OUUROBOROS

(Alternate title: an assortment of irritants that you should very definitely avoid)
Hello, there :> I thought about doing this post for a while, and I've finally got around to it. This can either be viewed as a list of personal grievances with things people do when they write, or a list of tips to help do it better! Make of it what you will.
Also, pretty much everyone ever will have made these mistakes. I have, and I still do, and then I normally slap myself upside the head when I realise my sins.

1. Remedial grammar.
Because it's the number one thing that people do wrong, and seeing it done wrong is a little upsetting. Observe and remember: Alice's crash course in grammar.

It's: short for 'it is', or 'it has'. (It's really annoying when people use apostrophes incorrectly)
Its: possessive, belonging to it (A leopard can't change its spots)

There = Indicates location. (There you are! Over there!)
Their = possessive, belonging to them. (It's their cake)
They're = short for they are. (They're eating my cake :( )

Your – possessive, belonging to you. (It's your cake)
You're – short for you are. (You're talking absolute flummery today)


2. Description, and over-description
Over-description is, quite possibly, one of my biggest pet peeves. Some description is fine, of course, otherwise your story would be pretty bland. So make it interesting, don't use clichés - be imaginative. The hallmark of the beginner writer is poor description, or over-description. Looking over my old writing from the age of twelve (a dark time for most people, to be fair) I can see that I was just as guilty.

You do not have to describe every little thing. You especially don't need to take two paragraphs to describe a character, particularly a main one. It's not necessary. No one cares precisely how tall they are, exactly what clothes they're wearing, or how poetically you can describe their eyes. Yes, description is fun to write, but be honest with yourself - you can give a character an introductory description in one line, and then you can slip the rest in throughout the story. You can do it imaginatively, too! No more reeling off all their attributes (read: stuff people don't care much about) one after another in a long and boring list.
(This wonderful example has been donated to my blog by my friend Dominic, as apparently my joke description wasn't funny enough. Read and weep. Enter Fuschia Moonclaw Garnet Naruto Maw-Sit-Sit Raven Never Smiles Smith-Jones)

She strolled through the spacious, sixty-seven-roomed mansion complete with thirty nine bedrooms, all of which with ensuites, seventeen bathrooms and a multi-disciplinary swimming pool. The walls were still drying, having had a fresh coat of magnolia just that very morning; allowing the rooms to be as airy and spacious as she liked.
Her shoes, cherry red with extremely long heels, click-clacked across the mosaic-tiled floor, reminding her of an evolutionarily beautiful business woman that she'd seen on her thirty-seven inch plasma screen TV when she had been a blonde, curly haired, chubby eight year old girl.
She deposited herself on one of the nearby seats; a beautiful sculpture of white leather that would have cost her a pretty penny had it not just fallen out of the sky one day; providing her with the comfort and security that a man had never been able to bestow upon her.
Yes, she supposed, it was unfortunate that she was as unlucky as she was. But with the white leather seats and fresh-smell of magnolia paint, she could not be sad. Not today. Sadness never ended well for her. 
"Oh, Chives!" She cooed, careful so as to not smudge her freshly applied elephant-tusk-red lipstick.

(Fuschia Moonclaw Garnet Naruto Maw-Sit-Sit Raven Never Smiles Smith-Jones is, of course, meant to make total sense at all times. Anyone who doesn't like her character is obviously just jealous of how perfect she is, or is racist against Munchkin Princesses. Or wants to usurp her throne. But she doesn't mind because she's so humble and kind to everyone. Gosh, I wish I was as awesome as her.)

Of course, instead of this tripe, you could do something different for their introductory description. Have them catch sight of themselves in a shop window or mirror; note a mass of scruffy blonde hair and a pale and peaky face staring back. Later on you can slip extra bits in - polished fingernails, chapped lips, high cheekbones, a Roman nose. Whatever takes your fancy. Zero in on one or two of their features at a time, don't try and do it all at once. Focusing on a flaw of the character is a good way to go about it - a crooked nose that looks like it might have once been broken, wonky teeth, or anything else. It makes it human. Why focus on perfection, when imperfection is so much more real and fun?

There are some exceptions to what I've said above, of course. Description is fine when it contributes to creating an atmosphere, or is central to the plot.

