Everybody is good at something. Nobody is good at everything.
At least 98% of the writers I know, faced with those two sentences, nod sort of absently at the first one and immediately start working out exactly how the second one applies to them – that is, they immediately start worrying about what they are bad at. Most of the people I know have a pretty good idea what their writing weaknesses are, even if none of us like talking about them much. The odd thing is that we spend so much time trying to find more things we’re bad at, supposedly in order to fix them.
In actuality, what’s most important are your writing strengths, how strong they are, and how well they fit what you are writing. Erasing mistakes and errors makes things less bad; it doesn’t necessarily improve their fundamentals. Getting rid of every single problem in a mediocre book will make it read more smoothly, but it won’t make it a great work of art. A writer who has lots of basic craft problems with plot can, with work, get rid of every last technical difficulty, but if the plot wasn’t interesting to start with, technical changes aren’t going to make it interesting. A writer whose strong point is creating intricate plots but who is weak on characterization will very likely have trouble selling to a genre in which characterization is fundamental (like literary fiction or Romance), but not have a problem selling a thriller.
So how does one identify one’s strengths? Hint: What things do you enjoy writing the most? Very few people enjoy doing something they are bad at. If you adore writing dialog or battle scenes or description, if the fun part is making up random stuff in the first few chapters, if you love seeing your plot come together or your characters unfold – those are probably things you do well.
Note that enjoying writing something doesn’t mean that the writing is fast or easy. Sometimes the stuff I enjoy writing most is labored over. Also note that I’m talking about stuff that you enjoy the writing. Some of the stuff I labor over, I enjoy because writing it is fun; other stuff, I enjoy because it is a challenge. When it is a challenge, it usually means that I am still learning how to be good at it. Of course, most people do not enjoy failing at something, either, so challenging stuff that I’m enjoying is usually stuff that I am “getting right.” (Final note on this: the fact that you are not enjoying something does not mean you are getting it wrong. This isn’t a reciprocal equation.)
Things that come fast and easy are sometimes just inspiration (which is unfortunately no guarantee that the result is any good). If, however, you always find dialog fast and easy to write, or you have to rein in your tendency to write pages of gorgeous description, that’s probably something you do well.
Next, what do you think you are good at? What do you think your writing strengths are? What do your friends and beta readers compliment you on – do they like the banter in general, or is there always a character they fall in love with, or do they say it was exciting and they couldn’t put it down?
Put all of these things together, and you should get an idea of what your writing strengths are. Bear in mind that sometimes, this is a matter of personal taste and preference. There are writers who have won multiple major awards whom I find virtually unreadable – I can get through one of their books, but it is an unpleasant slog. There are writers I admire or love whose work friends of mine bounce off in the same way. I do not believe that this means some of us have “bad taste” in style; I think it means that we have different tastes, full stop. So if you enjoy a particular aspect of writing, like what comes out, and find it easy and think you’re good at it, but you have people telling you that that aspect of your writing doesn’t work…it may be a matter of taste.
None of this is guaranteed to be right. This is not rocket science. Writing is not something that has been mathematically quantified, and an enormous amount of what constitutes “good writing” is a matter of taste, personal preference, and the conventions of particular groups and genres.
And it doesn’t matter whether your list of strengths is complete, or even mostly right, because what you do with your list of strengths is…you work on improving them. The payoff for going from mediocre plotting to pretty good plotting or pretty good characterization to very good characterization is generally a lot bigger than the payoff for going from terrible, horrible plotting (or dialog, or characterization, or whatever) to merely bad whatever-it-is.
How you work on improving involves two very obvious things: reading and writing.
You read stories by writers you think are doing whatever-it-is better than you do it, and observe what they are doing that you aren’t. Then you experiment with adding those things to your writing to see how they work. You also read stories by writers you think do whatever-it-is worse than you do it, and look for a) what you are doing that they aren’t (and decide whether doing more of it would help or be overkill), and b) things they are doing that you are also doing and that you maybe shouldn’t be (often, it is a lot easier to recognize an area that needs improvement if you spot it in somebody else’s work first).
The writing part is practice, practice, practice. I prefer to do my practicing on pay copy, i.e., on stories that I fully intend to sell. Depending on what aspect of writing I’m focusing on, I will sometimes construct a story so that it forces me to do whatever-it-is – five or six of my earliest novels were quite deliberate practice in various types of viewpoint and viewpoint structures. Some writers find that this makes them crazy – they don’t want to risk finding out halfway through a novel that they’ve totally messed up some extra-stretchy thing they’ve been trying, and the novel will have to be completely rewritten. So instead, these folks do exercises and “practice pieces” until they have enough of a comfort level to apply their new, growing skill to potential pay copy. Still others like the formality of a class, if they can find a good one.
When and how you practice is up to you and your process. The only thing that is not optional is, you have to do it. The writing fairy does not come down and leave beautiful new words on your computer without you actually doing anything. You have to write, yourself.
I guess I’m in the 2% because when I read those first two sentences my first thought was, “OK, what am I good at?”
I’d have to say that I’m good at initial set-ups and settings.
