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Your Weakest Writing

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Jessica_312

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Just wondering what everyone's strongsuit is when it comes to writing, and what you struggle with. I'm not talking genre. For example, my strongsuit is dialogue and character descriptions. I'm also good at describing scenery, but I'm lazy about it and have to really force myself to do it ("I haven't decribed this building yet, I probably should" :D ). By far, I'm the worst at backstory - I have a horrible time figuring out where to place it and how much to reveal at once.

So, what's your best/worst? Action sequences? Dialogue? Backstory? Setting? Character descriptions?

Just a topic for chat :D
 

MetalDog

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Beginnings and endings. I over-stress about both and as a result they are both clunky and horrible and need crying over.

Characterisation is probably my strongest point - the most consistent good marks I get from beta readers is how real the characters seem, closely followed by tension building.

Sneaking backstory and information in elegantly is like trying to smuggle a giant in a tutu through customs, I feel your pain =D
 

Jessica_312

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Sneaking backstory and information in elegantly is like trying to smuggle a giant in a tutu through customs, I feel your pain =D
LOL! This, exactly! :D

I also get what you mean about beginnings and endings. Although honestly, I'm a master at beginnings - usually, the first line of the novel is what pops in my head first, and I craft the story around it. But that's the problem - I tend to write sequentially rather than seeing the story as a whole first, so I have a tendency to write myself into corners and thus the ending is a beast for me LOL
 

still alive

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Narrative description is my long suit.

Keeping it short is my worst! Short sentences are something I have to strive for!

From a French voluble culture background and Southern to boot...
 

Jessica_312

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Keeping it short is my worst! Short sentences are something I have to strive for!
I used to be really guilty of this, too. I tend to be wordy. Though I'm getting better at identifying it up front, I still have to go back and hack and slash out unneccesary words when I revise.
 

CJ Knightrey

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I'm actually pretty good with backstory, I love world and character building, I work them through until I know more about them and it then I know about myself. :p I feel like my dialogue is good too, at least in a realistic sense, but I struggle with knowing what's too much and what's not enough.

I'm also horrible with second guessing my work, this would be my biggest down fall I believe. I go through long spurts of thinking that my characters suck, or are inconsistent, my plot is horrible and why am I even doing this? But after a few days when I look back over my work I realize that the stuff I wrote on my shit days are of the same quality of my awesome days, and both are pretty good (in my humble opinion :p).

So characterization and world building are my strong points, but knowing what's enough/not enough and second guessing myself are my weak points. Great thread by the way. :)
 
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lorna_w

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Strong suits: character, POV, dialog and, they tell me, "invisible prose."

Weaknesses: I have to think about a number of things. Maybe they aren't weaknesses by the final draft, but they surely don't come easy in the first draft. Descriptions are the biggest challenge, and in particular, putting the occasional smell or taste in there. Because of the weakness of descriptions, I have to really work at evoking a setting. I also tend to magically transport my characters places in the first draft. One dialog sentence, they're on the ground floor. Next one they're on the roof. So I'm forever going back in upon rewriting and adding, "She ran up the stairs and banged through the fire door to the roof," and other stage directions to move them around correctly.

ETA: titles. length. I don't think I have a 100K novel in me.
 
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victoriakmartin

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Dialogue is my strength, though I have a problem when it comes to having "talking heads."

As far as weaknesses go, I definitely think description because I'm not a super visual person when it comes to reading/writing. I'm trying to work on this though (and have a few book recs thanks to another thread here).
 

Jessica_312

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Dialogue is my strength, though I have a problem when it comes to having "talking heads."

As far as weaknesses go, I definitely think description because I'm not a super visual person when it comes to reading/writing. I'm trying to work on this though (and have a few book recs thanks to another thread here).
I'm good at writing descriptions, but I have a tendency to just skip over them and not do it because I'm lazy about it LOL. I have to look at the scene and tell myself, "You need to describe this building here!" and whatnot. Also, I even tend to be lazy with descriptions as a reader, I often find myself skipping over long descriptions as I read. Not sure why LOL
 

mrsvalkyrie

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My writing buddy told me I have a knack for dialogue, so I suppose that would be my strong suit. Haha.

