All Write - Fiction Advice

Continuity errors might seem one of the least important aspects of a writer’s list of things to watch out for, but they are easy to make and sometimes difficult to spot and yet remain an important part of the writing method. Writing a novel isn’t an instant process. It takes months (years even), and during that time it is feasible and sometimes unavoidable that writers will inadvertently create continuity errors, simply because it’s hard to remember what happened on page 12 when you’re at page 200 of the story and you’re beavering away to get it completed. Just as in movies, the mistakes can sometimes be glaring or sometimes quite subtle, but they are errors nonetheless. Common Errors:- Time – Time of year, time of key scenes etc. Place – Setting, place names etc. Characterisation – Clothes, personal objects, birthdays, names, traits etc. Plotting – Plot flaws and gaping inconsistencies. Objects Time continuity errors happen because writers forget timeframes. A ...

With the usual faults of clichés, grammar, POV and sentence structure etc all corrected through judicious editing - the prose polishing process should then take on a deeper narrative cleanse to tidy the things that are not so obvious to writers, the things that we don’t always look out for. This means looking a little deeper to see what else can be improved prior to sending your pride and joy to agents and publishers. Ambiguity, for instance, is something writers tend to miss.   Ambiguity occurs due to poor sentence structures, often inadvertently giving sentences double meanings and thus confusing the reader (and on occasion, making them chuckle).   What you intended for the reader isn’t always what is understood by them, so make sure every sentence reads correctly and doesn’t give a double meaning. Tenses still remain the one thing that confuses so many writers, and especially so when working in first person point of view because it’s easy to lose focus and slip f...

Every writer should understand the importance of adding finishing touches prior to a submission to an agent or editor.   While absolute perfection is unattainable, writers should tidy and polish their MSS/short story to the best it can be, and this is for several reasons. One is to present to your would-be agent or publisher a professional writer, someone who knows what they’re doing.   Your aim is to make an impression – the right impression.   Another reason is show the reader a flawless, enjoyable piece of writing. Paying attention to your prose – an integral part of the editing process - is vital because this is where your voice, your style, your technique and your narrative is scrutinised by your agent, publisher or readers and the very structure of your prose determines whether it reads smoothly, makes sense, is enjoyable, or whether it is jarring, clunky or doesn’t read right at all. The downfall of some writers is that they don’t pay enough attention t...

Imagination alone isn’t always enough to help you write.   Writers can fill their stories with as much ‘made up stuff’ as they like, but there is no substitute for astute observation – the kind of things that add fine brush strokes and layers to your narrative. Observation is one of those things you can choose to include in your writing, or not.   It’s entirely up to the writer.   But writing without some observation is like a painting without colour.   It’s about noticing the smaller details, the backgrounds, the minutiae.   The kinds of things that help build a picture, a scene or a landscape in the reader’s mind. Artists, for instance, don’t paint with their hands – figuratively speaking, they paint with their eyes.   That’s because, on a deeper level, their observation and study of their subject is what is translated to the canvas.   The same is true of writers.   What a writer observes and studies is translated into the written w...

The tortoise or the hare? Everyone knows the old fable about the Hare racing the tortoise, and the assumption that because of his speed, the hare will easily win, until he decides to take a snooze, leaving the tortoise to overtake him and amble across the finish line.   Most writers fall into discernable categories, depending on how they approach writing, and some could be described as hares and others might be more like tortoises.   Writers are as individual as fingerprints when it comes to writing, but how do you approach your writing?   Are you the kind of writer that likes to dispense with meticulous planning and instead rather get right into the writing and letting the story go wherever it takes you?   Or are you more likely to take the time to carefully plan in detail and plot how your story and characters will evolve?   Perhaps you fall between the two types.   You might be a mix of both – you like to get on with it, but might do a little ...

A writer’s job isn’t just about telling a story.   It’s more complicated than simple storytelling, because there are so many devices available to help writers improve and enrich their writing. One very useful tool available to writers is the art of foreshadowing, or in simple terms, the art of subtle revelation, forewarning and teasing. It’s surprising how much foreshadowing is overlooked in fiction – we don’t always think about little things like this and we tend to forget the minute intricacies that help bring depth and richness to our stories. What does foreshadowing do? Foreshadowing has many functions, from providing subtle hints about characters or situations, clues to events yet to happen, to imparting necessary information, but it also serves to move the story forward and to sometimes deliberately wrong foot the reader. Foreshadowing more often than not brings an extra dimension to the story, because it means you are hinting at what might come, what might happen...

There are, on occasions, when fiction writing causes numerous headaches for writers in their pursuit of better writing. One of those headaches is the rate of use and occurrence of ‘he’ and ‘she’ within sentence structures, and in particular, the incidence of the old ‘he said’ / ‘she said’.   ‘He’ and ‘she’ become so commonplace within the narrative when we are writing that we take them for granted, but it’s not until you read back through our story that you realise just how much you have relied upon their usage, and only then you can appreciate how clunky your descriptions might appear if they are overused. Of course, using them is completely unavoidable. We all do it and we do need them, but as with adverbs and adjectives, writers can limit the amount of ‘he’s’ and ‘she’s’ within sentences by tightening and tidying the narrative so that it not only reads better, but it looks better to the reader’s eye.   Look back through previous manuscripts and stories a...