Novelists help each other out! Strengths and Weaknesses

therealbereth 2019-04-27 10:52:23 UTC #1

Hey everyone~

I've seen some threads from '16 and older where people were talking about their weaknesses and such (meaning that was even before the novel page launched lol), but I thought it might be nice to talk about our writing strengths and weaknesses, while looking out for things where we can offer advice!

For example, my greatest strength is character building—once I create a person, they just talk to me, I see their every move instantly when I throw them in certain situations.

With that comes:

natural dialog
an intimate 1st/3rd person narrator
subplots; so many subplots that flow into the main story (pls halp, it's a lot to juggle ;A;)
a character-driven narrative (they make the plot, not the other way 'round)

Conversely, my greatest weakness are... descriptions!

Because I've been focusing on the inner workings of my characters for years, I struggle to describe a scene that doesn't involve action or romance (these, I like lol). But a street? Reminiscing about the city around them for a moment, without it becoming stale? Geez, I can not seem to find good transitions between the character's thoughts and their view on their surroundings. It always feels stiff to me.

But perhaps some of you are just in love with descriptions. I'd love to see them!

So!

Does any of that feel relatable to you? What are your greatest strengths and weaknesses, where do you need help?

Let's discuss how each of us can become an even more dedicated and better writer and creator.

yansusu 2019-04-27 11:03:52 UTC #2

Ah, I love that idea!
I'm actually not so sure what my strengths and weaknesses are though.

I think I'm best at coming up with the story itself but often feel like they are too predictable. Reader feedback told me otherwise though so overall I'd still say that's my strength.

On the other hand, I always feel my action scenes are severely lacking. They fit some of my settings so I think they're important but I'm not able to dedicate a whole chapter to them without it becoming boring so I normally end up with just a few paragraphs which is sometimes not enough.

Considering the descriptions you mentioned, for me they depend on how well I have a grasp on what everything looks like. So if I'm not totally sure of something, I'd search for pictures online or leaf through a book on the subject to find some fitting images. Maybe you could give that a try too?

DasIstWunderblyat 2019-04-27 11:06:39 UTC #3

I don't think I'm particularly good at anything

However, people have been (therefore it's not my own judgement) noting my:

Description; being vivid.
Characters and their interaction; being likeable, enjoyable and believable at last.
Distinguished speech and thought pattern among characters.
Character design (it's not very important being a novel. But hey, I've been drawing much longer than I've been writing)
My introduction to world building (although I admit my current world building is a bit stale because it's low fantasy)

I mostly worry about my:

Pacing; being inconsistent or too stretched.
Description; being too descriptive or technical with many repeats (thus make it boring), people have complained about this. I need to balance it out.
Emotion; it's not easy to me to feel emotion in prose so I'm not good at how it should be conveyed.
Dialogue; maybe stop being an underground-dweller gremlin would help. It's always too dense for no reason.
Consistency; I don't outline and I'm very forgetful, guess what happens next.

DokiDokiTsuna 2019-04-27 17:06:46 UTC #4

Very relatable...I'm exactly the same way. ^^;

Except...I'm even worse with descriptions. Action scenes make me gag; I just try to get through them as quickly as possible while still trying to make all the lines sound cool. And I've never really done a 'romance' scene...I don't think I can. All I can do is write cute fluff, and no one can demand any more from me! >_<

As for inanimate objects like streets and rooms...I just throw the thesaurus at 'em. ^^ When worst comes to worst, I focus on my strength: the character aspect. I try to write about how the character would feel about the scene, and what they might do in it: for example, just last night I wrote a scene involving a very fancy room, and to round out my description I just wrote that it was so fancy, the MC couldn't help but want to steal something from it. 'Course, I used better words than that, but that was the gist of it~.

Allyx 2019-04-27 22:48:51 UTC #5

I tend to be better at description, and this is mostly because I can imagine my scenes very clearly in my head as I write them.

However, I am worse at character development. I like writing with a plot in mind better, so I always have to spend extra time making sure the characters are distinct and not just there to serve the plot. I spend a lot of time trying to design their personalities like real people with motivations, flaws, etc., but I don't have much reader feedback so I don't know how that's going.

It seems that I'm opposite of you guys. Maybe we could help each other out since it seems like we're all good at different aspects?

Zaboem 2019-04-28 00:08:29 UTC #6

These are all good talking points for the book club threads. I haven't had enough feedback to clearly establish my own strengths and weaknesses, but I have an educated guess.

Strength: comedic dialog, that is pretty much my thing. I have entire chapters which are nothing but my characters roasting other Tapas novels. I am thinking and quarantining those chapters into their own separate book to simplify the situation with my Creative Commons license.

