I have to say my biggest problem is trying to be perfect. When I write, I like everything to sound good - and if it doesn't, instead of just writing the whole thing out and editing later, I edit first and write later. Which explains why I haven't gone very far in my original work yet. I've edited the prologue almost a dozen times (literally), sometimes rewriting completely different scenes.

So, what's your problem? Share with us here!

I am also having a not-so-secret love affair with the semi-colon; I suspect that I use it too often in my work. :P

/vel

Additionally, I tend to assume that my readers possesses a certain level of intelligence, and will be able to pick up on implied events or emotions in my stories without my spelling it out in foot-high neon letters.

I'm the opposite of this; I'm far too paranoid about whether or not my readers *get* what I'm writing, and as a result sometimes I overwrite. I repeat things often unknowingly.

I have the same problem - I describe too much for the reader and explain everything. I leave very little space for my readers to think for themselves. It's weird because I love and admire stories where you have to read "between the lines" a lot.

I think it might have come from reading too much Gregory McDonald in my youth. [embarrassed cough]

/vel

I can't emphasize on an idea enough. My brain just wanders onto the next thing, and so on.

I emphasize little ideas to much. But I cant seem to make the big ones appealing.

:(

I'm a noob here, too...

-Promesse

Other than that, description is my one weakness. I just am not good at describing things. I write something lame like, "The sky was blue," and then I get frustrated and end up substituting some urple prose in instead ("The sky was azure"... ugh). The part I hate most is describing people. The extent of most of my descriptions is "her eyes were [insert urply word here], and her hair was [insert urply word here]", a vague notion of height compared to the height of the character whose POV I'm writing from, and skipping over clothes, facial features, and other such miscellany entirely. Argh, I'm terrible!

(On the other hand, I write for Japanese video game fandoms, so I'm not sure exactly HOW to describe the characters. What the heck am I supposed I write? "Her eyes were the size of dinner plates"? "His silver hair fell like a waterfall down his back"? "He tried to catch a glimpse of her breasts through her barely-existent shirt only to discover that she was really a man"? LOL... gotta love the Japanese.)

Someone do the world a favor and shoot me... v_v;;

(Oh, and my other big problem is writing too much. I tend to go on and on and on. And it doesn't just apply to my fanfics either... can you tell? ;D)

When I look for synonyms in my thesaurus, I usually check with my dictionary too to make sure that word conveys the feeling I want. For instance, if I want a synonym for 'triumph', my thesaurus gives me 'success, accomplishment, achievement, attainment, conquest, coup, feat, victory'. But in the dictionary 'conquest' = the act of taking a country/city/etc by force and 'coup' = a sudden, illegal and often violent change of government, which is very well if my character has done something like that. But if all he did was triumph in a fight with the adversary, 'conquest' and 'coup' would be the wrong words to use. You could try double-checking with the dictionary to make sure you're using the right words =)

Other than that, description is my one weakness.

Perhaps you can try just randomly picturing a character and describing everything about him/her. Not in the context of a story, but just writing a paragraph on what he/she looks like. I rather have a problem describing faces as well, like what kind of noses they have or mouths. Try focusing on different parts of the face and body. Long or short hair? Spiked up? Long nose, short? Is it flat or sharp? Are the eyes big or small and narrow? Does he/she have a well proportioned body or very skinny arms and legs?

I'm with you, Cathrl. I always worry when I write dialogue for characters who aren't Canadian. I (personally, that is) speak a bizarre mix of British, American, and Canadian English. Unfortunately, this means I don't write any of them very well. [thpbltbltblt]

Forgive me, Rhea, but this made me laugh! I'm reminded of a Blackadder quote: 'Disease and deprivation stalk our land like two giant ... stalking things.' [giggle]

In this case, I recommend thinking of other rhythmic things that are quick and loud. Horses' hooves, native drums, machine gun fire, and torrential rain all come to mind, but they might be a bit too purple for your purposes. [grin]

I'm terrible at them too! Arrgh, I just can't think of good comparisons, so I will often focus on the physical signs of someone who is nervous or in distress. "Heart hammering, he fought to control his breathing. His breath came in short, hard pants and echoed off the cinder block walls. Closing his eyes briefly, he took a deep breath and let it out slowly, and swiped at the sweat stinging his eyes."

