#violetvineyard

--or things that i’ve found work for me. disclaimer: these may not work for you. take these as only suggestions.

don’t let yourself hit backspace. even though you might think what you just wrote is complete trash, it’s still something you wrote. you never know how helpful it might just be - maybe it’ll further your story, maybe it’s some character building tidbit, or maybe it’s just pointless fluff. whatever it is, you can save hitting backspace for editing.

if you can write using background music, write to your favorite movie soundtrack! or, use one of the million bgm music videos on youtube. personally, i like to write to “in love with a ghost,” “biosphere,” or “snail’s house” since they have some really calming songs. that, or the stardew valley ost! it might help you tune out everything going on around you.

try writing in a new place. the feeling of novelty might help refresh your mind. maybe it’s just another place in your room, or another table at the coffee shop you always go to. who knows?

don’t forget to take a break. burnout can creep on you and take as long as a year to get out of. things to do on a break: listen to music, go for a walk, play video game, or literally anything else!

rotate wips! of course, this depends on whether or not you want to have multiple wips. i’ve found that by rotating wips, i’m able to avoid straight burnout and keep writing, although with a different story in mind. it gives me a break from what i was focusing on, but also doesn’t let me forget how to string words together in nice sentences.

set small goals for yourself. whenever i hit a slump, or get burned out, i tell myself i’ll write 100 words and then go play a little bit of a video game or read a book. of course, that means i usually end up writing less than i wanted to, but it’s progress towards the goal of climbing out of the slump. usually, i up the amount of words as i grow more comfortable with writing again. i go from 100 words to 150, to 300, and so on.

talk to someone about your wip! i ramble to some of my friends about it and it helps me figure things out. sometimes, i fix a plot hole. other times, i figure out what to do with a character or where i should go next. they can give you some really great input, or just help you along the way.

let me clarify this: if you really want to improve your writing, focus on the things you want to improve. take that out of your writing and only do that. for me, i’ve always been bad at dialogue. so i’ve started writing in the form of a play script. 

an example of something bad you probably unconcsiously do: i hate worldbuilding. very much. i used to just put it off, focus on character interactions instead. this is the issue: i wrote a lot, but it was always the same thing.

there came a point where i just couldn’t keep going if i didn’t know important parts of my world. so lately i’ve been working on magic systems, and i’m actually starting to like them. next step is the government. i’m going to keep going from there. 

The siren’s song, It plays along The cresting whitecap waves

From splashing tails To snow white sails, It fills the foggy bay

The prows of ships Turn t’wards the cliffs Of crags and caverns grey

The mist, it clouds, Conceals and shrouds The cries of sirens’ prey

A woman runs, The only one To escape their waylay

Her glasses bright With flick’ring light When thrown the siren’s way

The lenses shine, Catching their eyes, Leading them each astray

Their hunt forlorn, The sirens mourn The one who got away.

- An excerpt from Dione Nikolaeva’s journal, based on a personal recount from Dr. Zhaohui Shen

(Check under the cut for more information~!)

I don’t know firsthand because I left the server after being officially reprimanded for “chat policing” for sending this message suggesting that dogpiling a minor is bad:

but yeah, pretty much everyone knows the VV server has been shut down now. I don’t know the “official” reason why but it coincided with the owner being accused of tracing art, and a bunch of people “defending her” by being transphobic to a 19 y/o by making fun of their chosen name. so. yeah. that might be why it shut down? I don’t know if there are more internal reasons, but these apparent external ones have been covered in depth by @nuwuhorizons

It’s only natural that novels and short stories are usually dialogue heavy - it’s a written medium. We need the characters to talk. However, a lot of the time we have difficulty writing dialogue. 

Hopefully these tips will help some people!

How to Make Your Dialogue Better:

Relationships and voices matter. Unique voices matter, and character relationships will affect how they speak. Think of how strangers or friends or siblings would interact. Even friendly strangers will hold themselves back a little. Think of how Iroh and Zuko from ATLA talk, for example. Their relationship is clear from how they speak, and they have unique voices. Iroh frequently spouts wise idioms and is generally calm and serene, while Zuko is all anger and urgency. Think about how your characters feel about each other and how they might interact.

