine being an actor in The Room. “What’s my motivation?” “Motivation?”
Even Wiseau was confused. "It's bullsh*t, bullsh*t! Oh hi, Mark!"
Steins;Gate uses chekovs gun perfectly. Literally EVERYTHING comes back up, so much so that when you watch it a second time you go “wow I didn’t even notice that detail”
The whole thing just fits together.
That said, I can see why people might find the opening slow, pacing-wise. My brother asked me, after the first episode, "what just happened?"
Makes sense in the end, and the confusion makes the whole thing much better at the end (and on a rewatch), but I can see why it could confuse people lol
@@klop4228 yeah. the "what just happened" feeling is what made me want to get further into the series, far enough to when it picks up. i have had friends that didn't think it started slow, and i've had some that did.
All great points for making a mainstream hit. Very glad that people ignore your advice with frequency. If people followed these rules we wouldn’t have an amazing Dune series but also most of the Tolkien books.
This is such high quality content why tf do you not have more of a following? This is so helpful, thank you!
Well, I just started making videos in March ... and I kind of took the summer off and went on a two month vacation. Ha ha. So I'll get there. Thanks for the kind words!
Had to chuckle at the metaphors, because I love using them a little too much. But I know this and so I have a certain character using most of them, making for a nice, individual voice. 😊
You mentioning Twilight's dialogue issues reminded me of how the author Stephanie Meyer straight up forgot that the character Renesmee's name was unorthodox, and had all the other characters act like it was some beautiful, perfect name and not acknowledge how weird it is.
Finally seeing something mentioned in a book that isn’t forshadowing and is there for the simple pleasure of enjoying life is always wonderful
Love your videos!! plus the background you are shooting in is really cool
Thank you! Glad you enjoy the background as well. Sometimes I get bored of it and want to change, but it's too much work.
This was an amazing video and awesome advice. Thank you!
I knew these things as basic ideas, based on what I enjoy and hate in books/film but never cohesively thought about them before. When writing, simply trying to nail what I enjoy reading - with a vague idea of what to aim for / steer away from. I just started the editing / re-reading / re-writing process of a rough draft and it's been weeks and I'm still on chapter 1 - apparently, google realized what I needed help with before I did - because your video was magically recommended to me days after starting the refining process.
dune books 3, 4 and 5 are literally the best ones
"It's a rock monster. It doesn't have motivation."
"See, that's your problem, Jason. You were never serious about the craft."
I LOVED THE SUMERIAN LANGUAGE PART OF SNOW CRASH THE MOST! I wanted the whole book to be like that and instead got tired of the vehicles and driving around.
Great video! I’m working on my first historical novel. I’m about 1/4 through and your videos are a great help!
Thank you for educating me, you have really helped me in my novel writing projects. Thank you!!
You are so welcome!
Hey man I love your channel I am here just to ask you to make more videos like the Hemingway video because I really loved that one. Giving tips and talking about famous authors I thought it was really cool . Plus I am a Hemingway fan so I was really glad you posted a Hemingway video. Keep doing what you are doing because it’s really cool and I if you read this please consider more videos about authors thank you!
Solid content as always! A more eye-catching thumbnail could help more people discover the hidden gem your channel really is. I’m lucky I found it!
Fantastic video, instantly subscribed 😊 I also love that you gave concrete examples
I love that: disciplined imagination.
So frikkin’ true.
You could argue that the first Saw had a point to its ultraviolence and that there's artistic value behind it, though I'd agree with you for every other entry in the series.
As someone who couldn't possibly make it through a single scene of that franchise, but married somebody who loves it, I'd say the only point is "violence begets violence", or something similar, like "misery loves company" 😅
@@anamazing2297 It's a little more like a rollercoaster ride, the entire point of watching it is the "point" the killer is trying to make. You compare the situations the characters find themselves in, and their sins, to your problems. And you experience, vicariously the thrill of trying to survive against impossible odds, but in a safe environment, while being reminded to try not to take your life for granted.
@futurestoryteller Makes sense. I'll use that in the future, since I'll never watch it willingly 😅👍
Saw 1-6 are excellent
Saw is the worst example he could have chosen. It's the one series where the antagonist sees himself as a teacher and uses his methods to impart his lessons that he explains to the other characters very dramatically.
I just love your videos. I can always pick out at least one gem, usually more, and you don't deal with political agendas within the writing community, which I appreciate. Thank you.
So glad you enjoy them. And yes, I try to stay away from politics! Just want to talk about fiction.
I agree...left or right, we all enjoy stories here
Sociopath's stories are just as valid as empath's stories.
wow, more information in this video than I can process! I will have to watch it again. I do appreciate your videos. Thank you!