Outfit description – if the character is putting on a one-time outfit that is particularly special (a lavish ballgown, for example, to go to a party that is important to the story) then you can describe that from their point of view. You just don't need to do it for every little thing they wear.
Character description – you -can- get away with longer descriptions of other characters from the point of view of your narrating character. Normally you should keep it brief - 'the other girl was tall and stocky, with a shock of ginger hair and a nasty grin' but if the character is particularly unusual, go deeper. I say this because one of the characters in my shorts is a human-like robot, and her description is from the point of view of the psychologist who will study her development. Because the robot is not human and is completely alien to May, she gives a much more in-depth description of her. I comment on her factory-smooth skin, skin a single blemish or mark - and how she makes May's own skin crawl. She's real and yet not real, flawless and yet horribly, uncannily imperfect - all at the same time. Deep in the uncanny valley, this one ;>

Anyway, getting back to it. Here's a checklist of what to avoid during descriptions.

Overlong descriptions, especially of main characters, are pointless. One sentence should do, with other bits slipped in throughout the story (ie, in conversation with others 'you're a scrawny little squit, aren't you?')
Focus on the flaws that make them human, rather than how beautiful they are. A broken nose, bitten nails, wonky teeth – all make your descriptions more alive!
Don't use poetic terms all the time, especially not cliché ones. No hair falling like waterfalls, no eyes described as gemstones. Every fool with a notebook and pen does that, and it's at once cliché and Mary-Sue-ish. (more on Mary-Sues in my upcoming character development post! Stay tuned!)
Don't be afraid to let the reader's mind fill in the gaps! It's better to paint a picture in their subconscious rather than just tell them your character has 'raven locks' and 'azure orbs for eyes'.


2.5. Using -ly words
I know, more angsting over description. But this deserved its own point. Observe, if you will. Fuschia returns.

"Chives!" Fuschia said frustratedly, "Do hurry up!"
"Yes, madam," Chives said happily, quickly passing Fuschia her drink. Fuschia sipped it boredly, relaxing on her chair. There really was so little to do, she thought sadly, for a Munchkin Princess who had just valiantly claimed her rightful throne. 

Grating, right? The flow is awful, and it reeks of amateur. The fact is, you don't need -ly words to describe verbs. The verbs describe themselves! Instead of having 'said loudly' you can have 'shouted' 'yelled'. Instead of 'yelled crossly' you can have 'snapped'. These verbs don't need extra, unnecessary description! You can use them occasionally (she said, quite calmly) but do your best to keep them down.

Oh, and for the love of God don't start making up -ly words. If you're using 'boredly' as a description, then there is no hope for you. I have a raging hate-affair with overuse of -ly words, especially those that were pulled out of thin air. The English language is vast and there are so many words to choose from – please don't bastardise it without good reason?


3. 'Favourite' words
I am absolutely guilty of this, I find it all the time when I edit my work! People often do this subconsciously, but it really needs to be corrected.

'Fuschia was so very tired. She'd had a very long day and her tiredness was starting to take its toll. It was very difficult not to drag her feet on the cobblestones as she walked. She had never been so tired before. Munchkin Princesses weren't used to being so very tired'.

Okay, that's an exaggeration, but you get the idea. Here the overused words were 'tired' and 'very', but they can be anything. Beautiful, hell, shadows, night... you just need to get the thesaurus out and swap some of them out for other words! It really affects the flow of the story, which is something I'm big on. The 'flow' of a piece of writing is really important because it can change the whole atmosphere of it – it can be dreamy, bitter, angry, regretful, tired-out. It's like painting colours, with words! It's art. Sometimes a single word can ruin the feeling you're trying to create, so you should choose another that fits.

'Fuschia was completely drained. She'd had such a long day, and her tiredness was starting to take its toll. It was difficult not to drag her feet on the cobblestones as she walked. She had never experienced anything like this before - Munchkin Princesses were hardly used to exhaustion.'

Still about Fuschia, but at least it reads better.


4. Edit, edit, edit!
Once you've done writing something, read it aloud to yourself to get a feel of the flow. You'll be amazed how many sentences don't work, are too long, interrupt the rhythm of the writing. You can leave it for a few days before going back to edit it, so that it's not quite so fresh in your brain and the flaws will be easier to spot.