Anyway, that's how I deal with them, by avoiding them whenever possible!

I might have subconsciously avoided using similes in the past but I'd like to overcome that weakness coz it's kind of annoying, hehe...but if worst comes to worst I suppose I'll just have to avoid them!

Another problem: Writer's block. Need I say more?:P

ChatterChick

There's nothing wrong with shifting POV for a while, especially if you make it obvious you've done so. Not the horrible "X's POV" header, just a little break to show that something's changed (this is where I glare at this site's habit of stripping out double blank lines, because that's what I prefer using. Here I have to use a horizontal line.)

If I catch myself needing a single line in the second character's POV, I try to turn it round, so character A looks at them and wonders what they're feeling (or can tell from their expression etc.)

I used to automatically write third person omniscient (where you sort of flick between characters' POVs rather than being solidly in one) and I've lost it! Now I find I have to be in one person's head for a long time. I wish I could have it back. I think it's the only thing I did better when I started writing fanfic than I do now :(

Let me list out my grand flaws: adverb/adjective abuse, overdescription, jumpy POVs, the emotiveness of a rock, the sense of humor of the same rock...Continue in that vein for a while, and you'll see why I thrive on CC from my [wonderful] reviewers.

On the other hand, my grammar and spelling aren't bad, and I don't think my sentences are too cavemen-like, though I will leave that up to the readers.

I overuse commas, adverbs, and I guess adjectives as well. I think I *under*describe. And sometimes my writing doesn't flow...just like this post.

There is allso a sense of sameness in my writing, but I can't seem to find it. It's sort of a feeling I have.

Also, my action scenes never seem to work. I have a tendency to merge a lot of the things I want to say together into one sentence, so I don't have to write a lot of small, loose sentences that sound stupid. It works pretty wel (I think) when describing emotions, but I have yet to find a way to make action scenes work within this style.

Oh, and my titles suck. Either the entire story is based on the title, or I can't find any appropriate title.

I've always thought action scenes would work better with shorter sentences though...they'd be easier to read and you can get through them quickly to find out what happens next.

When I actually get to writeing I'll only have like one little scene in my head that I've been all juiced up about since it came to be there.

I'll write that out and then I'll take it as far as I can then, nothing. I'll have no idea where it's going or how it started, or I'll have to stop and do something else, so all I have is a fragment that I never get around to building in to something.

And If I can string two pieces or more together they'll be meaty in content but the between parts will be too thin to make the story flow.

I'm also very self concious, a lot of my work dies before it gets to far because I start to think my insanity should stay in my head not on paper.

I have style? *Starts to get teary eyed*

Edit: Wow, I'm not sure what 'completely' is doing in my previous post, but it's not supposed to be there. Whoops.

I'm also wondering if the 'X's POV' thing isn't a good idea. That's the way I'm writing my current story...so, I'll ask the public what they think.

I think I'll get a little better though, becouse I've been looking at some of the websites people have offered up as advice (OFF TOPIC-NESS: Maybe there should be a topic to post all those sites? It would be very helpful if all this crud was listed out somewhere, even if many of the noobs posting here in random topics don't bother looking at it.)

Another problem I have is not knowing how to type properly (...), which means I'm still looking at the keyboard while writing 30 words a minute. Thus, my spelling and grammar comes out worse than ever before! :D

I plan to fix that problem soon with a typing program (which is boring but works), though I still type faster looking down (meaning not-there-yet and not-there-soon).

I also think that I have a bit of a tendency for 'Sue-isms. I do it all the time when daydreaming about the story, but slowly and surely I'm toning them down or making them less perfect-prone. One thing I found that could be useful is seperating out one giant 'Sue-ism into parts, and then seperate them out to the characters. Based off that and how I want them to act, I make up flaws.

I also tend to make sentences a bit over-complicated when they could have been stated in a simpler way (thank you to my Beta-reader for pointing this out). I also have a bit of trouble in keeping tenses straight. Lastly, I think the plots I come up are not that interesting as I don't get any reviews.

Lastly, I rarely write OC's, but I have a habit of taking a canon character and turning her into a Mary Sue *lol*

Also, I'm not very good with coming up with titles and stuff.