12:25 Not that it detracts from the point, but the angel did it to gather the additional souls of the passengers descendants that could be born, since they survived for the war in Heaven. He made that Celine Dion excuse to hide the truth and to mess with the Winchesters.
This works, because he is introduced as a petty and selfish character and the Winchesters only know him as such.
You are spot on about Aaron Sorkin's dialogue. I watched one episode of newsroom and made the same conclusion
8:33
Oh my god, finally I know the right term for what's wrong with Marvel productions.
They are insanely guilty of Dialogue Ventriloquism, most exchanges are just constant snarky quips and one-liners that feel like people in a writer's room scribbled it all on a whiteboard for later and just chucked the lines into the script whenever they couldn't think of anything to write.
Snark worked well for Iron Man, because Tony is the kind of self-absorbed shallow guy to throw snark out to avoid real conversation, and quips worked for Spider-Man because Peter uses humor to keep from losing himself to stress or introspection, or to throw an enemy off-balance by frustrating them.
Other heros are **not** like them, and it's frustrating to see their unique personalities run through a quirky snark filter courtesy of the hacks making the scripts.
Captain America and Bruce Banner are really smart, well-balanced men that would want an engaging dialogue, but would be frustrated by dealing with someone like Tony, they wouldn't be constantly jabbing back.
Banter is not just snark and quips, and it's really hard to watch.
A counter to the Kitchen Sink is Alita Battle Angel, which had so much crammed into the movie but it was amazingly done and one of my favorite movies from that year.
Wow, my problem is the usual one: the middle section. None of these are an issue.
I feel good now.
These videos are just so high quality
Thank you!
16:50 nope, I didn't expect this. :-)
Really solid video. I just got back into writing in my spare time, and I notice that it's hard to not fall for all of these traps. So far, the best test I've come up with isbto ask myself "if somebody was reading this aloud to me, would I be bored?".
The "Everything but the kitchen sink" syndrome - okay, but I will pull it off.
Dude, you're not the exception 💀
@@sheila19954 No problemo machiatello
I have faith in you comrade
Give me hell!
Kurt Vonnegut, Breakfast of Champions.
I am currently working on a novella, it will be my first published work. I was expecting this to be a checklist of things I messed up, but instead, it made me feel better. 😀
I must admit I give out a heavy sigh of despair every time someone informs me of let another heavy tome on writing I need to buy.
Well, you can just watch my videos instead! Or take some courses with me!
This video provides excellent criteria for a novel. I shall do everything mentioned!
12:49 That was a lie to Sam and Dean. The real motivation was to get more souls for the civil war in heaven by harvesting all the people saved and their descendants
Great list! Informative and helpful.
I will say, the only one I seem to struggle with is "Everything but the kitchen sink syndrome". I am an ideas and characters person and I love cultivating ideas and fashioning characters. The struggle for me is that I get excited about so many of them that I want to try to fit everything (and everyone) in, and if I can't, then I get frustrated because I am impatient. I don't want to *wait* to use those characters and ideas. I definitely need to work on this impulse.
I'm going to do every single one of them
Not the TikTok reference at 16:48 lol
Jokes aside, this is probably the most engaging, to-the-point, and easily memorable video on novel writing I've ever watched. Will be referring to this again in 2-4 business days when my characters have stopped listening to me, I've been stuck on the same sentence for three hours, and I've completely lost the plot in a literary and mental context. Thanks!
Babe, wake up! Bookfox uploaded another videoo!
I suspect you have a bebe in the first place
😂😂😂
I just now discovered you and, after watching, subscribed. Excellent insights! When you introduced the section on metaphors, my mind went straight to Raymond Chandler.
I am good for a lot of these, but I always have to check myself with the Checkov's Armory and "Everything but the Kitchen Sink' traits. I vomit all these potentially cool ideas and realize quickly I need to pull back and look at it all again from a simple lens; 'what do I want the reader to take away from this story? What elements are truly important in order to accomplish this?" And then I will remove characters, remove unnecessary reltionships or world building and plot points and save those cool ideas for another day. There are times where I accidently lose track of plot holes, or places where something cool is introduced but never touched on again. I recently remembered that there was a magical tracker that a character had on them but it is never really mentioned again; so I have a really cool plan for how it will be used, and making sure that it is mentioned a couple times as a reminder to the audience it still exists before it is used for a very important plot point. Keeping track of things and bringing them back is important!
Appreciated this. I've got some ideas and I'm trying to figure out How to get the story to do what I want
Okay, so I honestly believe they were supposed to be throwing that football in an alley, but because Wiseau had every set built in a studio (like Hollywood films of old) it looked like it was inside. That's also why the rooftop scene looks so obviously green screened, because it was.