Oh, and you will be needing to edit it. Nothing you write is finished the first time you write it, and if you think so you are wrong.
Out of interest, pretty much all my stories get at least five rounds of edits over a period of time before I call them done (it's why they take so damn long) and even then I'll keep going back and changing things.
Get other people to read it and edit it for you, too! And get them to be brutally honest. Unless you hear the ugly truth over a beautiful lie, how will you ever improve?


And I think that brings us to the end, for now! I have so many more pet peeves - misuse of commas is a big one, as is inconsistent characterisation, but I'll get to those another day.
I hope this post helped, at least a little! :> It took me quite a while to type up, so it had better. (;

Yeah, so I was just editing We've Lost Our Moral Compass (almost completed the digital edits, have completed the ones on paper) and my computer decided to crash. Unfortunately it crashed right in the middle of me saving my file, so now I have to write all the edits out again.
All of them.
Shriek.
Flail.

It was a dark moment. I shall put off dwelling on it.

Now, as anyone who lives in Britain knows, we've had a stupid amount of snow over the last few days! So, you can all have some snow spam because every idiot with a camera seems to be posting them at the moment, and this idiot doesn't want to miss out.
I tried to make a Dalek snowman, but unfortunately it was an embarrassing failure. No photos. None.

Oh, I did my Chemistry retake and for a final showdown, it went decently. Couldn't do a couple of the questions, but apparently no one was able to do those questions as they weren't actually in the textbook. C'mon, OCR, give me this one! Let me have my dratted A in Chemistry and I'll walk away. 

I also finished reading 'A Clockwork Orange', which is absolutely fabulous and has made it onto my list of all-time favourite books for being deliciously dark and twisted and thought-provoking, and for some incredibly fun messing-around with language.

Okay, so it's two posts today  ♥
My favourite writing buddy has just started a blog! Visit her at Artemistimms  ♥ I asked her ages ago to get one and she finally has and it's all rather exciting!

Reasons you should definitely visit this blog:
1. She is currently working on a novel (and has one finished already! There's something unfair about this!) 
2. She is a liar, I am not a better writer than she is, so you can ignore that part of her introductory post ;> As her occasional-inpromptu-editor, I think it's safe for me to say that she's brilliant.
3. She is  fabulous in pretty much every way? ♥

So this is being written basically to put off my Chemistry revision (exam is in two days. Christ.) and because my friends are being funsponges and ignoring my whinging on the matter on skype. Boo, commoners!
Whinging is pretty pointless if no one gives it attention :( My friends are peasants. I'm not being narcissistic at all here. Gosh.
All you need to know about this one is that my self-esteem is not going to recover after this exam. This is going to be abysmal.

This post does actually have a point, of course - and that is that I'm trying to design my ebook cover! My laptop was broken so I was using my Dad's at this point (I got it back today) and so what I've got so far has been made in GIMP rather than my usual Photoshop. It's not done, my original design idea turned out not looking so great so I had to scrap most of it. But I've sorted the typesetting and the background and so decided I might as well post my progress.
It was born out of a desire to escape Chemistry revision and We've Lost Our Moral Compass, and me stumbling across lousybookcovers.tumblr.com. I can remember thinking, as I scrolled through it – this is not going to be me. I absolutely refuse! So, I decided then and there to make my ebook's cover. For one thing, it was a valid reason to procrastinate. I was going to have to do it sooner or later, and I might as well get it done while I was feeling creative. You can see the first part right at the top! I personally feel it's pretty snazzy so far, especially for someone who isn't so interested in graphic design. I'm not posting the whole thing yet (partially because this is only a start) and though it doesn't look very impressive now I hope it will later!

I had a look at the covers of the books in my room, and tried to figure out which ones worked and which ones didn't. The first thing I looked at was typesetting - most book covers have two different fonts - and I picked Jura and Infinity after a quick google search. I experimented with sizes/combinations on MS Paint (stay classy) before hopping over to GIMP and arranging them.

The background itself, I already knew that I wanted to be navy blue. Not as harsh with white text as black, and it suits the nature of my writing. I added more colours and hues with a low-opacity layer and a fuzzy paintbrush (deep purples and greens) to give depth, and also incorporated a free paper texture from bashcorpo. I noticed in my bookshelf 'market research' that covers looked better with a faint texture to them rather than flat colour, so I turned down the opacity on it, adjusted the colours and erased some distracting darker areas. I quite like how it turned out!

