What's On Your Mind About Your Writing?

Emermouse said:

I tried, but the icons on the toolbar are so small you have to have the eyes of a fairy to make out what does what. Plus, I'm not sure how well this works for someone whose totally more of a Pantser than a Plotter.

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edutton said:

I pantsed in it just fine.

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Same here and I'm a bona fide pantser

Emermouse said:

I tried, but the icons on the toolbar are so small you have to have the eyes of a fairy to make out what does what. Plus, I'm not sure how well this works for someone whose totally more of a Pantser than a Plotter.

Click to expand...

edutton said:

I pantsed in it just fine.

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Dana_B said:

Same here and I'm a bona fide pantser

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I define myself as a plantser (also known as "plant-facer"), i.e., I plot then deviate from the plot after about five minutes. Scrivener helps me keep track of the changes. I either intersperse scenes with "WHAT NEXT?" brain dumps, or (re)develop larger plot points into their own little folder. It ends up making sense. Almost.

I like how the labels and tags can be customised. For me, I track POV chars, and I also have meta tags with the day / time of day, and stuff like: main goal / conflict, etc.

Trying to decide which Uni subject for next semester will most benefit my writing; analysis of literature or poetry writing. I suspect the poetry course would be the better option - if only hearing the stuff didn't make me want to leave a Wile E. Coyote style hole in the nearest wall. My lecturer read out a supposedly famous work by a Big Name Poet this week, but despite his usual high standard of oration after two minutes I just tuned out. All I could think was "that guy could have used a better editor".

I read through one of my fleshy intimate scenes earlier, which I thought was only passable, but is actually really shit.

A clear area to work on.

I genuinely Don't Get poetry. Like, I read it and I'm thinking, "....okay?" but I don't understand why those specific words were chosen, as opposed to other equally as descriptive words.

edutton said:

I pantsed in it just fine.

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Maybe but what the hell am I supposed to do about the icons? I can't tell what the heck they're supposed to be, if that's a Bold or an underline, because they're so tiny. WTF, man?!

Emermouse said:

Maybe but what the hell am I supposed to do about the icons? I can't tell what the heck they're supposed to be, if that's a Bold or an underline, because they're so tiny. WTF, man?!

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What kind of resolution do you have your monitor set to? The icons are legible on mine at 1366x768... I'd have to see a screen shot to have a hope of diagnosing, but I've done tech support for donkey's years and would be happy to take a look (assuming Windows - I'm useless on Macs)... PM me if you want.

Emermouse said:

I tried, but the icons on the toolbar are so small you have to have the eyes of a fairy to make out what does what. Plus, I'm not sure how well this works for someone whose totally more of a Pantser than a Plotter.

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What resolution is your computer screen, and how long ago did you try Scrivener? One of the problems with Scrivener was that it doesn't scale well at all to higher-resolution monitors, and the icons end up being absurdly small, but they (kinda) fixed it in one of the updates this summer. Text now appears blurry on significantly higher-resolution screens (like those laptops with 4K screens they sell for reasons that escape me), but it's better than nothing.

I recently put Scrivener on my 13 inch laptop, which has a 1920x1080 screen, and everything is a good size for my eyes at least.

Yesterday, I felt like writing for the first time in a long time, but then I opened up the document, and nothing happened.

Looks like my friend, and the woman who said she wanted to help me in beta reading my work, have deserted me. I've heard nothing from them, and them chapters aren't but so long to warrant no correspondence in the 3-4 days that I mailed them. I'll have to rely on myself on this one (I love how someone will say they'll help you with something then, when the day comes for that something to be done, they do the quiet fade into space).

Punk28 said:

Looks like my friend, and the woman who said she wanted to help me in beta reading my work, have deserted me. I've heard nothing from them, and them chapters aren't but so long to warrant no correspondence in the 3-4 days that I mailed them. I'll have to rely on myself on this one (I love how someone will say they'll help you with something then, when the day comes for that something to be done, they do the quiet fade into space).

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Welcome to my world. I've had so many people say they want to read my work, so I give them the first chapter and I hear nothing back. I did somehow manage to find one person on AW a few years back read the entire manuscript and gave me lots of helpful advice, and some that I didn't use. I really appreciated that. But everyone else, friend or stranger, never replied. I've since given up on that project (for now) and started a different one, but for the last few years I've been not writing more than writing. I just can't get my "muse" back.

Vaguely related to the last two posts: I don't want a beta reader right now, but I've been thinking I should try to find a writing buddy. But what are the chances of finding someone who won't disappear on me? (Or what if I end up being the person who does the slow fade? That would be equally crappy.)

I remember when I used to participate in role play forums, I made a couple of close friends who could post consistently for long periods, but the majority of members didn't stick around for long. The internet makes it easy for people to be enthusiastic about something for a short period before jumping to the next thing that grabs their attention.