Ventriloquism is definitely a problem that I fear happening in my own writing, and it’s so hard to recognize. That’s why there’s such value in having a trusted and honest friend to read your writing and point things out.
Clockwork Orange goes much deeper than 'he was punished, he is good now', that's actually very boring interpretation of what happened.
Supposedly, author said he didn't like the Kubrick movie because Alex isn't reformed by the end, so it doesn't _sound_ like it's much more complicated than that. tbh
@@futurestoryteller it's been a long time since I've read the book but if I remember correctly, he doesn't give up his violent ways due to the punishment. I think the punishment/brainwashing doesn't work as intended, but he ends up basically just maturing and being better on his own later basically just by growing up and reflecting on how crappy he was as a teenager
@@futurestoryteller Perhaps, but what if you didn't have Burgess to tell you what "he" thought of Alex, his character? How will you know Mr. Henchard's real sense of guilt, or lack thereof, if Thomas Hardy is not there to tell you how to interpret his novel? What are Prospero's motivations if Shakespeare never told us, in writing, how to really view The Tempest? There is a slippery slope here. Authors write (and publish) their work. We interpret that work. Whatever Burgess may have thought about his character is fine and dandy, but should not influence readers in their own embrace and attempt at understanding Burgess' novel. I happen to agree with luthor24127 that A Clockwork Orange goes much deeper than the simplistic approach luthor is criticizing, and I mean the book, not the film. If Burgess disagrees with me, that's too bad, but the man left plenty of clues (whether intentionally or not I don't know) that point towards a far more complicated interpretation, one that goes beyond the "he was punished, he is good now" approach to which luther takes exception.
"How will you know Mr. Henchard's real sense of guilt, or lack thereof, if Thomas Hardy is not there to tell you how to interpret his novel?"
And how will alien androids who don't speak English, and know no guilt interpret it, in a billion years, when the meaning of the text itself is long since indecipherable? The death of the author is simply transference of ego from author to audience.
I'm not defending the point itself, I'm not even completely sure he said it at all, feel free to take it with a massive pinch of salt. But Art is a form of communication. It happens to be the only form of communication where we allow the listener to disregard the intent of the speaker because "art is ambiguous." Communication is always ambiguous.
Hell. History is ambiguous. The fact that something might need more context to be fully understood is the very nature of reality and of understanding. Treating fiction differently because it's not real is just another part of the ego trip. If the author's not around to tell us something, they're not around, but if they are around to tell us something, or they've already said it, "what if it _didn't_ exist though?" Is not gonna fly with me.
@@futurestoryteller Perfectly valid way to deal with reading fiction. I used to do it like that. I still do it from time to time, when I'm not paying attention. Happy readings
This motivated me to stop procrastinating. Gotta stop dragging my feet. Think im afraid of failure or even success. Afraid of what happens when im done.
15:40 There are so many cop shows when you know that hey, this is the 15min suspect, so it's not him and nope, not the 25min suspect either... Once you recognize the recipe, those first suspect reveals become less fulfilling.
Underrated channel. This is actually good advice
He must have quite a few bestsellers under his belt, right?
00:12
Chekhov’s Armory
Can we consider Games of thrones having this trouble?
Could George RR Martin be able to wrap up his novel?
@@mohamed_saleh game of thrones had. Asoiaf dont. I think it's clear how all of the peices will eventually collide in the Winds.
For a while I had a theory that Game of Thrones ended extremely similar to what he had in mind and that the negative reaction had startled him into quietly shelving it. But another video I watched last month persuaded me otherwise- he's just struggling to get the writing both complete and up to his own standards.
Kingkiller Chronicles is a better example in a similar vein
can't have unsatisfying resolutions without resolutions :)
I appreciate your use of movies as examples because you instantly restrict the field to what is possible to do well in a limited time. When I argue about movies, one of my fundamental arguments is that novellas make better movies -- because a novella tends to have the right amount of characters, plots and subplots (if any subplots), etc, to make a 90-180 minute movie and still get pretty much full treatment. An example using two of my favorite movies:
1984 Dune. Too much. Still love it.
Shawshank Redemption. Perfect. In fact, I bet one or two people would call it a short story.
In the words of old world corporate auditing, "all and only all" is what you want in a movie or a written work.
I feel called out. I'm guilty of 2, 7 and 12.
😂😂😂😂
Me with a main band of 10 fully developed characters seeing #2: You dare challenge me?
@@ermlerml7925 😂😂😂😂😂
Good. Knowing the problem is step one towards fixing it.