I was drawing the images to use on the cover by hand (I had a little picture for each story drawn out, but it didn't look so great on the mock-up so I'm rethinking the design) and now I'm having a long think before I commit to another. I'll be creating it myself in either Photoshop or Illustrator, but whatever happens I want it too look professional and classy. Think cogs and gears, perhaps a swallow. I'm going to take my time on this one! I'm determined to do it right. I'll post the full cover just as soon as I finish it - and hopefully soon after (drumroll...)
My first three stories will be available to download  for free! (:

LOOK IT'S THE BOTTOM PART OF MY BOOK COVER AND IT HAS MY NAME ON IT
AM I A REAL AUTHOR NOW?

Okay, I really need to do some Chemistry.

This blog isn't dead. :>
I just have had an extremely busy holiday season, and it's only just calming down now! Lots of nice presents, and writing. I finished story number 8 at 00:05am Christmas Day (because I was determined to get it done before I went to sleep on Christmas Eve) and was stupidly proud of myself afterwards. ~

As for where I now am with the stories:
♠Completed: 1,2,3
♠Finished, need edits: 6,8,9
♠Finished, need serious edits: 4
♠Half finished: 10
♠Unwritten: 5, 7

I also completed 'Death of the Hour' and I'm looking to slot it in, though it still needs edits. It's starting to look pretty good now! Also, considering publishing my ebook on amazon very, very shortly - the first one will be free and will contain 1,2 and 3. I'll then release the others as paid, I think - either in batches or as a complete set. Who knows? But it's super exciting!

I had to trudge off to the hospital today, where I spent an hour having an assortment of needles stuck into me and laughing my head off. Apparently this is my basic response to blind terror, because I did exactly the same thing when I went to the dentists' to have two teeth yanked out. I'm really not okay with needles - as in, really not okay. It's not necessarily a phobia (my two happen to be small spaces and burglars) but they really, really freak me out. Pretty sure the nurses thought I was deranged.

So... I guess I'll try and keep posting.

(The picture of the cat is unrelated. I just befriended it this morning and took some photos. It was a pretty awesome cat, to be fair ♥)

But I am having a bit of a problem :<
I really want to include two new short stories into the set - and they should actually be quite short this time - but it's just giving me more work to do. Originally I was going to maybe do a first and second edition of the set and include them in the second but I want them now ugh :< This is so lame. I really like them, too! I plotted them out a while ago and wound up procrastinating on my actual stories by writing some parts, and now they're better than my actual stories and it's just not fair OTL.

The first one is 'Quantum Entanglement' which is a story about a couple of scientists (who just so happen to be the parents of a character in another story) - perhaps my first love story ever, if it can count as that? I really don't do romance, but the plotline follows how they met, became friends etc, wound up having a kid, the works. The guy's a neuroscientist and the girl's an astrophysicist so that's pretty interesting in itself to write, and basically they wind up finding out a whole bunch of the Government's plans and it doesn't end so well for them.
I'm mostly just proud of the name of this one, okay? :<

'Quantum Entanglement occurs when particles interact physically and then become separated'.
You see what I did there? You see?

The second is 'Death of the Hour' which I just thought was a pretty interesting concept. The character it centres around is called Cassandra Trent, and she's from story number 8 'Against the Machine'. She's an ultra-paranoid computer genius with a twitchy demeanour who is obsessed with conspiracy theories. You know, the works - doesn't like to go outside in case the Government take her away to do experiments on her, that sort of thing. Death of the Hour chronologically takes place after Against the Machine (though it appears before ATM as a story in the collection, the timeline of this is a bit wibbly-wobbly and back-to-front, though it's all put in order again in the final story.)
Cassandra is now an even more paranoid computer genius with a even more twitchy demeanour, gone a little bit off the rails during the years she's spent alone. Now her time is spent recording the names of everyone who has died because of the Government's crimes. Every hour, on the hour, she updates the record. It's hidden away online so that they can't find it. She sees this task as 'penance' for her actions in ATM, which I can't mention because it would give away the story. :> Also because no real record of the dead is kept in the city, at least not an honest one - and she feels that someone has to do it. Prior to this in the story all the people who get sent off to labour camps for various sins are referred to as 'forever missing'. As they never come back, they are eventually forgotten. I guess Cas feels that if their names and numbers go on record, if they are remembered, it wasn't for nothing.

