Cutting more words and making more decisions. Mostly I'm concentrating on cutting right now, but there are plenty of other things to improve as well. One of them is the description of settings. I want to invoke a sense of place without laundry listing details, just enough to give the reader a catalyst to imagine the setting.
Description of setting is probably where I get the biggest contrast from beta readers. Some want much more detail to be able to build a picture in their minds, some don't want lots of detail slowing down the story or interfering with their own imaginings of the setting. A similar thing with characters descriptions too. I don't think there is a right or wrong approach if you do it well, people like different things. I don't intend to do lots of detail, but I still have a plenty to improve on so what's there is effective.
Instead of reporting, I'm reviewing yet another disability memoir. Sigh. This one has a twist, though. This guy became some kind of Navy commander by denying his mild CP and passing for AB.
Which I find kind of admirable and fucked-up at the same time. And it's not something he ought to be encouragimg in The Youth, imo.(Special Comment Voice) Have you no responsibility, Commander?(/Special Comment voice) Because let's say that two out of 10,000 can white-knuckle it through like that, without succumbing, even briefly, to what Frank McCourt called the "Irish weakness" like this guy Quinn...what about the rest of us? My inability to pass is not a failure of heart. If it is a failure, it's a failure of wiring. I'd match my heart against most people's, actually. Seska, if you weren't so far away, I'd send you this and watch your head explode over it.
Also, I'm disappointed...there are no dirty bits. If I write a memoir, one way or another, I'll put something smutty in it.
AB= Able-bodied. Some people say "walkies" but that takes me to a Barbara Woodhouse place and there's a tiny percentage of people I really want on a leash.
Also sometimes Amber Benson and Andre Braugher, but not right now.
If they ever worked together on a disability movie, we'd have to invent a different system.
I've heard it referred to as temporarily abled.
sigh ... I'm trying to write an article about something I have no interest in. 1,200 words on a college baseball stadium. (sorry baseball fans)
me too...it's a bit morbid, but I get it.
Good luck Toddson.
I didn't have much time last night but I cut yet more words. I've decided to simplify one of the planned changes. It could have turned into a whole new subplot and I'm definitely not looking to add more.
I'm finding it remarkable how excessively wordy I am. In the first three chapters I've probably taken out about 1,000 words without changing much of anything, only smoothing out the prose.
I've gotten a bit more feedback from an old high school friend of mine who is a voracious reader of fantasy. Some useful stuff, and he's almost into the 20s and 30s chapter-wise which I think are an interesting part of the story.
My beta feedback for everything up to the mid-thirties has been very encouraging. Past that is uncharted territory and I'm a bit more dubious about some of those chapters.
I like the phrase 'non-disabled'. I was able-bodied for years, but I've never been non-disabled. :)
Seska, if you weren't so far away, I'd send you this and watch your head explode over it.
Got access to a scanner?
Also, I'm disappointed...there are no dirty bits. If I write a memoir, one way or another, I'll put something smutty in it.
Absolutely. Apart from this being important in a campaigning sense (why yes, disabled people do have sex lives, thank you for asking), memoirs should have smut. Without it they are dull.