This was an incredible help to me. Thank you!! 💐
With the dialogue thing. just making a character curse a lot does not work. A lot of romances do this with their men, and it's just the woman's dialogue with a lot more 'fucks' thrown in.
Excellent video, thank you so much! You've really reassured me of being on the right path with third draft of the novel I just spent the last several years on.
George R.R. Martin's "gardener" style falls deep into Everything-But-the-Kitchen-Sink-Syndrome and Worldbuilding Vertigo by ASOIAF books 4 and 5.
While he was a big inspiration as far as even my major characters having thin plot armor, I consciously avoided his trap of name dropping "So-and-So from This-or-There" on every other page. The only people I mention who are already long dead have some point to the current narrative.
tbh, daenerys has some of the thickest plot armor i've ever seen
@@rickmel-q7m Do you mean her being fireproof when her dragons were born? George explained that as being basically a one-time thing of Targaryen magic.
@@TurquoiseStar17 no, i mean how she always ends up profiting despite making bad choices because she has the magical dragons thanks to her magical powers
Thank you for this! I was dreading the idea of having an editor. Not knowing what to expect. But now that I've seen this video, I'm convinced I should never have one.
😂😂😂😂😂
Ending up with a bad editor is of course a destiny worse than death. But a good editor is worth hes (his or hers) weight in gold. And then you can end up with an oldfashioned editor saying "This whole manuscript is crap. But the last sentence is good. Take that one and write a new novel, and I might publish that." Authorship is often a case of "life is hard, but I'm harder". cheers! / CS
Excellent video! Liked, and subscribed
_Laughs in Legend of Galactic Heroes_
I personally think that, watching videos like this leads to death of creativity.
You get stuck in " _You shouldn't do this, you shouldn't do that_ " then you see or read examples of people who didn't give a shit, did what they wanted to do, and succeeded.
So the moral of my comment is: Just, write. Just do it. Stop watching videos like this and just write what it is you want to write!
This. Rules are meant to be broken.
Life's too short. Write what makes you happy!
Great video. I might go further on the example of Moby Dick where you say “… there is a section that goes on and on about …”
My experience was that there was one section that didn’t drone on and on: the last 25 of 481 pages that was the actual chase and final battle. I felt the Hero’s Journey was finishing the book; I was exhausted
Man, you nailed 'LOST' - the experience felt like a long, drawn-out betrayal.
I'm one of these people who believe everything the author tells me. I got annoyed at this and dropped the show within 2 seasons
@@Cocc0nuttt0 took me about 5 episodes then spent the rest of the run and indeed the rest of jj's career raging that we hadn't grabbed up our pitchforks and chased them into the sea.
And what sticks in my craw is that it didn't cause lost or JJ to fail.
What about it felt like a betrayal? I'm genuinely curious, not trying to be an ass.
I bet you're one of these people who think the characters were dead all along, died on the plane crash and the island is purgatory. I know it must come as a shock, but that's not what happened in the final episode. And every question can be answered by analysing the plot, the show never spoon-feeds you information.
Only if you completely misunderstood it, lol. Let me guess - you think they were dead the whole time or that none of the questions were answered. Neither of these tired complaints are true, they're just exhausting.
regarding number 9: When you have so much exciting backstory, that the present actions feel boring in comparison, then your story should play in the past.
I'm glad you brought up Snow Crash. It seemed like such a cool book but I DNF'ed at around chapter 5. So glad i got it from the library.
This was really helpful, thank you! I have too many similar sounding characters and the characters are too much in the present.
What is the empirical evidence for the "90%"?
Thank you! I'm pretty broke right now, but I might be able to ask for your course for Christmas. I'm going to write the bulk of my novel in November, but I think your course would help with the revision process :)
I do have a whole course on Revision! And I'll probably have a sale for Black Friday.
I'm looking for a dwarf in mining
brown eyes
Guild son
4'5"
Ha! You get me. You really get me.
Thanks for this! Brilliant and really instructive. I'm subscribed. Looking forward to more!
Thank you! And welcome aboard!
1:46 i know a few people who could really use this advice *cough* *cough* hazbin hotel *cough*
I would be strongly cautious about using specific accents and dialects in writing. If you write them out... it can become hard to read, and annoy the reader. There's also the risk of accidentally stereotyping certain groups of people, or making them look bad. Which can piss of a lot of readers. Writing normally, and saying "he drawled" as a tag is different, and works just fine. But going: I vas very varm" the german said. Could have more backlash. See the difference? :) Using different vocabulary for different characters, and making one longwinded and another short spoken, giving them different triggers and tempers, etc is way more interesting and makes a bigger difference in the story.