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Help! I’ve written something and it won’t stand up!


In my writing journey, I have had help along the way. I had some pretty good teachers in school that got me going. But in retrospect, a lot of what they taught me didn’t stick (Subject? Object? Participle? What?). When I was in college I fancied myself as a short story writer. I churned out a lot of stories that did not go anywhere. Then I had the experience of taking a writing lab at Idaho State University. That meant one-on-one two days a week with Dr. William Gibson (no, not the guy who wrote Neuromancer, though that would have been interesting; this one was an English professor). That was painful, stressful, hard, but ultimately I would have to say it was necessary. He tore my writings apart, showed me how bad they were. Things that I thought were clever and funny, he found to be trite and overdone. It was kind of a confidence killer. But I made it through. I learned a lot. One of the things I learned was that I seemed to be very fond of comma splices. Okay, I learned what a comma splice was. (And if you are now asking what a comma splice is, go here: https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/maybe-you-like-comma-splices-maybe-you-dont )

The next bit of help I got with my writing was called “reading”. I did not read a lot when I was younger. This is another reason my early stories were lacking. As I have gotten older I have become a voracious reader. I firmly believe that the more you read, the more your writing will improve. And you should read a variety of things. Don’t just stick to your favorite genre. Be an omnireader. This is what I have tried to do anyway. My favorite genre is Science Fiction. But I also read my fair share of general fiction (whatever that is), mystery, fantasy, and nonfiction. The library is my friend. I love having books in the house, but I don’t need any more. I would much rather check them out from the library. (Yes I know ebooks don’t take up any space and I do occasionally read on a kindle, but I still prefer to read a physical book. After all I was born a looooong time ago, back in the days of rotary telephones and the internet was something fishermen used. Okay I made that last bit up.)

As I have gotten more serious about my writing, I have found Youtube has opened up a doorway to helpful resources. Of course as Abraham Lincoln always said “Be careful, not everything on the internet is true.” There are a number of vloggers out there who give pretty good advice to writers or would be writers. Editor Ellen Brock has good advice from an editor’s perspective.  Vivien Reis and Jenna Moreci are both self-published authors who share their experiences and writing advice. And for a bonus, their video’s are fun (Vivien made a video that gave the best explanation ever about passive voice). Of course there are many, many others out there but these are the ones that I have found helpful.

One more helper I have had in my writing is my wife. She patiently reads whatever I throw out there and gives me honest criticism and helpful encouragement. I borrow some of her artwork from time to time, with which I can do cool things. She even helped me figure out how to do this blog thing. We will see where that leads.


(Earlier I talked about the importance of reading. Presumably that means I was influenced by all that reading. In next week’s blog I will talk about authors and/or books that have influenced me.)

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