It’s the mirror image of my having a horrible hard time spinning out a plot from those initial ideas, and especially working out a satisfying climax and conclusion. My ideas never come with even a skeletal plot attached. On rare occasions they do come with (or I can work out) a climatic scene along with an initial set up, and those I grab and run with. Or trudge forward with, more like.
Writing the story then becomes merely very hard instead of stone-wall impossible. But I still keep running into knots and snags in the plot. Or worse, short-circuits where the plot goes “zapp!” and vanishes in a puff of smoke.
But initial ideas without any plot or ending attached? Easy.
short-circuits where the plot goes “zapp!” and vanishes in a puff of smoke.
I hear you on that one. Oh, I hear you.
I can write individual scenes with snappy or emotive dialogue, good atmosphere, characterization, and pacing. These gems, as I think of them, come fairly easy to me. What I have trouble with is weaving them into a tapestry that isn’t full of unslightly gaps and lumpy parts that just won’t iron flat.
There are dozens of articles and books on how to craft the details I already do well. I have yet to see anything helpful on how to manage the overall big picture.
Try post-it notes. Virtual if you need to – but I find moving physical pieces of paper around far more helpful. You can even color code them to keep track of different elements of the story. Then move them around to smooth out the lumps and cover up the holes.
You can even make post-it note montages to practice spotting the “big picture” in novels by other people. Pick a great example in the genre you are trying to write of course. Hope that helps.
Also, the “post-it note” method works particularity well with the bits and pieces writing you said you were best at. You will end up with left over bits tho. And some of those bits will be really, really good.
I’ve been thinking doing Post-its to find my way between Chapter Seven and Chapter Last would be a good idea … but I haven’t got a flat surface to spread them out on.
I have no idea what I’m good at … except that Pamela Dean Dyer-Bennett once complimented me on having read all the same books she had. I don’t know if that counts.
But I do have Chapter Last, or part of it, and it seems to work, so maybe ….
Nice thing about post-its is that they work on walls as well as tables. (floor works too – but can be awkward if you have bad knees)
One thing I know I’m good at is names and physical descriptions of characters. I tend to see them from the outside first, so that’s what’s easiest to get down on the page. Making sure they have proper depth beyond that is trickier, though, as is constructing a plot that’s more than a character sketch.
Oh goodness. This post hits close to home. I find I’m pretty good at voice and characters, but my plots are somewhat predictable. However, it’s hard to practice coming up with twisty plots when your brain doesn’t tend to think of them in the first place. How am I supposed to think of good plot twists when it’s not like I can practice as easily as I would for say, writing from a different view point? How do you practice the mental part of coming up with different plot points? (This is a genuine question, if you’re ever wanting another blog post idea. I’d really like to know how you “practice” making your stories unpredictable.) I can recognize it in things that I’m reading, but doing it myself is another matter entirely.
If a writer can be identified by the large quantity of writing piling up, then I think I’m an editor. I’m also good at research — finding things that most people can’t. My writing tends to be informative, but not necessarily entertaining. It’s like I can create a stick-figure plot that goes from beginning to end, but I can’t really get any depth to it. I’m quite obstinately persistent, but I don’t get enthusiastic about much of anything, and I think it shows up in my writing. I enjoy reading fantasy but thus far my writing of it hasn’t been very successful.
(And I can do four sentences in a row that go “statement, but…”.)
If you’re having trouble finding a flat surface for post-it notes, have you considered taping them to a handy door? The back of my bedroom door is currently covered in post-it notes. I got the idea from `Save the Cat’. (I think he used a cork board. I didn’t have one, though. I had a door.)
I think what I am good at is suspense. Not action scenes- the bit right before action happens, when everyone is all tense and worried. I love writing those bits so much. I also enjoy dialogue and I’m not bad with humorous viewpoints. What I AM bad at is endings. Mine tend to turn into Victorian Epilogues. Also, I have a hard time with settings and world building. I didn’t even start practicing them until a few years ago when I realized that every single story couldn’t take place in Generic Fantasy Landscape. I’m definitely getting better, but I feel silly for not realizing the importance sooner.
It looks as though there’s a common theme of weak plotting. I certainly know that I could use some guidelines beyond “make your characters want something, put obstacles in their way”. So if you’re looking for another blog post idea….
Hm… for a blog post topic of “focus on your strengths” there is a LOT of comments complaining about what people are bad at! Specifically on how their strengths can’t properly compensate for the weaknesses. Part 2 blog topic maybe?
I watch YouTube channels a lot – and one LetsPlayer I sub once said that “I know my videos are not entertaining but… that’s ok! I only have to be INTERESTING – not funny.” And considering the guy has over a million subs he is probably right. That advice works for writing. You don’t have to be funny, or have thrilling plot, or complex mysteries…. you simply have to write something that is “interesting”.
Non-fiction is interesting. Slice-of-Life is interesting. Cookbooks are interesting. Even grammar books can be interesting!
I keep getting complimented on my sense of place, so evidently that’s one thing I do well. And I thoroughly enjoy fleshing out my characters.
But plots hate me. Pure and simple. And the feeling is mutual most of the time.
I can do characters and setting, including names for both (I write fantasy) … and I really love the denouement of a story. I usually know the beginning and the very very end, and get hung up over the climax! But I love that final couple of paragraphs when everything just comes perfectly together.