As far as backstory goes-- when it comes to the rough draft, I include it when the need arises, but that doesn't mean I won't take it out or move it around when it comes time for revising. For example, while writing last night, my MC mentioned about dreaming of a dog growling at him (for reasons relevant to the story). This led me to include the backstory of why he is scared of dogs through the other MC reminiscing about the event that caused this fear. It may or may not stay. It depends on how it sounds when I read through it after its completion.
 

flapperphilosopher

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Strong suits: character, POV, dialog and, they tell me, "invisible prose."

Weaknesses: I have to think about a number of things. Maybe they aren't weaknesses by the final draft, but they surely don't come easy in the first draft. Descriptions are the biggest challenge, and in particular, putting the occasional smell or taste in there. Because of the weakness of descriptions, I have to really work at evoking a setting.

This is basically me exactly. The playwriting approach to fiction writing, haha. Evoking settings doesn't come naturally to me at all. Description in general doesn't. I connect with the people of the story readily-- too readily, in that I sometimes don't care enough about the non-people stuff.
 

Shadow_Ferret

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Strong suit: dialog.

Weakness: endings. I have trouble coming up with a satisfying ending. They always seem corny or forced. It's like those songs that don't end, the band just keeps playing as the music fades away. That's how I feel about my endings, they leave the story feeling unfini
 

Squirrel on a Ledge

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I don't know if I have any strong suit, but I sure as heck know my weak area: romance. God, I hate it. I wish characters didn't need to have so darn many romantic relationships.
 

KellyAssauer

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Silly me,

I'm fairly certain my weakest writing is currently available in SYW...

:D
 

Jessica_312

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I don't know if I have any strong suit, but I sure as heck know my weak area: romance. God, I hate it. I wish characters didn't need to have so darn many romantic relationships.
LOL! I have a surprising knack for writing romantic scenes - in fact, I'm a bit of a sucker for them LOL. I'm less great at adding comedy to my stories. I usually try to have at least a little bit of comic relief to break up the intensity, but it usually fails miserably LOL.
 

Kalea

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I'm good at dialogue.

I'm terrible at titles.
 

lorna_w

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I'm terrible at titles.


omg, yes, I forgot about that. Me too! When people title every chapter of a novel, I'm always amazed. How do they do it?
 

MetalDog

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Oh God, titles. All of my WIP titles are abysmal.

Oddly, I have no trouble coming up with chapter titles, on the rare occasion I use them - I think it's the difference in pressure involved. Much like with beginnings and endings. The moral appears to be that at the slightest sign of pressure, I collapse like a cheap deckchair, I really must sort that out.
 

pandaponies

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I'm good at dialogue and characterization.

I'm terrible at intrigue/suspense. :'( Also have a tendency to be rather wordy...
 

buz

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Logical plotting...

Which is unfortunate because I consider that pretty...important...:D

I also tend to ramble. But I'm slowly getting better at both of these things. I hope. I'm at least a lot more aware of them, so I look for it more.

Dealing with backstory is also hard. ...I am no longer totally new at this, but I'm only still crawling out of the hole of "what the duh am I doing", so a lot of things are still hard. :D

I'm told I do good dialogue and characters. Well. Sort of. Apparently some of my characters come off a lot bitchier than I picture them. :D (I, too, come off bitchier than I actually am. It's a pervasive issue.)

And my own voice is "strong", when I use it. I guess. Which I suppose means it's one of those love-or-hate types of things. (Currently agents seem to hate it. But they'll see. THEY'LL ALL SEE)
 

M.Macabre

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Narrative description is my long suit.

Keeping it short is my worst! Short sentences are something I have to strive for!

From a French voluble culture background and Southern to boot...

Same - I try to limit myself to one semi-colon per chapter.

I suffer from chronic fast-pacing and really awkward endings.
 

ladyleeona

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Best at setting the scene, character motivations.

Worst at pacing and plotting, which can make life a little difficult...
 
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