I noticed that.
What does it consider style in terms of a story?
I noticed that.
What does it consider style in terms of a story?
Stylistic choices can mean a lot of things - PWA doesnāt care about stylistic decisions, or āerrorsā that are done on purpose. It operates based on standard style guides, so flags these things as errors.
Understood.
Well, I still have the Chrome extension. I doubt it can help me fully.
I have to understand that Red Reign is a draft that is slightly edited as I write. So, it will not look that awful in whatever the final stages are.
Iām not there yet.
Eight. Eight drafts. I dunno thatās what Iāve been told takes at minimum to produce a text. I donāt count, and determining whatās āeditingā is hard since I, like many others here, edit as I write.
I donāt ābraindumpā when Iām working project; I do that beforehand as a writing exercise. On the few occasions I do rewrites, itās usually a rewrite at the beginning to refine the original thought and initial passages. And from there on I continue.
Eight? Eight drafts? And you write as you edit the story?
In between those drafts, how much time away from the story do you give yourself? Like a breather before you get back into it with fresher eyes?
Yeah eight minimum. I go over every sentence when I finish writing it. Then every paragraph, then the whole chapter. My editing process comes down to selecting the right order of words in a sentence, and the flow from one sentence to another. My primary concern as a writer is the language I use as opposed to, say, āplotā, āpacingā, āsettingā or ācharacterā. I think focusing on language allows a more effective expression of all these elements.
Most of the time I return to a sentence or paragraph the following day. Sometimes a week. For academic stuff Iām on tight deadlines so I canāt obsess about it too much (I use narrative in my research). For fiction I could go on for months refining and reconfiguring sentences.
When you say language, you mainly mean that placement and choices of the words? Focusing on the language over the plot, characters, pacing, or setting of your novel, is a means for you to understand how you can word a sentence or paragraph, in a way to understand how the story flows better?
I felt like I repeated, not sure.
Pretty much. I approach writing as art. I think of it like painting; words are brushstrokes, and words layered upon words, in different sweeps and strengths, produce the image.
I love how you word that!
Youāre a poet and didnāt even know it!
LOL!
6 or 7 and depending on the story it could be 5, but I would say 6 or 7 is a normal amount for me. But that doesnāt mean I always have a ādraft 6ā file. Usually I work on maybe draft 4 or 5 multiple times because by then, Iām not changing a whole lot, so I donāt need to save many different versions.
Btw, I donāt edit as I go. Pantser here. Draft 1 is just getting everything down. Draft 2 is fixing the flow and filling in plot holes, and fixing any inconsistencies, switching scenes around, cutting massive chunks out and putting massive chunks in.
Draft 3 is refining what I just fixed and maybe adding things to expand if I need. Draft 4 is more of that, just a more polished version. Draft 5 is where I start doing a kind of line-editing and often little filling in things.
Draft 6 and 7 is nearly the final step of self-editing before sending it off to an editor if I do choose to do that, or sending off to a beta reader. Iād likely look up crutch words like, for me Iād look for āsmirkā or ājustā or too many unnecessary uses of āthatā.
I canāt do that afterwards. If I have to edit an entire draft over 100k without editing as I go, I will lose it.
Though the idea of finishing a novel that I donāt ever edit (unless I feel itās worth it) once itās done gives me delicious shivers.
I am a panster.
Itās interesting how, despite weāre both pantsers, we come in different flavors
I know a pantser who canāt write anything until she makes a cover with a title which she then refers back to when writing the story.
Can you write a story without a title or do you need one?
I canāt I genuinely cannot. I canāt even start a chapter without a chapter title. It gives me an unsettling feeling if I donāt, I cannot describe why that is.
I have to name something before I can start it.
Not sure if that is an Audhd thing or a āmeā thing.
I often see many others saying they need a title before working on a thing, so I donāt think itās something really unusual.
I also need a title for the project, but the difference between you and me is that I can write a chapter without a title. In fact, Iām so in the zone that I canāt bother coming up with a chapter title. It would break my flow. Sometimes, after a writing session, I go back and name all the chapters I wrote. Sometimes, depending on the genre, I donāt and just use numbers.
But I would give a chapter a title if I come up with it while writing that chapter. Otherwise, chapter naming gets put on hold.
I have to do this too. I have to give the project a unique name, not some random name either. Itās so weird.
I give it a number and a title; Like Chapter 1: Burying Shapes. Even if the title doesnāt represent the chapter, I have to give it a temporary name, until I find one.
I donāt get into the zone until I come up with a title, temporary or not.