Weakness: Accessibility. By that, I mean a few things crammed into a single category. One accessibility issue is the narrowness of the themes. For example, few people have even heard of the Breachworld RPG, so authoring an unofficial book in that setting shrinks my audience down to just about me. Also, my characters are unrelatable, unsympathetic, jerks and numbskulls. Lastly, I havr a distinctive writing style. My writing style is very colorful to an exaggerated degree for comedic effect. Some readers cannot get past the first paragraph or two before deciding that they just don't like it.

therealbereth 2019-05-03 13:30:57 UTC #7

Dang, I am sorry to keep y'all hanging here for so long after starting the topic in the fist place;;

But I'm happy to see all of your replies! So now, after days of being a hermit crab and then forgetting I started this topic at all, I can try and actually answer you. (Srsly, don't try to remember anything with a pregnant brain; it isn't your friend lmao)

It isn't too easy to discern one's own strengths and weaknesses, for sure. Mostly, the more experience we gain, the easier it gets, but I think it's safe to say that your strengths lie where your passion lies. I love characters and their interactions, so, naturally, I put most work in that skill over the years; but limited narrators tend to make it hard to describe the world, so that's my weakness—naturally, again. xD

It's not so much that I don't know how something looks; I can envision the scene just fine. But since I work with limited narrators (either 1st or 3rd person), describing the surroundings either results in something lackluster the reader can't really see (if I focus too much on the character's pov), or I risk getting in the way of the character, making the words sound stale and unfitting for the rest of the text.

I know the problem, I just can't fix it right now. Sigh. xD

What is your struggle exactly with action scenes? Can you pinpoint where they pose problems for you?

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I think I could possibly lend a hand when it comes to emotions, though! Do you put yourself in your character's shoes, or are you more one to keep your distance when you write scenes that are supposed to be emotional?

That is super clever; I should try to focus more on that, as well. I remember one scene I once wrote (in German, sadly, so I can't share it right now) where my protag was just sitting in a cell, waiting to be interrogated. And he was bored. And I wrote the scene so that, when reading it later, I felt his boredom, but without being bored myself, but more amused with his thoughts (he contemplated throwing a chair around the room just to make things more interesting lol), and I was so proud of that one scene. XD

But I never managed to do it quite so vividly again, so definitely taking your approach to heart for the next edits of the chapters I'm gonna upload. <3

Have you tried developing the plot around the characters' wishes and goals? Maybe that could be an exercise when you struggle with character development. I always feel like plots that are driven by the characters (and not the other way around) are more engaging in a way? But that might just be a preference;;

How do you plan your plot, though? Do you have detailed outlines? Timelines? I don't work with any of that and pants my way through the story based on what my characters want to do at any given moment, and so far, it hasn't bitten me in the ass.

Hm, I have a protagonist (in a story that's not yet online here) who's an arrogant assassin slash rude know-it-all. While not sympathetic, people find him interesting: his shattered psyche as well as his tendency to do the right thing regardless of personal feelings give him a depth that allows readers to root for him within the narrative, even though you would keep your distance from him in reality.

Maybe that spark of "interesting" is something you could work more on when it comes to your characters?

yansusu 2019-05-03 14:15:39 UTC #8

It's a lack of knowledge and confidence
I'm super un-athletic so I can't try stuff out and I don't know enough about things like anatomy, self-defense etc to set it up theoretically (which is probably what I'm going to change but rn I don't have the time for that so it's going to take at least until next year). And then I'm writing Chinese stuff so I'm stuck somewhere between "realistic, believable fight" and "flying Daoist Masters". So I kinda gloss over it before anyone calls me out on it

kaikeagan 2019-05-05 19:42:22 UTC #9

Ohhhh!! This is an interesting topic...
Okay, so for me, I would say that my strengths related to writing include character building. The whole process just comes naturally and I can create an entire unique backstory in a short amount of time. The characters speak to me and they feel so real, sometimes I wonder if I should get them a birth certificate.

However, my weaknesses have to do with description. Similar to you, I struggle with describing places and scenes. There is nothing I find more tedious than painting a classroom or a forest into a reader's mind. I don't know, it's just not my thing.
Obviously, I'm aware that I need to improve in that area because I do enjoy writing a lot, and I want to share my stories with the community.

WillisAuthor 2019-05-05 20:50:58 UTC #10

Oh, good topic!

Strengths:
Foreshadowing and character development

Weaknesses:
When I second guess myself or mentally stutter while I am writing. It results in paraphrasing the same content for 6-8 sentences in a row. So repetitive info and keep it simple stupid.

Paranoid:
Always wondering if I'm overloading or inconsistent with my Fantasy and Mythology based information.