Finally getting back into editing my MS after almost two months in the drawer. Reading through to refresh myself before diving into beta notes. So far, it still doesn't suck...

Tepelus said:

Welcome to my world. I've had so many people say they want to read my work, so I give them the first chapter and I hear nothing back. I did somehow manage to find one person on AW a few years back read the entire manuscript and gave me lots of helpful advice, and some that I didn't use. I really appreciated that. But everyone else, friend or stranger, never replied. I've since given up on that project (for now) and started a different one, but for the last few years I've been not writing more than writing. I just can't get my "muse" back.

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First off, hope you get your muse back (when I lost mine during the project that I'm currently on edit #3 of, I did a mean session of African hunter, with a good coil of rope waiting to be thrown the second I saw the creep, on him; it took me 4 weeks before being able to find and then wrangle him back to where he's suppose to be).


My friend did message me on Facebook to tell me what's going on, so guess she's still on-board (apparently, her roomate/boyfriend has been annoying her, so she can't dedicate herself to reading what I've sent her yet). Still nothing from the one who said she wanted to read and help me in my work -- even after I've messaged her about it, and she's online all the time to boot!


During the final edit of one of the chapters that I put a mean session on, I found that I had a duplicate session with three paragraphs, which amassed to around 500+ words. Once I deleted them three paragraphs, and implemented the new ones, the word count went back to what it was before that edit was done. I do love them "oops" moments where you accidently put duplicates of a paragraph or paragraphs into the document.

The closing chapters have swung into an entirely different direction than the first two drafts and I am thrilled!

Time and place are on my mind, as a character wanders the bustling streets, searching the pubs in the small hours, and a creepy observer uses his mobile phone. But this is 1992 when the pubs shut at 11pm, and mobiles weren't something you could discretely use in the background.

Alternative plot options are on my mind right now.

I was sitting here and researching if it was actually physically possible to thrust a sword through someone's chest to kill them. Then I remembered that the user of said sword was not human and was much stronger then a human would be... so it didn't really matter if it was "real life" possible.

So, I have a combination of a bonk on the head and a neurological language disorder. I think I pass all right in type (cross fingers). I have more speech difficulties than writing.

The most frustrating thing is a lot of my skills don’t transfer. For instance, just because I know how to hold a fork doesn’t mean I know how to hold a pen. My brain acts like those are unrelated tasks. I might also forget in a new situation. “What, you want to hold a fork? Ha ha, you’re at the zoo now. You’ve never held a fork at the zoo. This is now a nightmare.”

So I can write a (decent) narrative. At this point I can do decent technical and conversational writing. Synopses and queries are new. I get to be very frustrated by them for a few years.

LilyJade said:

I was sitting here and researching if it was actually physically possible to thrust a sword through someone's chest to kill them. Then I remembered that the user of said sword was not human and was much stronger then a human would be... so it didn't really matter if it was "real life" possible.

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As long as it goes between the ribs, absolutely.

It's been really tough to keep writing. I work for a state conservation agency, and recently I was sent to help out at another site which is 40 miles away. I leave earlier and get home later. This will continue for about a month at minimum (two of their people are on maternity leave). I've been writing short stories, which is always fun, but in today's world the only way to secure a professional career is a breakout novel. I'm still waiting on a critique from an editor for my most polished manuscript and I shudder at the thought of starting a new one. They say persistent writers are the ones that end up succeeding, but I don't know how much harder I can push towards this goal.

Despite my technical woes yesterday, I actually managed 3k words. I'm thinking that: I rule!

Wanting to hit my head on my keyboard... because going through my notes I wrote from like two years ago, I wrote something about "white water" and I can't seem to find it in other notes... and now that's on my mind.

What do I mean by white water?

Decided which scenes to cut in draft 4 or 5 if my word count is too high, and it highly likely will be.

Reading through the chapters that I did no follow-up edit on -- I've found half a dozen mistakes already, and I've only just started! I so want to be done with this project but I'm only halfway through with Part 2 and have parts 3 and 4 to go (I need coffee, and lots of it.... and something with cream cheese either on or in it).

LilyJade said:

I was sitting here and researching if it was actually physically possible to thrust a sword through someone's chest to kill them. Then I remembered that the user of said sword was not human and was much stronger then a human would be... so it didn't really matter if it was "real life" possible.

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Very easy. Like sticking a steak knife into a cube of butter. 'Course, you gotta miss the bones.

WriterDude said:

Despite my technical woes yesterday, I actually managed 3k words. I'm thinking that: I rule!

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You rule!

SinceIWas7 said:

Wanting to hit my head on my keyboard... because going through my notes I wrote from like two years ago, I wrote something about "white water" and I can't seem to find it in other notes... and now that's on my mind.

What do I mean by white water?

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If your notes are on a computer, a search should cough up all your references to white water in about 30 seconds. If your notes are on paper, well, good luck.