Content: police ranks, Promotions and how they work, daily life, career paths, jobs usually glossed over, administration, etc.
Job Related
Here’s a quick rant. There is always one person we know that is constantly blowing smoke out their ass and quoting bullshit facts. I used profanity heavily in that sentence, because those people are the peoples whose hands I’d like to break. There is a large difference between being occasionally wrong and consistently wrong and refusing correction. They are stubborn, angry people whose lies MAKE EVERYTHING SUCK. In writing it sucks even more, because you lose a lot if you;re just making things up as you go along. (Alright, all writers make things up. But you know what I mean.) So let me explain why you need to research for whatever you’re writing.
Facts. Facty Fact Facts. Facts.
Are you writing this down?When you’re writing, doing research can do a lot for you. First off, it lends realism. One of the main goals of writing is to suck the reader into your world without losing them in the process. If you can be specific, it makes everything more realistic and it lends credibility. Saying he saddled his horse works, but if you can go through the process/mention some of the things in saddling a horse, you gain credibility and realism, which means consistency, which means the reader isn’t going to pick up any jarring notes. They’ll learn things instead, and letting your readers go away having taken something away is always good, because they’ll want to come back for more.
Research is needed for fiction writing for the same reason that fiction is needed for an essay or non-fiction piece. There are very few people in the world that can write a non fiction piece on something they know NOTHING about and have it come out nicely. If you don’t know anything about sci-fi, technology, or science fiction genre or convention, it’s going to make it very hard to write a sci-fi novel. Don’t know anything about the Salem witch hunts or that era? There goes your novel based in that historical time frame. You need specific knowledge and facts about those things to make those concepts work. I get very frustrated with people who write novels about people who are living in the woods without having a realistic portrayal of things that happen in the woods, edible plants, snare types, etc. etc, because I have some survivalist training and yeah, I’ll tell you right off the bat, even with my limited scope of knowledge, that that was wrong and a visit to the library/reputable internet sources could have easily corrected that.
Having your story based in fact also lends a sense of professionalism. Writing is a lot of work as it is, but when you do all the things that you need to do outside of actually writing, you are being a professional. You look like you care about what you’re doing and what you are saying. You care about building up a world that people can connect to this one, one that seems realistic and wondrous. Because that’s the other thing. The real world and the facts that float around in it are fucking awesome. Think of everything you could do. For example, did you know stonefish poison has one of the most poisonous neurotoxins in the world? Throw that into a murder mystery. How about some Irish mythology? Let’s change how the world at large thinks about fairies. How about the plasticity of the human brain? Fuckin’ awesome.
Research isn’t just for you. It’s for your readers. It’s about how realistic your world is, the dedication to your craft, and how awesome everything in the world is real. It’s about credibility and realism. Even if your readers take everything with a grain of salt (and they should, since you should never really believe everything you read), using research and fact in the crafting of your piece can make everything you write more wonderful, strange, terrifying, and real.
And you get to avoid being one of those annoying writers where when you read them, you’re just ticking off everything that’s wrong in the back of your head. Which is probably the best thing of all.
Describing a character’s body language can be very important and helps your story from being too “telly”. You end up showing your readers how your characters are feeling instead of constantly telling them what’s going on. For example, if someone’s face “burns bright red”, you know they’re either angry or embarrassed (or perhaps a combination of both). Depending on context, your readers can figure out how your character is reacting. Using these simple techniques can help improve your story and make it much more entertaining.
- A character that is over confident (possibly the antagonist) will most likely stand taller, put hands on his or her hips, or bark orders at others. The way they sit will also reveal a lot about their character. Their legs will probably be unfolded and they might sit up straighter to show dominance.
- Someone who is shy and closed off will slump his or her shoulders or wrap their arms around their legs if they are sitting. They will do anything to remain unnoticed, which will come across in their body language. Submissive people tend to smile a lot because they might not want to engage in conversation.
- Anger can be described through clenched teeth, reddening skin, heavy breathing, or crossing arms. If a character feels physically threatened, he or she might ball her fists as if ready for a fight.
- When people lie they tend to touch their face or avoid eye contact. They will try any physical action that might distract people from the fact that they are lying and it will often be subtle.
- I once read that when you’re attracted to someone or open to conversation with them, you’ll point your knees in their direction. Your knees will often face the person who you wish to talk to. If someone is not open to conversation or feels uncomfortable, they will turn their body away from the person to show they aren’t interested.
There are a lot of clues in everyday life as long as you pay attention to them. If you want to learn more about body language, all you have to do is analyze the people around you or even yourself. What do you do when you lie? How do people know when you’re happy? Take a look around and observe.
Tumblr URL: porcelain-to-steel
Age: 20
Language: American English
Original Stories: No
Fanfiction: Yes
Fandoms: Game of Thrones/A Song of Ice and Fire, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Doctor Who, Avatar the Last Airbender, Legend of Korra, Lost, Lord of the Rings, The Walking Dead (show & comics)
Preference: Rated T-M, Romance
Refused Content: Poetry
Strengths: Continuity, grammar, spotting repetitiveness, descriptive words
Weaknesses: Spelling
Previous stories written: A Plentiful Bounty, Right Where I Belong, Murphy’s Law
There a new beta directory blog on the block, which I was originally excited about, until I noticed how similar our blogs are
As you can see the submission forms are almost identical, and we both have a very similar blog description. I dont want to tell them to go away, as it may be purely coincidental, but the fact that our submission forms are the same makes me think they copied me. Although I am flattered, I put a lot of hard work into this, and I would rather it not get copied…
Does anyone have any advice?
Tumblr URL: lord-of-the-ringos
Fandom: Sherlock
Genre: Romance, fluff, teen
Pairing: Sebastian Moran/ Jim Moriarty
Rating: T
Warnings: Male homosexuality, fluff, attempts of suicide, drug use (implied)
Completed: Not yet but I have 5 chapters done, 2 posted
Length: 3,019 (+ about 6,000)
Title: People are Strange
Bio: This is my first fic (besides a basically abandoned otp challenge.) None of my friends are writers, so I need someone.
What you wish the beta reader to help you with: just stuff like awkwardly worded sentences, plot points that are hard to understand. I’m pretty good with grammar and spelling, but my thoughts don’t always make sense.
Link: AO3
Tumblr URL: meislovely
Original story.
Genre: Romance, Adventure, Fantasy.
Rating: M
Warnings: F/F Some sexual content in later chapters, cursing, violence.
Completed: No.
Current length: 8K
Predicted end length: 50+k
Title: The Show Goes On
Bio: Ash is a lazy, promiscuous girl attending St. Katherine’s academy of the supernatural. When a new student comes and turns out to be her partner, she has to team up with this girl in order to save everything she’s worked for.
What you wish the beta reader to help you with: My descriptive writing and the flow of the story.
Link: Here
Imagine that I’m telling you about my day and I say, “I woke up. I ate breakfast. I left for work.”
Is that a story? After all, it has a protagonist who makes choices that lead to a natural progression of events, it contains three acts and it has a beginning, a middle and an end—and that’s what makes something a story, right?
Your style and how to find it, what influences it, and what you can do to keep it in good shape.
Content: police ranks, Promotions and how they work, daily life, career paths, jobs usually glossed over, administration, etc.Job Related