Allyx 2019-05-06 02:12:41 UTC #11

I designed my plot after I designed the characters, so in a way, the action comes out of their motivations and desires.

Nope, I am a panster. I have lots of vague ideas in my head about where the characters will end up eventually, as well as how they will get there. I also know the histories, backgrounds, and relationships a character has. However, all this information is just stored in my head right now.

DasIstWunderblyat 2019-05-06 02:32:09 UTC #12

I do try to put myself in their perspective, plus predicting how they react based on the circumstances and personality.

I do think we have to emotionally detach ourselves from what we write to some degree, and so far what I write doesn't have an highly upsetting or emotional scene.

I'm just thinking maybe it feels flat because I'm the one writing it, but seeing people crying and sympathizing with their own characters when writing making me think if I'm doing it wrong.

Zinx 2019-05-06 19:58:24 UTC #13

Descriptions are definitely my weakness. With me, I feel like I get so involved in my story before I actually start typing it out chapter by chapter that I forget readers don't know everything the way I do, and so I accidentally leave out a lot without intending it.

Strength wise, I think I am good at coming up with unique concepts. Then again, that's only my opinion.

BoredWeaver 2019-05-13 06:29:19 UTC #14

This seems like fun, so...

Strengths:
-Descriptions: I can explain my setting fairly well and build the imagery to how I want it to be
-Emotions: Thinking of how my character would react or confront an issue, dealing with stress, etc., as always been rather easy for me. Along with just how their feeling in general

Weaknesses:
-Motivation: I can get run down fairly easily, and sometimes working up the nerve to actually sit down and write can be challenging
-Dialogue: It will be the death of me
-Overly Critical: I can be really hard on myself and judge my own work unfairly, which deters me from writing.

EmbassyOfTime 2019-05-15 08:02:23 UTC #15

Introspection, here I go...

Strengths: Descriptions, worldbuilding, characters, plots.

Sounds cocky, right? Well...

Weaknesses: BREVITY!

I overexplain, repeat, overdescribe and in general overdo a lot of stuff when writing. So I've taken the consequence of that and am now using my 300K word novel as a draft for writing the longest novel in the world, predicted to come in at 2M+ words when done. It's at about 250K now and 5 chapters done. Make your weakness a strength, I say!

Edit: Also, weakness: Procrastination. But does that even count for a writer? That's like saying doodling is a weakness for artists, at this point...

dparparita 2019-05-15 10:16:42 UTC #16

This will be a long list (mostly weaknesses), but here I go:

Strengths:

Characters: my characters are very real to me from the moment I create them, and I can get inside their heads and figure out exactly what they would do or say in any given situation.
Descriptions: I've learned how to keep my descriptions brief, but also specific enough to present the setting and the mood of each scene.

Weaknesses:

English: English is not my first language (I'm Romanian), so I sometimes find that I've accidentally left in Romanian idioms, or I get confused about which word to use when there are 2 words in English for 2 different notions that are covered by the same word in Romanian. The most embarrassing example I have is that I once wrote "nimble as apes" when I meant to say "nimble as monkeys" because there is only one word for both monkeys and apes in Romanian. Fortunately, an editor caught it, since it was in a story that got published in an anthology, and she sent me the suggested edits with the note that she doesn't find apes to be particularly nimble.
Action scenes (fight scenes in particular): I tend to describe everything that happens, but that slows down the pace. I've been studying Alexandre Dumas' books to remind myself of how he went about writing fight scenes, and I've also been reading Writing Fight Scenes by Marie Brennan, but I haven't improved much.
Sub-plots: my stories tend to go in a straight line from beginning to end. I know where I want the book to end, and I seem to be so eager to get there that I don't know how to write anything that isn't moving the plot in the right direction.
Red herrings (I'm currently writing a murder mystery): this ties into the sub-plots issue. Everything I write in my mystery novels is a clue. It's like telling the readers to solve a puzzle and then giving them puzzle pieces that are carefully labelled to indicate where exactly they go. Any good detective story needs something to throw off the investigation, but I can't seem to come up with anything like that. I have been thinking of using tarot readings to generate random events in the characters' lives, which would divert the readers' attention from the clues, but what I really need is more suspects, and then things that would make each suspect look guilty.

I'm certain that I have other weaknesses as well, but I haven't received much feedback (I haven't exactly been asking for it either), so these are just the ones I can think of on my own. Oh, oh, long sentences! That's the one weakness that I keep forgetting, because I love long sentences so they don't bother me when I re-read my stories. But I am aware that readers prefer sentences shorter than 2 pages each, so I try to break-up my sentences when I edit.