'Citizen 2788145AS Alexander Saker deceased, mind-wipe, 13/07/69 21:00
Citizen 291045200LM Leon Malenkov deceased, death by officer, 13/07/69 23:00'

She's sort of vital to the plot as she holds the circles of revolutionaries together online and acts as a go-between, passing information along, but she was never intended to be a major character.
I just thought that the idea of keeping record of the deaths in such a way was pretty interesting. I think it would unhinge most people, after a while.

Interestingly enough, both of these are written as a second-person narrative. I've never really dabbled in second-person much before, but I found it fit these two well!

As to personal shenanigans - I spent last evening with my friends (who are all back from uni, it's brilliant) and we went ice-skating in town. On an open air ice-rink the one night it decided to rain. The ice looked like it had a sea on top of it with all the lights, it was so cool - if just a little bit dangerous. ;> I haven't been for ages, which was unforgivable - but I still managed to do all the turns and spins and crossovers without killing myself.
I actually need to get my own pair of ice skates, the stubby ones without picks that they give you at these places are horrid. The only reason I'm any good at skating is that I spent most of my life from the age of twelve to fifteen down the skate park, so used to be pretty hot on rollerblades. I'm nowhere near as good as I used to be, which is a bother, but I can still look snazzy if I want ;>
Afterwards we all went to the bar, looking like seven drowned rats. Brilliant. ♥

Oh, and my statcounter on here says that I've been visited by several people from America and also people from Germany and Ukraine? If you guys are reading this, hi from the UK ( ´ ▽ ` )ﾉ Nice to meet you!

This was totally written to procrastinate on my story. I'd apologise, but I'm not sorry at all.

Forgot to update this. A lot of stuff has happened, okay? :<

First of all - and quite clearly, most important of all - I'm going to the Houses of Parliament. That's right! I have two days of work experience there this summer, and it's going to be fun! What can I say, other than this is blatantly just the beginning of my rise to power? First the UK, then the world!
I'll actually post about the story behind this work experience at a later date. The politician in me is super excited!

On the other hand, this is my current progress with my short stories (the titles can be found on the current projects pages)

Stories 1, 2, 3, 6 & 9 are completed, and I actually like them. 1, 2 & 3 are in the final stages of editing, 9 is close behind, 6 needs lots.
Story 4 is completed and I absolutely hate it. It took a whole month because I kept blocking on it, and it still sucks.
Story 8 is being worked on right this minute and is half way done!
And story 10 has a bunch of ramblings written for it that I mostly don't like and will change.
7 will be written but will be super long, and I still don't know how the hell I'm going to do story 5.

Over the last few months the overall storyline of the collection has developed a lot! I'm really excited by it now, even though it is super behind schedule.
I also completed NaNoWriMo this year, beating 50,000 words easily! Unfortunately I didn't know you had to submit your work once you finished, so it didn't even go on the damn record. Boo!

I'm super behind schedule with it and won't get the ebook completed in time, but I'm going to do my best to hit my new deadline - Easter. I've got no work until early January but I've also got to revise for my Chemistry retake, which is pretty lame. I'm going to fail it, I already know. I don't just hate Chemistry, I actually despise it. I'd forgotten how much I hated it until I picked up my old notes again.

Everything's going well in general, though this short story collection project is taking far longer than I'd hoped. It may well eat up most of my gap year, but I don't mind so much any more. I really think that the plotline, now completely refined, will be enjoyable for other people to read. At least, I hope so! We'll just see what happens.

I also sent off my UCAS form (just before I got my parliamentary work experience - so I can't put it on there, which sucks) and am nervously awaiting my results! Regrettably Cambridge said they'd take me for English but not Biology (or NatSci as it would be there) so I've had to start gunning for Durham. Please let me in, okay? If I get to the end of my three years and haven't made my fortune as a writer/get sick of science I'll just convert to Law, I suppose.

I'll update this more, I swear :<