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Saturday, Dec. 28, 2024

11:36am EST

Members: 806

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Writing Blog Number 2

by S

Rated: 18+ · Book · Personal · #2311764

This is a continuation of my blogging here at WdC

This will be a blog for my writing, maybe with (too much) personal thrown in. I am hoping it will be a little more interactive, with me answering questions, helping out and whatnot. If it falls this year (2024), then I may stop the whole blogging thing, but that's all a "wait and see" scenario.

An index of topics can be found here: "Writing Blog No.2 Index"

Feel free to comment and interact.

Show Recent Comments

10 Most Recent Blog Comments:

Kåre เลียม Enga

32 minutes ago
In response to "20241228 Messages In Writing"

It's the same with setting. There's no need to dump everything on the first page. Or describing the main character in minute details ad nauseum.

Is Narnia Christian? If it's a great story well told, does it matter?

Kåre เลียม Enga

Dec 21, 2024 at 12:34am
In response to "20241221 Kudzu Plotting"

IMO Anne McCaffrey does this well with the parallel Dragonriders of Pern and Harper Hall trilogies. Adults-with-dragons; youth with fire-dragons. Memorable world building. Wonderful characters.

Kudzu the plant... only a curse for those who don't know its uses: forage, food, fiber.

Dec 19, 2024 at 7:09pm
In response to "20241219 'Misogyny' In Writing"

🐕GeminiGem🎁 - I chose Grease because it is so egregious and goes against everything Sandy had demonstrated up to that point. Dirty Dancing was set a few years later (early 60s), and, though Baby changes, it is gradual and is more a change of growing up, being true to herself. So, I think the time period can be used effectively without being so demeaning. As I see it.

🐕GeminiGem🎁

Dec 19, 2024 at 6:58pm
In response to "20241219 'Misogyny' In Writing"

I agree that when a woman changes herself to attract a man shows misogyny and is annoying...but...using the movie Grease as an example it an interesting choice. Yes, the lead female changes her appearance to appeal to the male. I think it was more because of peer pressure, but the peer pressure happened because of the pervasive misogyny of the peers. Interestingly, the male character does the exact same thing for the same reasons.

The movie is set in the 1950's, a time where the misogyny we see now is even waaaay worse. So, here is a thought. If you are writing about a time period like that and are showing social interactions of the characters, something like the pervasive misogyny is going to be true to the time and place the story takes place. Does that excuse it? No, of course not, but having present-day sensibilities in an era like that would make the story seem really off.

Kåre เลียม Enga

Dec 19, 2024 at 3:57am
In response to "20241219 'Misogyny' In Writing"

In my travels I try to connect with most everyone. I wonder what my stats would be... but many contacts have names whether human or not, whether the boss or 'servant' or guest.

In my writings...

thinking.

I do have characters without names.

SAD Holiday Potato

Dec 18, 2024 at 3:54pm
In response to "20241218 Children Characters"

As someone who is an Aunt to two children who have an age difference of four years, I can definitely tell you that they act completely different. Even though one of them is neurodivergent, the older one definitely acts more mature than the younger one.(also the older one has never tried to lick my feet.)

With very few exceptions, I've never had to tell an adult "stop eating my dress," "please don't lick me" or "stop pulling my hair," to anyone over the age of six. Yet within the last year or so I've had to tell my five year old niece these things repeatedly. She thinks this is hilarious.

Anyways, thanks for pointing out that kids aren't just miniature adults! I'll try to keep that in mind while writing.

Dec 18, 2024 at 6:44am
In response to "20241218 Children Characters"

Elisa: Snowman Stik - Writing about those who are neurodivergent is not something I feel I can talk about comfortably. I am trained as a teacher of those on the spectrum, and so I would not write a character in that regard because I do not feel it is my story to tell. But, yes, that last point may not apply to a child with developmental issues.

1 Like

Elisa: Snowman Stik

Dec 18, 2024 at 6:28am
In response to "20241218 Children Characters"

I am curious if there is wiggle room for the last point for child characters with developmental disabilities. (I do recognize this kind of character presents its own set of development pitfalls in terms of depicting the disability without stereotyping. That said, I think this can be a reasonable exception to the rule when done with care.)