Summarise the boring parts. A common mistake in bad writing can be to repeat in the dialogue what was just described in the inner monologue...exactly how it was just described. You don’t need to do this; summarise it. Reword it. And you don’t need the characters to go through the usual motions of small talk every time they meet. It’s boring and a waste of words.

Avoid name drops and dialogue tags. At least, don’t use them too much. People don’t say each other’s name constantly in dialogue without a reason (see Captain Holt repeatedly saying “Rosa” in B99 because he didn’t want her to feel dehumanised. This was for comedy but the point stands). Dialogue tags are fine, but they should feel invisible. Try to use verbs more extravagant than “said” or “asked” sparingly, and don’t end every piece of dialogue with a dialogue tag. As long as every new piece of dialogue is on a new line, it should be clear who’s speaking, and it won’t bore the reader. This will also help vary your prose/sentence structure.

Create pauses through narrative. By breaking the dialogue up with narrative, the characters will pause in the reader’s mind without you having to specify that they’ve paused. This is a handy way to avoid using dialogue tags too much. It can also make the dialogue easier to read if it’s not all smushed together with no breaks. Especially if you have a long passage of one person speaking; long, rambling speeches aren’t that popular anymore (not that they have no place, but that’s another story).

Dialogue isn’t perfect. People make mistakes; they forget words and lose their train of thought when they speak. They change topics and get lost in the moment. This can add realism to your dialogue, and can be a fun way to show character. But don’t do it too much or the scene will go on too long without getting to the point. And try to avoid too many ‘um’s and ‘er’s - they may be common in real life but they can drag the prose down if used too much.

An example I have is from Big Hero 6 (a movie I love by the way, but this was bad): Tadashi: What would mom and dad say? Hiro: I don't know. They're gone. (this is good, this is fine) Hiro: ... They died when I was three, remember? (NOOO)

Dialogue should show something important. There's a common idea that dialogue has to move the story forward or get cut out. This isn’t necessarily true. However, dialogue should tell the reader something about the characters or the world they live in. This comes back to cutting out the usual mundane small talk. Dialogue doesn’t have to move the plot, but it should be there for a reason, even if it’s to show the relationship between two characters, or how they feel about something that isn’t central to the plot. It doesn’t have to move the plot forward, but there has to be some reason for the reader to see it.

Fantasy/Sci-Fi Writers: use apostrophes! “I am not”, “I did not”, “I do not” - this can feel unnatural if all your dialogue is like this. You don’t need to write all your dialogue like this. Don’t be afraid of the apostrophe! Apostrophes are great! It won’t make your characters seem too modern, I promise. Don’t make the dialogue too awkward or stiff. After a while, they’ll stop sounding human.

How to Make Writing Dialogue Easier:

Write your dialogue like a script. If you’re struggling with the dialogue in a scene, try writing it like a script and omit the narrative (aside from very basic actions). I’ve done this once or twice; sometimes it’s easier to figure out what you want your characters to say when you’re not bogged down by writing the narrative, especially in a scene where the dialogue is especially important. You can incorporate the narrative later.

Read your dialogue out loud. Reading out loud can help you see how your dialogue will sound to the reader. It can help you spot weird sentence structures, or if something sounds out of character or inhuman. You can also get an idea of the characters’ voices. If you have a willing friend (and you’re not too embarrassed), try to get them to read with you!

Colour-code your dialogue. This is a trick you can use for scenes with more than two characters. By colour-coding the dialogue, you can clearly get a sense of each character's voice, see who's speaking the most or the least, etc. You can use this to redistribute roles and dialogue in the scene, or maybe experiment with adding or subtracting characters depending on their contribution to the scene. It can also help you keep track of all the characters, which is generally harder in written medium when you can’t see the group in front of you.

Like these posts? See more Writing Wednesday tips Request Writing Wednesday topics here

As you may have heard, my flash fiction piece ZERO has been published in Bright Flash Literary Magazine! ZERO follows a 9/11 search dog’s desperate attempt to find survivors, while struggling to understand the catastrophe before him.