I don't do it...

Anyone know a way to get qround this?

My biggest problem is description. I love dialouge, it's what I'm best at, but I forget that no one else can see inside my brain and find out where the characters are and what they're doing. Unfortunately, I just can't get past this. Also fight scenes.

Anyone know a way to get qround this?

I find that the best way to make sure that you get the entire point across is to descride their actions more than once -and yet not make it look like I'm doing it.

That probably didn't help you at all though, so I'd say you should start by thinking of how they say things.

Write how they say things:

When descibing their tone with emotions (playful, exasperated, threatening, nervously, haltingly, desperate, estatic, shocked, chided, ordered, mocked, in exaustion, confidently, ect.),

Their tone in sound or the speed (flat, with a small lilt, drawled, hurriedly, horse, scrachy, sqeaked, whimpered, boomed, sang, ect.),

The volume (screamed, whispered, quietly, hushed, screached, evenly, loudly, simply, ect.),

The facial expressions (smiled, scowled, frowned, gaped, gawked, wide-eyed, smirked, grew pale, blushed, bit their lip, flinched, eyes watered, blank, dead, defeated, tears rolling down their face, ect.),

Then the actions used to express (waved her hands exitedly/in warning/trying to get his attention, shoved his hands in his pocket before looking away, Ran like hell, skidded to a stop, froze, danced, whipped around, sholders drooped, his hands quivered, pulled at her hair/her shirt in nervousness, covered her mouth with a hand in shock/to hide her smile/to try and stop from laughing, ect.),

Then the actions used to express when others are involved/reactions (He quickly hid behind his sister to use her as a shield, she gently pulled on her father's sleeve to get his attention, he grabbed him by the back of the shirt and yanked him towards the door, she backhanded him, he grabbed the broken and shaking girl and let her cry on his chest, hugging her hard, ect.)

I think the last few may be a bit harder for you to remember to do, but I think you'll have to get used to using them if you're dialogue-driven; it will make your dialogue much better and more dramatic and expressive.

In general though, the best way to create descriptions (IMO) is to constantly question yourself on it. This starts with the big six questions:

Who?

What?

When?

Where?

Why?

How?

Unless you want the scene to be shrouded in mystery, you need to answer these questions with every single scene (though you don't always have to be exact about it). Set the stage early on if you reasonably can (Ally whiped her forehead before putting down the heavy box. GOD is it hot! She though, breathing in the humid air -which really wasn't helping her at all- and wishing she was not moving into the new house alone right now. "I just hate the summers here.", ect.)

If you've got a play going on in your head while writing, thry to think about all the expressions used to say without words how that person feels in this situation. If you're the type who needs to just write everything down in that moment without distraction, you might want to just say "he smiled" or "she blew him a raspberry" as short notes on the play. You can then go back and slowly read through it and ask yourself all the six questions (he said "bah, blah, blah!" Why...? At Who...? Because...?, she ran. Where? Why? How? Because they did What?, and when you realize that you haven't said something, just fill it in.

Then there's also points where you need to describe actions without the characters speaking. One way is to just do all of the thoughts and use the same descriptions you'd use with speech, and another is to use only description.

For Example:

She scremed How? in pain, gasping for air Why? as she felt her body being crushed By What? by the dashboard of her car. What's happening and How? She coudn't feel her legs anymore, and all she could see Where? infront of her was the spider-webbed cracks in the car's front window and a mass of decimated plants. It was hard to decifer the green of the leaves around her Where? face, and it was all dark and blotchy. She realized, that for When? mid-morning, it was dark -too dark- Why? and that it should never be possible for night to keep coming so fast. Why? It didn't take her long to realize What? why her her clothes where What? soaked and sticky though, and as the lights dimmed, she realized What? what had happened when she had swerved Where? off the road, and it all came to her.

Who? Elizabeth's What? hope disappeared When? just a second before the light did.

I hope that helped a little (and that you got what I just said, for that matter). :)

I'm in ninth grade, in eight we did spen alot of time on it. And in the 7th grade, I didn't learn jack about grammer.

My wordprocessor has spell check, but not grammer.

I am also coma happy.

Edit: Also, I type too fast.

Edit: I mean, "Didn't spend alot of time on it."

I also type way too fast.

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