1 Like

Dave Ryan

Dec 16, 2024 at 1:26am
In response to "20241216 Poor Characterisation"

There was once a variation of "compressed vice" in an original episode of Star Trek ("Who Mourns for Adonais?"), where a landing party of the usual suspects + one random never-seen-before-or-since female crew member are captured by the god Apollo and they turn the usually gruff Scotty into a simpering, love-struck puppy to try to introduce some conflict when Apollo puts the moves on her. Why they didn't just have Kirk horndogging it as usual I do not know - at least then everybody would have remained consistently in character. It looks like Scotty, it sounds like Scotty, but WTF?

1 Like

SAD Holiday Potato

Dec 14, 2024 at 3:41pm
In response to "20241214 Punk Genres"

This is interesting yet confusing. So basically it's like world building but with the word "punk" in there to make it sound cooler.
Maybe I misunderstand.

February 11, 2024 at 1:31am

#1063963

20240211 Setting – A Final Word

Setting – A Final Word

I hope this is going to answer three questions:
1) Is setting important?
2) What makes up setting; what goes into it?
3) How much is too much? (aka: Does the colour of the curtains actually matter?)

Look, I think over the course of a series of posts, I’ve established that setting is vital to giving a story of decent length a grounding. You’re not going to have the word count in a drabble or flash fiction to do it, and even some short story lengths are not conducive to establishing setting beyond the bare bones. But if you have the word count, it is very important.

It is said by some academics that “a story needs three things – a protagonist, stakes and a place where it happens” (a setting). (This is a direct quote from the lecture notes from my Creative Writing degree.) Without that setting, a story does not feel quite real; it “floats there” (same lecture). If a reader has to ask themselves where the characters are, then they are lost.

So, is setting important. Yes.

Now, as to what goes into setting, that same lecture (that I am going to keep referring to for this) indicated there are 4 components:
Location – the physical place where it occurs. This is what I have been talking about up till now. The house, in the town, in the region, in the country. Geography in all its myriad forms. Don’t forget weather in that (or climate if talking longer term).
Time – not only time of day, but time of year, and year itself; a story set in 1980 will be very different to one set in 2020.
Politics & Culture – this was something I talked about in World Building. While it might not be included explicitly, a story set in Australia and the USA are going to be different because the cultures vary a lot; a story set in Russia and the UK are going to be different based on politics alone.
History – this was also mentioned in World Building, but it can also be very specific. Not just big history, but the history of the haunted house – who built it, who died there, how did it fall into disrepute, etc. – is important. Not the personal history of characters; that is not setting, that is character.

As to how much detail should be included varies, realistically, across genre. A story set here and now needs much less than something set 40, 60, 100, 1000 years ago. Science fiction and fantasy will need more detail given than a contemporary romance. What is needed to build the world in the mind of the reader is what is needed. However, a lot of writers do go overboard, especially in fantasy. No, we really didn’t need to know the seventeen different colours of flowers around the tree in the back yard of the Hobbit-stand-in’s hovel-cave, no matter how pretty you think it looks, if he’s going to leave said hovel-cave and never go back and the flowers mean nothing to the story.

Of course, greater word count does mean greater detail. A novel will have more than a novella, will have more than a short story. That doesn’t mean you can add extraneous and irrelevant information, just that you have more room to expand on the things that matter.

If done well, a setting can be a character all its own, one that feels as alive and vibrant as the actual flesh-and-blood characters. Think Pratchett’s Discworld for a magnificent example.

So we come to the final question, and what makes too much detail?

Some readers like the less is more approach; other readers love family trees, maps, lists of characters that read like the white pages of a decent sized town (does that analogy still fly nowadays?) and descriptions of the mountains, plains, rivers and forests.

However, the issue comes when info-dumps occur. You’ve done your research for your story set in 18th century Oxford, but the reader does not need a list of every shop on the main street. You know all about manufacture in the 1600s, but the reader does not need a treatise on smithing in the middle of their historical war novel.

This is back-story. We don’t need to know the life story of the infantryman in World War I who is hit in the face by a bullet next to the hero; likewise, we don’t need every little object in a room described and listed and everything else in a bedroom if they are never going to be used. (Okay, yes, Mario Puzo did tell us about every insignificant character’s life story in the book The Godfather… and that is why this is a rare case where the film is better than the book.)

Quote again: “Setting is very important to every story. However, the two things that matter most are what the characters are doing and what is going to happen to them next.”

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